Paper short abstract:

I present an ethnography of MiHoYo’s Genshin Impact and the associated 'HoYoVerse' project. I draw upon cybernetics and psychological anthropology in my explanation of how the experience of living in the fictional world of 'Teyvat' shapes identity.

Paper long abstract:

Drawing upon eighteen months of fieldwork with players of Genshin Impact in the US, UK, and China, and contiguous communities on social media, I present an ethnography of MiHoYo’s corner of the metaverse. I tackle the methodological concerns for ethnographers venturing into such novel cyber spaces, for instance the gameworld itself, but also the contiguous community spaces that include Genshin VRChat servers, Twitch channels, and cosplayer niches on TikTok, as well as the associated desktop and streaming 'V-tubers', such as MiHoYo's own 'Lumi', the sister-gameworld of Honkai Impact 3rd, and MiHoYo's other virtual spaces, including Tears of Themis and the HoYoLab social network.

My focus, however, is the gameworld of Genshin Impact itself: 'Teyvat'. Herein, I develop my conception of 'cybernesis' so to explain how identities are shaped within and across these spaces, and situate these within what I see as the great continuity, virtual-to-corporeal, within Chinese-coded metaverse.

I communicate the special affordances of the metaverse in terms of the novel identities, even wholly new forms of personhood, such as digital 'ghosts' and human-AI composites, which in turn mean wholly new forms of researcher formed through the conducting of research within such space, our fusion with AR and VR technologies, the assistance of AI and otherwise algorithmic research assistants, and other recent developments in HCI. Lastly, I frame my ethnography within the context of major recent developments in the scale and ambition of 'HoYoVerse' and their juxtaposition against contemporary discourse on metaverse and digital subjectivities in China and beyond.