Foreword

It all started when my girlfriend forced me to play Overwatch 2 with her. I don't enjoy OW2 that much and I'm not even good at it. I decided to at least have some fun with it and started writing the message "Any puppygirls in chat?" into the chat at the beggining of every match. Most reactions I got were short and negative. OW2 is a game that requires nonstop attention and players don't have time to write in chat. I figured I might get more interesting responses in different videogames and decided to run this experiment.

What is a puppygirl

There are a lot of definitions on the internet. Most of them focus on emotional and sexual aspects but I want to avoid those if possible. For the purpose of this experiment a puppygirl is simply anyone who identifies as one and idealy shows at least some of the following aspects:

• writting barking sounds in chat or other sounds associated with canine animals
• using emoji such as | :3 | ^^ | >.< | o////o |
• has a name that references puppies or the trans community

Collection and classification of data

In the experiment I will analyze interactions with other players. My communication will always start by writing "Any puppygirls in chat?" in the game chat. The rest of the conversation will go depending on the reaction I get. I'll try to classify the interaction into one of the five categories explained below.

Positive

The player identifies themselves as a puppygirl or shows positive interest in the topic.
Example of interaction:

Samurajka: Any puppygirls in chat?
Gamer1: Haiii :3
Samurajka: Are you a puppygirl? woof
Gamer1: Yes, bark bark ^^

Mostly positive

The interaction is positive but too short to get a proper conclusion.
Example of interaction:

Samurajka: Any puppygirls in chat?
Gamer1: woof woof
Samurajka: woof woof, so you like puppygirls?
Gamer1: maybe
*Gamer1 ignores further messages*

Neutral

The player doesnt show much interest in the topic or the conversation gets cut off.
Example of interaction:

Samurajka: Any puppygirls in chat?
Gamer1: What's that?
Samurajka: A girl that has puppy accesories and barks
Gamer1: oh, okay
Gamer2: anyone wanna do the dungeon?
Gamer1: sure, im coming

Mostly negative

The player shows some hostility but expresses it relatively politely.
Example of interaction:

Samurajka: Any puppygirls in chat?
Gamer1: I hope not
Samurajka: You dont like puppygirls?
Gamer1: Go bother someone else with your weird shit

Negative

The player shows clear hostility and expresses it vulgarly.
Example of interaction:

Samurajka: Any puppygirls in chat?
Gamer1: get out of here you sick degen
Samurajka: why are you so mean? :(
Gamer1: you're disgusting
Gamer1: *vomiting noises*

Games

For now im concluding the experiment in Guild Wars 2. Later I plan to try Destiny 2 and Minecraft Hypixel. Depending on how succesful and fun the experiment is I might try more online games.

Guild Wars 2

Hypothesis

GW2 is a fantasy MMORPG game. The world map is divided into a lot of smaller zones. Each zone has its own map chat, seen by all players in the same instance of the zone. There can be a few dozen players in each zone, so I expect to get a response fairly often. GW2 is also quite popular in with the LGBT+ community so I expect less strictly negative interactions when compared to other games. My avatar in GW2 has accessories in the color of the trans flag which might affect some interactions.

Data

when I collect more data I will post them here
...