UCLA

This paper examines Chinese online game fiction (wangyouxiaoshuo), with a particular focus on esports danmei fiction as a subgenre, exploring how it constructs narrative pleasure, seeks creative space within the constraints of government censorship, and engages deeply with the cultural ecosystem of online gaming and fandom in mainland China. Drawing on Marie-Laure Ryan's theories of ludic immersion and mimetic immersion, as well as Michel Foucault's concept of heterotopia, the thesis argues that esports danmei fiction generates three layers of pleasure for its readers: the pleasure of playing the game, the pleasure of triumph in professional esports competition, and the emotional satisfaction derived from the romantic narrative between protagonists.The paper begins by tracing the development of video games and online literature in China, before offering a systematic overview of online game fiction genres, distinguishing between keyboard-based online game fiction, full-dive virtual reality fiction, esports fiction, and "Fourth Calamity" fiction. The second chapter takes The King's Avatar and I Can Do It as its primary examples, analyzing how esports danmei fiction reconstructs the immersive experience of gaming at the textual level by simulating game interfaces, reproducing in-game social interactions, and recreating the atmosphere of live streaming and professional competition. The third chapter focuses on the controversy surrounding the esports danmei fiction writer Jiang Zi Bei, examining the accusations of rong geng (creative appropriation) levelled against her work by Chinese gaming and esports fan communities. The thesis argues that when the “heterotopia” constructed by esports danmei fiction overlaps too closely with real individuals and events, the heterotopic distance that such fiction typically relies upon begins to collapse, and the narrative is pulled back into real-world cultural disputes and conflicts within fandom.