Abstract
This paper examines what types of relation that arise between the player and avatar in the video game series Mass Effect. Through a discussion of different phenomenological approaches, the paper aims to cast light on how human experience is mediated in the playing of third person roleplaying games with strong narrative components. Key concepts include the postphenomenological terms “composite intentionality” and “alterity relation”; terms used to describe how the player relates to the avatar and other characters in the game. The theory of Mark B. N. Hansen is used to explore the possibilities digital media gives for human experience. The concept of narrative self-understanding is further employed to account for the immersive, affective potential of the Mass Effect games. The body figures centrally throughout the paper, and is seen as central to the experience of playing video games in how it relates to digital media as a “center of indetermination” and as constitutive of the composite intentionality.