Research On The Motivation Of Virtual Consumption Behavior Of MOBA Games

With the transformation of Internet technology and the mature development of national cultural and creative industries,online games are playing an increasingly important role in Chinese society.On the one hand,it has combined domestic and foreign capital,relevant central departments,local governments and other resources to jointly create and promote the vigorous development of China’s online game industry;on the other hand,it has cultivated a large number of players who have been exposed to video games since childhood,and formed a corresponding cultural circle between them.The outbreak of the COVID-19 has brought new development opportunities for online games.It has achieved rapid breakthroughs in market revenue and user scale.There is no doubt that it is gradually becoming an indispensable way of leisure and entertainment in our lives,and the virtual consumption behavior that runs through it also constitutes an important part of people’s online life.MOBA game is one of the online games with the largest fan base and widest influence in the current game market.It mainly relies on the sale of a virtual commodity called "skin" to make profits.The consumption behavior of "skin" not only reflects the huge commercial value of MOBA games,but also contains the complex psychological motivation behind the players.Therefore,the study of virtual consumption behavior in MOBA games has certain academic and practical significance.Using qualitative research methods,taking the two typical MOBA games "League of Legends" and "Honor of Kings" as the research objects,based on in-depth interviews with30 game players,the virtual consumption behaviors in specific types of games were analyzed and excavated.The psychological motivations and influencing factors behind it.The research found that:(1)MOBA games originated from RTS,MMORPG and other games,and their gameplay mechanisms and consumption patterns borrowed from these two types of games to a certain extent,but also made unique innovations and improvements on this basis..(2)MOBA games are changing the "commander" role of players in it,dividing them into atomized individuals who consume and compete.At the same time,MOBA games have eliminated the numerical bonuses of virtual props in the game,making them change from "functional" to "non-functional".These are the two most critical changes made by MOBA games.(3)The overall mechanism of MOBA games reduces the difficulty of the game’s operation,and puts more emphasis on the pursuit of competitiveness,efficiency,and individuality.These characteristics echo the current social environment and the background of the times to a certain extent.Consumption behavior has a certain impact.(4)The purchase of "skin" by players is affected by a variety of complex internal motivations,but it can basically be attributed to their management and grooming behavior of the "embodied image" in the game.The ideal image they aspire to include a unique personality image,a superior social image,and a high-level competitive image.(5)The purchase behavior of “skin” is also influenced by external media,which is mainly accomplished through classification marketing strategies and industrial integration.Affected by this,players’ consumption repeatability will increase,and consumption rationality will decrease.The innovation of this paper is that it has carried out a detailed analysis of the game mechanism of MOBA games,a game type that currently has a great influence but has received less attention from the academic community.The behavioral process has been deeply analyzed,aiming to explore the psychological motivations behind players’ virtual consumption behaviors and find out the relevant factors that affect them.