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Endowed by Their Creator: Digital Games, Avatar Creation, and Fat Bodies

ABSTRACT This research explores the relationship between character creation systems in digital games and the potential for players to create and embody fat characters via those systems. The character creation interfaces of a sample of games that allowed for the explicit creation of fat-bodied characters were analyzed to identify what tools were available to players looking to create a fat avatar, and what values about fat bodies were encoded into those interfaces by the designers. While these systems did provide varying degrees of control and freedom to create a fat avatar, the options to do so were marked by their deviance from an imagined “average” body, and sexual dimorphism frequently meant that options for fat women were even fewer. While fat bodies in these creation systems can exist, it’s often in a narrowly-constructed field that offers fat players little room for play with the shape of those bodies.