When you play a game, who are you?

[Obscure]

When you play a game like Good Girl Gone Bad, are you playing as Ashley, or are you playing as an outsider who controls her choices?
Are you sucking the dick as Ashley or are you making Ashley suck the dick?

When you play a game like Big Brother, are you playing as Max, or are you playing as an outsider who controls his choices?
Are you getting cucked as Max or are you watching Max get cucked?

How emotionally connected to the game are you?

 

[Staimh]

Treat all games like puzzles (which I think puts me in a minority - your poll will tell)
With porn games am sometimes distracted and have to take remedial action

 

[Jonathan Y]

Fantastic question.
I personally more often than not prefer to get immersed as the mc, I like to do this with both male and female characters, submissive or dominating etc. I suppose I'd start the game with a mostly third person view of things until I manage to immerse myself in the narrative and in the shoes of the main character.
As for Ntr games, I personally don't find getting cucked stimulating ( yet ), so I like to see it from either the one doing the cucking ( that how you say it ? ), or from the female's viewpoint.

 

[Avaron1974]

When I play female MC games I am the MC. I try to make choices I would make which means my Ash in GGGB was a lesbo too.

When I play male MC games i'm just directing traffic.

 

[Obscure]

Personally, I am always roleplaying as the MC.

That is why I hate kinetic novels, find sissification squiggy and NTR heart wrenching. Why it is exciting to break through resistance and transform that girl into a slut.

I just think you're skipping the experience otherwise.

 

[H3X4G3N]

Depends, never keep a Lady waiting..

For me i`m like a never ending story (if im drunk i think i`m 10.000 fist`s better then the rest^^)

 

[Deleted member 2128394]

Great question, and a kind of a difficult one, especially since you mentioned GGGB specifically.

When it comes to Good Girl Gone Bad or Our Red String, I played them as someone who controls Ashley and Lena and played them as full on straightforward romance VNs, because an irl ex I'm still not nearly over was a camgirl, and I just went full wholesome with their relationships while developing their onlyfans/camming sideline. Especially in ORS, because the entire story I know it's unhealthy, but it's better than looking her cam up again lol.

When it comes to games with male protagonists (honestly haven't played a lot of games in general), I roleplay because it's fun that way. Except in stuff like Broken Dreamers where the game is so scifi that I can't identify with anyone, so I just go with "what a badass ghost buy would do".

 

[GingerSweetGirl]

For porn games I don't role play. I always start off trying to, but that fails pretty quickly when the meat of the game comes into focus. I tell myself "Ok Ginger, let's make decisions that seem in-line with the character." That usually lasts until the first time I have to pick between a "good" or "filthy" option, and then I breakdown and chose the "filthy" option 9 times out of 10. When I play a game like A Wife and Mother, I want to play the good wife route, but inevitably I end up choosing the filthy routes. One of the few exceptions to this was in Good Girl Gone Bad when I didn't take Ashley all the way down some dark roads.

 

[H3X4G3N]

(Great thiings happen to....)

 

[jamdan]

I used to immerse as MC, then a certain housefire made me quit doing that.

Now I view myself as a non-entity in the game itself. I'm just directing the characters. For both male and female MC's.

I'd say my gaming experience is a lot better now. I can play games (and routes) that I used to avoid, some of them turned out good and some of them terrible. Just like when I immersed, but now it's not a personal or upsetting thing.

I also realized " How did I ever immerse as this MC?! " Most MC's are pretty terrible in general. I'd probably hate them all IRL and here I was pretending I was them.

Now, just because I do not immerse doesn't mean I don't care about what happens to the characters. It's like a movie or a book, you still root for the characters but aren't pretending that you're Harry Potter or whoever it is.

 

[bobdickgus]

I always play as MC and that is why I don't play female protag or NTR/rape games.

 

[GingerSweetGirl]

I will say that I was able to immerse into BADIK. While I'm not the same gender as the MC, I felt like I could guide him better by being realistic. So really I'm playing him as a generally good person who gets good grades, helps out his friends, and keeps his relationships simple and healthy. That means not pursuing many of the game's main love interests, but I think it has created a version of the MC that I could see actually existing.

 

[apatheticcreative]

I'm a role player. I like to put myself into the shoes of the playable character and immerse myself in the world and story. If the main character is too unrelatable and forces me to do things I can't imagine that character doing within the confines of the role I'm playing, it takes me right the fuck out of the game and I probably won't continue playing.

That's not to say the main character has to be like me in order to be relatable, as long as I know what kind of person the MC is going into it so I can get myself into an appropriate RP mindset.

 

[desmosome]

I'm a role player. I like to put myself into the shoes of the playable character and immerse myself in the world and story. If the main character is too unrelatable and forces me to do things I can't imagine that character doing within the confines of the role I'm playing, it takes me right the fuck out of the game and I probably won't continue playing.

That's not to say the main character has to be like me in order to be relatable, as long as I know what kind of person the MC is going into it so I can get myself into an appropriate RP mindset.

Damn straight. Most people don't understand the difference between roleplaying a char and self inserting. If you roleplay you can get immersed in any role.

Role playing originates from table top games. People assumed the role of any character of any race and alignment.

Roleplaying is healthy. Self inserting is not.

 

[desmosome]

For porn games I don't role play. I always start off trying to, but that fails pretty quickly when the meat of the game comes into focus. I tell myself "Ok Ginger, let's make decisions that seem in-line with the character." That usually lasts until the first time I have to pick between a "good" or "filthy" option, and then I breakdown and chose the "filthy" option 9 times out of 10. When I play a game like A Wife and Mother, I want to play the good wife route, but inevitably I end up choosing the filthy routes. One of the few exceptions to this was in Good Girl Gone Bad when I didn't take Ashley all the way down some dark roads.

Yea, in addition to self inserting vs roleplaying, there is also the dilemma of role playing vs porn gaming lol. Only the rarest and most well written games manage to let you role play reasonably (all choices making sense for the character at that stage of the game) while doing the "man whore/slut" route.

 

[Captain Kitty]

A Horny Fapper.

 

[Deleted member 3428201]

A Horny Fapper.

This.

Rare is the game where I project onto the characters. Most of the time I came to spank the monkey and chew bubblegum. And I'm all out of gum.

 

[Cryswar]

Depends on the game I guess. If the MC has a strongly defined personality/name/goals etc, I just want to see them get a happy ending. If there's enough room for me to direct the character meaningfully, I will happily roleplay as them and try to act as they would, generally with the same goals.

I used to do a lot of roleplaying/storytelling, so it's pretty easy for me to think as most decent-ish MCs of either gender, I don't play games with major assholes, NTR, etc. since they tend to make me uncomfortable to be a part of.

 

[Catapo]

Imagine a child playing with their toys.
I don't see myself as any character but I am emotionally invested in the story and events I put them through for my own desires. I want good things for some and bad things for others.

This way I can enjoy any genre: female / male protag, harem, incest, NTR, etc. They're just different methods to play with the "toys" I have.

 

[MrFriendly]

Depends on the game... I try to be immersed in the story but obviously there's only so far I can go with that.

When playing a protagonist of a different gender or orientation I play as someone who controls the character but isn't the character. Regardless of whether I can rename them.

When playing someone of the same gender and orientation who I can rename I usually play as if it is an alternate world version of me or a variation of me. I use names that I gave roleplaying characters from my old tabletop days depending on what the setting is for the game. I don't use my real name very often as it is boringly common and inevitably there are NPC's with my name.