Global Media and China

The prosperity of China’s digital gaming ecosystem would be impossible without the contributions of large numbers of informal gamer-workers through their play-to-earn labor practices. We define gamer-workers as individuals who occupy a vast gray area between casual play and formal employment. Though they come from diverse social backgrounds and are driven by varying motivations, gamer-workers closely tie their gaming practices to the pursuit of a livelihood, with socioeconomically disadvantaged groups forming a significant but not exclusive part of this workforce. Drawing on qualitative data from participant observation in game communities, interviews with frontline practitioners, and media narratives from multiple sources, we present a systematic overview of this overlooked—and at times misrepresented—labor landscape. Specifically, we develop a five-part typology that situates informal gamer-workers across the full cycle of game development, circulation, consumption, and iterative optimization. The typology highlights how game-related platforms and companies extract value from five key roles: (1) outsourced and freelance labor in game production, (2) user-end service workers who manually enhance gameplay experiences, (3) streamers who play a central role in game entertainment, (4) coordinators who bridge gaps left by platform infrastructures, and (5) various forms of profiteering—including but not limited to gold farming—that fuel the expansion of in-game economies. Our analysis also examines the intrinsic connections across these labor roles and the structural conditions of devaluation and precarity in which informal play-to-earn practices help proliferate China’s digital gaming ecosystem. The experiences of gamer-workers thus shed light on how digital labor is—and will continue to be—reshaped in a future where the boundaries between work and play are increasingly blurred.

This article explores how Girl Top/Boy Bottom (GB) genre in hetero-romance games creates critical spaces where fans actively engage in counter-heteronormative gender and sexuality politics. Using the concept of “constructive fantasy,” this paper examines how women fans negotiate and experiment with gender roles and sexuality in hetero-romance and how their efforts breach the boundary between fantasy and reality. We identify three ways in which constructive fantasy is manifested: (1) fans’ interpretative canonization of the fandom, (2) internal and external “border wars” that define and police fandom boundaries, and (3) the extension of fandom ideals, values, and preferences into other realms of social life. In this way, fantasies motivate individuals and communities to engage in various forms of constructive fan practices at different sociocultural levels. We argue that, by exercising constructive fantasy, GB fans generate new gender and sexuality politics through “female gaze,” challenge dominant beliefs about male effeminacy and amatonormative female representations, and articulate feminist sensibilities within and beyond fandom publics.

The rebuilding of ludic practices is evident with the rise of virtual worlds. “VTubers,” (virtual YouTubers) use virtual reality (VR) hardware and software to create 2D or 3D anime-like avatars for live-streaming. By moving the focus from real-person live streamers to virtual live streamers, the case of VTubers adds a new aspect to understanding “authenticity” in virtual intimacy. Through ethnographic methods, this study examines how VR technologies shape VTubers’ authenticity construction practices, a process that actively shapes their subjectivities. Performing as virtual characters requires VTubers to continuously design gestures, tones, and body movements that align with their avatars’ personas while mastering the use of specialized VR hardware and software. The findings reveal the extensive subjective engagement involved in VR-based play, as VTubers draw upon their emotional attachment to anime culture as well as their intellectual pursuit of cutting-edge VR technologies to perform the “authentic” fictional characters. The shift from physical selves to virtual avatars as objects of desire suggests that VR equipment functions not merely as a tool for gameplay but as an active mediator of users’ expression of their idealized selves in the virtual world. This perspective contributes to a broader understanding of the role that hardware equipment plays in shaping player practices and virtual intimacy.