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The Link Between Battle Royale Games and Aggressive Feelings, Addiction, and Sense of Underachievement: Exploring eSports-Related Genres

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Abstract

The extremely violent and competitive new game genre battle royale is becoming increasingly popular, as exemplified by Fortnite and PUBG. However, previous research has infrequently extended to the exploration of its detrimental psychosocial effects. Our study conducted an online questionnaire survey recruiting Japanese students (n = 874) who currently play online games on a frequent basis. The findings of path analysis demonstrated that, among the game usage time by genre associated with esports, battle royale (β = 0.09) was the only variable associated with aggressive feelings. Battle royale (β = 0.08) and action (β = 0.08) showed statistically significant correlations with gaming addiction, and battle royale (β = 0.10) and action (β = 0.11) significantly correlated with a sense of underachievement. From the results of this study, it is suggested that the battle royale genre requires more attention than other esports genres, particularly in terms of aggressive feelings.

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Data Availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, Shiroh Ohno, upon reasonable request.

Notes

  1. KADOKAWA Game Linkage (2020) https://kadokawagamelinkage.jp/news/pdf/news200213.pdf (accessed March 17, 2020)

  2. Statista: Number of registered users of Fortnite worldwide from August 2017 to March 2019, https://www.statista.com/statistics/746230/fortnite-players/ (accessed March 17, 2020)

  3. Armstrong. M (2018). Battle Royale: PUBG vs. Fortnite, https://www.statista.com/chart/13233/battle-royale_-pubg-vs-fortnite/ (accessed March 17, 2020)

  4. Entertainment Software Rating Board, https://www.esrb.org (accessed March 17, 2020)

  5. The screening survey was distributed to about 20,000 high school and college students who were registered with the survey company.

  6. This condition was set with the aim of obtaining a large sample of long-term exposure to online games within a limited budget. Specifically, “Have you ever been enthusiastic about (or been into) online games (including game apps)?” (Original text: あなたは、ネットゲーム(ゲームアプリを含む)に熱中した(はまった)ことはありますか。あてはまるものを1つお選びください) We used the question, “Please choose one option that applies to you. The choices were “1. I have never been enthusiastic about them.” “2. I was enthusiastic about them in the past, but I am not now.” “3. I am enthusiastic about them now” (Original text: 1.熱中したことはない、2.過去に熱中していたが、現在は熱中していない、3.現在熱中している), and the respondents who selected option 3 were extracted.

  7. Quota sampling was used as the sampling method. The participants in this study were selected to be as evenly matched in grade and gender as possible.

  8. Five variables were employed: 1 h or more, 2 h or more, 3 h or more, 4 h or more, and 5 h or more, indicating 1–5 points, respectively (M = 2.38 ± 1.40).

  9. The sports/racing/MOBA and puzzle genres were removed because they were not significantly associated with any objective variables.

  10. The shooting and trading card genres were removed because the paths to the objective variables disappeared.

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Acknowledgments

This study was conducted by Yoshiaki Hashimoto (the University of Tokyo), Shiroh Ohno (the University of Tokyo), and Mihoko Amano (Tokyo Kasei University) as part of JST/RISTEX “Building new public and private spaces that create a safe living environment: Building a network that supports recovery from diversifying addictions and self-destructive behaviors” (ATA-net, principal researcher: Shinichi Ishizuka). This study was planned and implemented by the above members in accordance with the ethical principles for research and study. Moreover, the analysis and writing of this paper are the sole responsibility of the author.

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  1. Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies, The University of Tokyo, 806, 7 Chome-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo City, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan

    Shiroh Ohno

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Correspondence to Shiroh Ohno.

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Ohno, S. The Link Between Battle Royale Games and Aggressive Feelings, Addiction, and Sense of Underachievement: Exploring eSports-Related Genres. Int J Ment Health Addiction 20, 1873–1881 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11469-021-00488-0

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