Date: 10/26/2022
Games are with spectators present in many scenarios, such as sports games and game streaming. Although these spectators cannot directly interact with the game itself, they may affect the game and receive feedback through other ways. Suppose you once got a chance to watch game streaming. In that case, you might find an interesting phenomenon: most of the time, streamers do not take actions purely independently—they take the audience's suggestions into consideration. For instance, a League of Legends streamer may listen to the audience's suggestions about using which Legend, carrying which special ability, and so on. In more extreme cases, some streamers are required to listen to the audience's request (or command) if the latter tips the streamer. This does not only happen in game streaming. If the streamer is live-streaming singing, the audience may be able to order a song by tipping the streamer, and the same applies in other cases. In this way, the audience becomes more engaged in the streaming activity itself compared with those who only spectate and appreciate the content. So, if spectators interact with play activities this way, is it correct to venture they are also players? If so, what are they playing? The answer is they are players, too, but not playing the same game that they are spectating.
When Do Spectators Become Players?
Purely watching live streaming and films or videos are the same. You might say, it's live, so accidents exist, whereas films and videos are pre-recorded with fixed content. Well, they are essentially the same thing, for the audience is always the content receiver, no matter what happens in live streaming. The nature of the activity completely changes when the audience is bestowed with the power to affect what will happen next in the content. The audience is able to take action, and feedback corresponding to the action emerges. Then this is a form of play. Play must include participation, interactions, and the bestowed power to act. Play is the combination of subjectivity and feedback. Players can act freely within the Magic Circle—a magic capacity, conceptual area of play in which Johan Huizinga put forward that all activities of play occur. By saying 'act freely' I do not mean that players have the absolute freedom to do anything; what I mean is that players must have the autonomy to make decisions over the limited options provided. The proper example here is when a singer-streamer allows the audience to order only one song called Never Gonna Give U Up, the audience still preserves the freedom of choice between ordering or not. Based on this definition, it is easy to conclude that watching films is not a form of play, whereas an activity that allows the audience to pay for changing the film's ending is.
Purely watching live streaming and films or videos are the same. You might say, it's live, so accidents exist, whereas films and videos are pre-recorded with fixed content. Well, they are essentially the same thing, for the audience is always the content receiver, no matter what happens in live streaming. The nature of the activity completely changes when the audience is bestowed with the power to affect what will happen next in the content. The audience is able to take action, and feedback corresponding to the action emerges. Then this is a form of play. Play must include participation, interactions, and the bestowed power to act. Play is the combination of subjectivity and feedback. Players can act freely within the Magic Circle—a magic capacity, conceptual area of play in which Johan Huizinga put forward that all activities of play occur. By saying 'act freely' I do not mean that players have the absolute freedom to do anything; what I mean is that players must have the autonomy to make decisions over the limited options provided. The proper example here is when a singer-streamer allows the audience to order only one song called Never Gonna Give U Up, the audience still preserves the freedom of choice between ordering or not. Based on this definition, it is easy to conclude that watching films is not a form of play, whereas an activity that allows the audience to pay for changing the film's ending is.
Two Cases in which Spectators Are also Players
It is not difficult to find a precedent of this form of play I am defining. In ancient Rome, a form of amusement for freemen was watching gladiatorial or wrestling in the arena(Colosseum). Those fighting each other in the arena were often slaves, while slave owners were greatly amused. For most freemen, purely watching slaves wrestling is not a form of play; yet for those slave owners, they might have the power or be able to pay for the power to set some 'personalized settings'—select the best slave based on their favor, set special rules of the fight, and so on. By doing so, those slave owners also became players in this activity while watching the game.
It is not difficult to find a precedent of this form of play I am defining. In ancient Rome, a form of amusement for freemen was watching gladiatorial or wrestling in the arena(Colosseum). Those fighting each other in the arena were often slaves, while slave owners were greatly amused. For most freemen, purely watching slaves wrestling is not a form of play; yet for those slave owners, they might have the power or be able to pay for the power to set some 'personalized settings'—select the best slave based on their favor, set special rules of the fight, and so on. By doing so, those slave owners also became players in this activity while watching the game.
A similar (but far less inhumane) example resides in the contemporary era: the coach. Coaches never play on the court or ground but are players, too. They are spectators of the game because they do not directly and instantly affect the game by taking actions, but they participate in, interact with, and receive feedback on their actions from the game. Even though this may be an extremely inappropriate comparison, what coaches do in the game resembles the previous example of slave owners very well: they select the best players, set tactics, and make regulations (rules) for these players. Their natures share common features.
We can look at some instance games like Totally Accurate Battle Simulator, Ultimate Epic Battle Simulator, Football Manager series, and so on. These games simulate exactly the activities I discussed above—select players, set rules, and, just watch(receiving feedback). The former two share the same gameplay, during which players select the soldiers for the battle and then witness it from a spectator's view. In the latter game, the Football Manager series, players manage the team lineup, select players who will play, and lay out the tactics before the game, and then they watch the game going also from a spectator's view.
