Over the last decade, Role Playing Games and Mobile Online Battle Arenas have been a dominating force in the video gaming industry, millions of people playing sometimes every day and often being quite passionate about their favorite game.
The thing that strikes me when looking at the most successful of those games (not sure I'm allowed to say any names) is the recurring presence of "class systems", ways to label characters and players with a specific set of abilities and roles.
Examples of this are the classic "warrior, mage, hunter, assassin..." classes attributed to RPG characters or the the "tank, support, damage dealer..." roles that players in MOBAS take on in a team.
What I find interesting is that players seem to like having a more or less defined role, class or play style in these systems. One such example of this phenomena is the use of the pronoun "a" to refer to someone or oneself:
"I am a mage player"
"He is a [insert MOBA character name] main" (main here means most played character)
"Where the heck is our support?" (referring to the player playing in the support role)
"She is the best [insert MOBA character name] on the EU server"
Is there a psychological explanation to why people seem particularly attracted to these systems that "label them" in a way?
My hypotheses:
- The discomfort of not fully knowing one's personnality and capabilities drive people to "symplify their personnalities" by endorsing specific roles in these games.
- Players "specialize " themselves as a way to get singled out and feel special.
Please tell me if there is something I can do to make the question better, this is my first time asking on this site.