Language in solo gaming

Video games present a multimodal textual ecology so varied that there is not one language of video games but many (Ensslin 2012: 47-52). Game language thus cannot

be easily generalised and described simply, but game studies with a linguistic focus try to closer describe variety, complexity and specific features of language in and around games. In this section, game language is described more generally, and different types and examples of game texts are described in the next section.

Games provide language learning contexts with exposure to diverse language and opportunities for meaningful language use (Bytheway 2015: 510-511). Made by and often also aimed for native-level language users, games for entertainment provide an authentic language learning environment, that is not modified for pedagogical purposes and that players find meaningful. Players can see games as a genuine activity of native speakers, and games are genuine cultural products with cultural discourses that can help language learners develop their critical cultural awareness (Reinhardt and Sykes 2012:

35). Online multiplayer games in particular provide a population of native or expert speakers that interact with the learner for the purpose of playing (Reinhardt and Sykes 2012: 35), which also applies to player communities formed around other than multiplayer games as well.

Gee (2008: 36) argues that games are good at providing situated meanings for words, introducing new vocabulary together with their context and possibilities for action such as problem solving. Furthermore, situatedness in games is also realised through the actions of the player being the actions of the game character, in the game world's context (Whitton 2014: 45), which creates opportunities for deep learning through action, not only abstract studying. Game language also presents different forms of language variation, including accents, registers and domains, for example in dialogue between characters of different backgrounds and vocations. On the other hand, some commonly discussed problems with the language of games include the appropriateness of either the content of the game, or the linguistic complexity and the vernacular nature of the language, which along with the uncontrolled structure of gameplay make particularly the use of games in educational contexts more challenging (Reinhardt and Sykes 2012: 35).

Although the social language use in multiplayer games has been studied extensively (e.g. Rama, Black, Van Es and Warschauer 2012), fewer studies have focused on the

language of game texts themselves. Thorne, Fischer and Lu (2012) examined the linguistic complexity of quest texts in the MMO World of Warcraft (WoW) and texts on three popular WoW-related websites that players use actively while playing. They found that the quest texts and texts on some of the websites were polarized, with the most simple and the most complex phrases of the readability scale being the most frequent.

For example, both short sentences like "Hurry!" and complex structures with sophisticated vocabulary like "My hatred for the elves burns, but I do not wish ill upon their children, so we must police our own" were most frequent in quest texts (Thorne, Fischer and Lu 2012: 290-292). Also Bytheway (2015: 510) described that WoW texts

"include both every-day high-frequency language (e.g. instead) and more formal language (e.g. afflicting)". As a player, this phenomenon can be seen in other games than WoW as well, although WoW is an example that has been studied most.

Also in studies on language learning, WoW has been well represented. For example Sundqvist and Sylvén (2012) found that playing WoW was related to learning vocabulary, whereas single-player games was seen to have a smaller effect. However, the game which presented single-player games was The Sims, which Sundqvist and Sylvén (2012: 191) admitted has less demanding types and amounts of language compared to WoW, and translations for The Sims are more often available, so the learning result cannot be generalised to many other single-player games as a comparison to multiplayer games.

Ensslin (2012: 89-96) has made an attempt to describe game language more in general, also focusing on structures. Different pragmatic speech acts, meaning linguistic structures with specific functions, are presented in game texts with different frequencies: directives (e.g. commands, requests, suggestions) and representatives (e.g.

statements, descriptions, conclusions) are much more common than commissives (e.g.

promises, threats), expressives (e.g. expressions of feelings, 'oh dear!') and declarations (an utterance that is an action in itself, e.g. 'I declare a war'). They manifest as different grammatical structures in game texts, such as imperative forms ('keep on going'), modal and auxiliary verb constructions ('you must follow the trail') and interrogatives ('why not try that next') for directives, and will + verb ('when the line is full, the blocks will

disappear') for representatives. These two speech acts are more common in games as they are needed to "communicate rules, enable gameplay and construct gameworlds".

The language used by gamers is its own jargon or slang, which varies between expert jargon and more general language. Ensslin (2012: 66-71) describes that this 'ludolect' features several characteristics, most saliently the specialist vocabulary both in games in general as well as in individual games and genres (e.g. avatar, level-up, boss, party, mage, goblin). In addition, gamer language in communication includes more hyperbolic and emotional forms ('best game ever!'), abbreviations and emoticons than general language use. These are very significant in multiplayer games and in player-to-player communication, but very familiar to and used by solo players as well. Finally, some word formation processes are more common in gaming language, such as acronyms (e.g. FPS, NPC) and affixation (usually changing the word class, e.g. 'spoil' + 'er').

In addition, when engaged in gameplay, players often utter expressives as 'response cries', such as laughter or expressions of surprise or disgust (Ensslin 2012: 89-96). More importantly, in a multilingual gaming context, players use different languages side-by-side while participating in playing as players or as observers. This code-switching between languages is used to express various choices and interpretations of gameplay and to move between the real and the game world (Piirainen-Marsh 2008: 138), for example when commenting the game characters' speech and actions through imitating their expressions. Many Finnish gamers are accustomed to mixing English in their speech about games, whether they play multiplayer or single-player games.