The Empowering Playground: The Rise of Feminist Ideology in Female-Leading Indie Game Community

This paper examines how feminist ideology and female-oriented values are expressed in contemporary Chinese indie games produced within Chengguang Games, a female-led visual novel community and distribution platform often described as the world's largest indie game community by title count. Its central argument is that the community has become an "empowering playground" for female players and creators, shaped by evolving narrative autonomy and feminist consciousness. The study takes a paratextual approach, analyzing creators' own statements and commentaries on their work, rather than focusing primarily on business models or individual titles as much prior research on the platform has done.

The analysis draws on 37 titles from the 2022 Hall of Fame Works, a list of the year's most popular and officially recommended games, with plans to extend the examination to works from 2015 through 2023. Four findings are reported. First, the community provides a safe space for female prosumers to explore fantasies and nonconforming identities, with games featuring increasingly diverse and gender-unconstrained romanceable characters and community jargon such as "mutual impurity" and "reverse harem" signaling tolerance for unconventional expression. Second, player cameos as non-player characters have become a common interactive storytelling strategy that deepens immersion and community identity. Third, avatars have grown more distinct in personality and value orientation, a contrast to the vague protagonists of earlier mainstream and indie otome games.

The fourth finding concerns rising aspirations for authority and autonomy, evident in the diversification of endings beyond romantic outcomes and in gameplay systems that shift from pursuing external affection to investing in self-development. The author concludes that these trends redefine player agency and reflect a broader feminist cultural shift within the indie game landscape.