Forms of Self-Reflexivity in Team Hero Shooters and Beyond

This paper, by Feng Zhu and Eva Liu of King's College London's Department of Digital Humanities, investigates whether the self-reflexivity that players develop toward their own play in team hero shooter games such as Marvel Rivals can function as a "technology of the self" with applicability beyond gaming. Its central interest lies in whether such reflexive practices transform players' relationship to themselves, a dimension the authors argue has been underexplored in gaming literacy, neuroscientific, and skill-acquisition literature. The paper also situates this inquiry within sociological theories of reflexivity, particularly Bourdieu's notion of habitus and Archer's typology of reflexive modes.

The authors frame team hero shooters as a notable case because they combine two tendencies: a community prone to toxicity, in which failure is externalized onto teammates, and a competitive culture in which players actively seek to problematize and refine their own conduct, such as recognizing when they "tilt" after a loss. They contend that the specific technical supports players use, including video recordings, heads-up displays, and coaching, may bind reflexivity to a particular techno-social field, though certain mental techniques such as emotional self-awareness may generalize across contexts.

The proposed methodology is a mixed design beginning with a survey of 50 players of team hero shooter games, followed by semi-structured interviews with the ten highest-hour respondents. The interviews use Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis and gameplay-elicited interviews built on recorded footage, and the data will be examined through thematic analysis. Data collection is scheduled from November 2025 through May 2026. The paper also commits to testing Archer's four modes of reflexivity against the findings and to revisiting Bourdieu's claim that reflexivity arises chiefly in moments of crisis, given how frequently gameplay produces such crises.