Proxy Play
So, let's go back to the question: what are those spectators playing? As I said, they are not playing the same game the direct players are playing: slave owners are not playing the fighting games, coaches are not playing the same basketball game as players on the court, and the streaming audience is not playing the game the streamer is playing. The form of play they participate in is the Play of Proxy, or Proxy Play. Proxy Play is an activity where players interact with another play activity. A play activity consists of a form of play and at least one player interacting with it(by saying interacting with it, I mean the player must get feedback from actions subjectively taken in that form of play). According to Huizinga, a form of play must be an activity. However, it cannot be called a play activity if no one interacts with it. We can say it has the tendency or potential to be interactive, but it is not interactive if no interaction is taking place. A play activity must contain subjective actions and feedback. League of Legends is a form of play, and when a streamer is playing it, this activity itself becomes a play activity; now, if a spectator tips the streamer and gives orders to him, this spectator is interacting with this play activity, which forms a new play activity. This kind of new play activity is one instance of Proxy Play.
So, let's go back to the question: what are those spectators playing? As I said, they are not playing the same game the direct players are playing: slave owners are not playing the fighting games, coaches are not playing the same basketball game as players on the court, and the streaming audience is not playing the game the streamer is playing. The form of play they participate in is the Play of Proxy, or Proxy Play. Proxy Play is an activity where players interact with another play activity. A play activity consists of a form of play and at least one player interacting with it(by saying interacting with it, I mean the player must get feedback from actions subjectively taken in that form of play). According to Huizinga, a form of play must be an activity. However, it cannot be called a play activity if no one interacts with it. We can say it has the tendency or potential to be interactive, but it is not interactive if no interaction is taking place. A play activity must contain subjective actions and feedback. League of Legends is a form of play, and when a streamer is playing it, this activity itself becomes a play activity; now, if a spectator tips the streamer and gives orders to him, this spectator is interacting with this play activity, which forms a new play activity. This kind of new play activity is one instance of Proxy Play.
Proxy Play reveals a nature of play: all play activities are fundamentally built on spectating. We say play consists of subjectivity and feedback, and the process of receiving feedback is essentially the spectating action. During the process of play, we take action and then become spectators of the reaction from the play activity to our action; after that, we take another action and then spectate the following feedback on our action... Players keep switching states from the player to the spectator and then to the player again. In other words, players must also be a spectator of play, but there are conditions for spectators to be a player. For Proxy Play, it exaggerates such nature of play through amplifying the spectator-ness of the player.
Proxy Play: a Solution to Future HCI and HHI
Proxy Play is far from rare as we may expect, and it has an auspicious future. The other day I had a late dinner with the director of Bilibili Live(a Chinese live-streaming platform) and a friend of mine who was working on a metaverse game project, and we had a conversation over the future of live streaming. We both agreed that it is very likely to be the form with the function of the "interactive bullet comment". It is a technology based on the idea of Proxy Play, which realizes the function of allowing the audience to interact directly with the content of streaming, other than leaving a comment to streamers asking them what to do. Imagine that you watch someone streaming LoL—with the technology of "interactive bullet comment", you are able to tip gifts to the streamer and directly select a legend for him without his permission(provided he has this feature turned on). For other types of streaming, despite that this interactive bullet comment feature might not be effective when applied to real-person streamers, it can perfectly fit in Vtuber streaming, for lots of linkage between the virtual images as well as scenes and the interactive bullet comment technology has the potential to be developed. You may send an interactive comment to change the Vtuber's outfits and background settings or even create your own Virtual image and add it to the live streaming. Tremendous possibilities await exploration, and more games adapted to this technology will be born and form a tidal trend.
Proxy Play is far from rare as we may expect, and it has an auspicious future. The other day I had a late dinner with the director of Bilibili Live(a Chinese live-streaming platform) and a friend of mine who was working on a metaverse game project, and we had a conversation over the future of live streaming. We both agreed that it is very likely to be the form with the function of the "interactive bullet comment". It is a technology based on the idea of Proxy Play, which realizes the function of allowing the audience to interact directly with the content of streaming, other than leaving a comment to streamers asking them what to do. Imagine that you watch someone streaming LoL—with the technology of "interactive bullet comment", you are able to tip gifts to the streamer and directly select a legend for him without his permission(provided he has this feature turned on). For other types of streaming, despite that this interactive bullet comment feature might not be effective when applied to real-person streamers, it can perfectly fit in Vtuber streaming, for lots of linkage between the virtual images as well as scenes and the interactive bullet comment technology has the potential to be developed. You may send an interactive comment to change the Vtuber's outfits and background settings or even create your own Virtual image and add it to the live streaming. Tremendous possibilities await exploration, and more games adapted to this technology will be born and form a tidal trend.
Through the example of the "interactive bullet comment" technology, we can see that Proxy Play redefines the application of HCI(human-computer interaction) and illuminates a way of possible integration of HCI and HHI(human-human interaction). Live streaming is just the tip of the iceberg in the future of this untapped field. The idea of Proxy Play, as well as its potential technical implementations, is and will be penetrating people's lives and getting all the users involved instead of purely creating content and making everyone an audience.
Work Cited
Huizinga 50. Johan Huizinga. Homo ludens: a study of the play element in culture. Beacon Press, 1950. ISBN 0-8070-4681-7.
Huizinga 50. Johan Huizinga. Homo ludens: a study of the play element in culture. Beacon Press, 1950. ISBN 0-8070-4681-7.