A Realm of Mere Representation? “Live” E-Sports Spectacles and the Crafting of China’s Digital Gaming Image

Abstract

This article addresses the proliferation of images and appearances in the realm of e-sports culture in urban China. The author's findings are based upon ethnographic research and participant observation of e-sports audience members, teams, and tournaments, including the 2010 E-sports Champion League tournament in Beijing, the 2012 and 2013 World Cyber Games Festivals in Kunshan, and a 2014 Starcraft II tournament in Shanghai. A comparison of these events leads the author to argue that live e-sports events in China are less about spectatorship than they are about creating a spectacle that presents a carefully crafted vision of Chinese politics, nationalism, and capitalist consumer culture. In these cases, the participants and audience members are not only commodities to be sold but also a means of masking contradictory and highly ambivalent discourses about China's role in technological production, digital game culture, and the promotion of the discourse of Internet addiction.

Shifting the Focus to East and Southeast Asia: A Critical Review of Regional Game Research

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