by CheekyGuy, HSM team writer

I’m about to tell you a mature fairy tale set in a virtual world.

No, not Home. Second Life. In Second Life, I was in love with this wonderful woman that I had met countless times before; she was once my boss lady that employed me to be an exotic dancer.  She was entangled in other relationships, and so was I. It was one of those situations where we were just glancing across at one another,  trying to reach out to one another in a crowded room, and it was just near impossible.

Her name was ‘Kandi Munro’ and she modelled herself on her idol, ‘Marilyn Munro’ (sic).

At the time I was partnered to the wrong woman; she couldn’t come in-world very often, as she had real-world obligations, and I guess I felt that I had to settle for this. When she eventually came online, it was late in my nighttime and I was just about ready for bed in real life.  I was deeply unhappy.

But I was talking to this fantastic girl (Kandi) that seemed to be around all the time; she was there for me, and we talked about everything. We connected, and better still, she was single in the real world, too. There were no attatchment issues; if we truly wanted to, we could meet in real life and the possibility would easily be on the cards of a real life relationship. That option was always definitely there. But in Second Life I was still partnered to another woman and I still wanted to honor this.

So I threw the dice and took a risk, I created an ‘alt’, (short for alternative avatar & account) so that I could see the woman of my dreams, and we could be together without tarnishing my primary avatar’s simple family life. My virtual daughters Jenny and Britney both already knew how unhappy I was, and they were unhappy too.  As far as they were concerned their original mother was hardly around.  But they liked ‘Kandi’ and gave their blessing.

I saw Kandi as my alt and we began actively dating together. True, this was cheating on a technicality, but I was much happier than waiting around for somebody that just didn’t seem interested when she logged on to play online. There was no chemistry and our interests were vastly different.

With Kandi, we could talk about anything and everything and we could talk for hours without a beat in-between. No stone was left unturned; any topic or area of conversation, as far as we were concerned, was our oyster.

Eventually I had to come clean to my original partner at the time.  I told her that it wasn’t working out and that I was seeing somebody else. There was no point to me logging into an empty house.

The breakup was amicable and I had told her that she could see our daughters, Jenny or Britney, any time she wanted to.

I was free to be with the woman that I wanted to be with. I no longer needed to be an ‘alt’.

Our Virtual Wedding

We got ourselves a dream home by a beach and settled in together; as time went by we eventually officially partnered and bought a bigger place, upon hearing the news that Jenny would make a return from a year-long hiatus to deal with her real life. (Whereas before it was just our teenage daughter at that point in time and elder sister Britney.)

When she returned,  we eventually married.  Kandi and I had always wanted to marry but it was never the right time.  On that day, everything felt just ‘right’.

My youngest daughter  Jenny from my previous relationship quickly took to Kandi, and they became great friends online and offline.  As far as Jenny was concerned Kandi was like a real mom to her in so many ways and she adored the fact that she had somebody that was there, in- world all the time to take care of her.

I eventually retired from working as an exotic dancer to be with my new virtual family (Now with our newest addition ‘Jade’), and that’s how my fairy story came to a happy ending.

THE GIRLS ; From right to left, Kandi, Britney (Center) and newest addition ‘Jade’ (Left)

This is just one example of why people use alt accounts. For the PlayStation network, this can be in ‘Home’ or general internet use.

People use alts for so many reasons; some are obvious ones in that they just want to play online games without being messaged every so often or explore Home in peace.  For other people in Home, alts can be used as part of a roleplaying fantasy or a particular gaming alt (say a shooter or RPG fanatic that can be a perfectionist with scoresheets and Kill/Death ratios. (You can tell a Call Of Duty fanatic a mile off with RAMBO somewhere in the name tag)

For some people alts can be used to become part of a society or cult group; some alts can serve for a much darker purpose.

Some people have a Jekyll and Hyde twist in their personality, so they bring it out ‘in-world’ as a physical manifestation of that.  Some alts are used to spy on another group or person, some are used to deceive, some alts are used for outright adultery and cheating.  Some alts are created for flirting or to calm sexual urges in other gaming worlds. Some alts are used for outright anarchy, which they can commit absolute chaos online and revert back to their original account and they will usually log into the ‘crimescene’, the area of which they had created the mayhem,  leaving chaos and confusion hanging in the air for their victim.

Some alt avatars can be used to threaten or intimidate others.

Some avatars can be the hero that can truly save the day, or a darker, sinister force.

But there are other avatars that  are created, purely to explore other activities they would not do as their primary avatar.

For Some users of PlayStation home, people use alt avatars to run events and organisations of which their primary avatar cannot (especially if the friendlists of the primary are at a stretching point to which she or he has to choose who to drop/keep on his/her friends list. This is probably the most difficult decision you will have to make, because really you shouldn’t have to make these decisions at all, but we are talking about memory allowance here)

Some of the female avatars in Home have a ‘repulsion’ avatar designed to repel the many male pests on PlayStation Home that will sometimes sexually harrass them, Some of these avatars are absolutely hilarious examples of ‘camp’ male-looking avatars in rainbow underwear or pink shirts.

Alt avatars and accounts can be changed at will to suit the many hobbies and interests/clubs that can be found on PlayStation Home. The question is this, then: in a virtual society where identity is fluid, where are the boundaries? How do we choose — and to what degree — the level of trust we put into any social interaction in a social network for gamers?

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One Response to “Alternate Accounts, and Why We Use Them”

1. Burbie52 says:

   April 15, 2013 at 11:02 am

   Great article Cheeks. I think that though you have to approach the people you meet in Home with a bit of wariness sometimes, I am one who chooses to give everyone I meet the benefit of a doubt when it comes to trust, at least until they prove otherwise. Yes this has turned around to bite me in the butt a few times, but it is worth it to me because I have met some wonderful people, you included.
   As for a more deep relationship like you had, I think if you can start with an open mind with someone you meet the sky is the limit. I think that relationships found in Home can be deeper than ones found in real life sometimes because they are based on the real person, not just a knee jerk reaction based on the physical aspects. As I have said before they are based on the person behind the avatar. Good read.

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