THE ultimate video gaming experience will never be complete without bumping into one of the game’s NPCs or non-playable characters.
These automated, game-controlled characters are often used to advance the plot and provide context on the environment and missions that players need to accomplish.
Oftentimes, NPCs exist to simply make the game more interesting because of their touching backstories and iconic catchphrases.
But who would have expected that NPCs will no longer be limited to the magical realms of video games, as they can now be found all over social media sites like TikTok?
TikTok users and content creators have been acting like robots online as they hop onto the NPC trend on the short form video sharing platform.
What’s it all about?
Popularized by Montreal-based content creator PinkyDoll (@pinkydollreal), the trend has TikTok users livestreaming on the app to imitate video game NPCs.
They often utter nonsensical and repetitive phrases as they respond to gifts sent by viewers, and this surprisingly maintains their livestream’s audience count.
While live, they would often say “Ice cream so good” after receiving ice cream stickers from viewers. They would also utter “You got me feeling like a cowgirl” when getting cowboy hat stickers in their livestream.
PinkyDoll also often says “Gang gang” when viewers gift her with the GG sticker on TikTok, and this would just really get stuck in your head.
Although it may seem bizarre, this trend is shockingly growing on TikTok, with viewers flocking to NPC livestreams to send gifts for the weird but entertaining content. Content creators earn big bucks by joining the viral trend.
The stickers cost money, and the content creators take home half of the value of the stickers they receive during their livestream.
In an interview with Vice, PinkyDoll revealed that she earns at least $7,000, or more than P38,000, when streaming for an average of six hours per day.
This is significantly higher than what she used to make when she first started using TikTok as a means to put food on the table and fend for her children.
The content creator said that she likes the feeling she gets when people send her gifts during her livestream. Reacting to gifts energizes her, she said.
“It’s not exhausting,” she said. “I kinda love to go live and reacting to gifts. There are so many and the views going up is boosting me,” she said in the Vice article.
As of writing, PinkyDoll has a total of over 819,000 followers and 3.4 million likes on Twitter.
Due to both the money and fame one gets from joining the trend, many content creators have started mimicking PinkyDoll and have transformed themselves into TikTok NPCs.
Some would even dress up like in-game NPCs or famous movie characters in order to give their audience a unique experience when watching their livestream.
Pinoys add local twist
There are also some Filipino TikTokers who have joined the NPC trend like Limuel Peña Huet (@bnt_limuel), who incorporated Filipino twists in the usual catchphrases TikTok NPCs say.
In his live, whenever he would get a GG sticker, he would say “galunggong” instead of the “Gang Gang” phrase PinkyDoll popularized.
Sometimes, he would also say “Captain Barbell”, a Filipino superhero, when receiving a dart board sticker that looks similar to a shield the hero uses.
According to TikTok content creator NPC NerdyWinter (@nerdwinter), this trend is continuously going viral because it is weird and people are confused when watching it.
And the more people find it perplexing, the more attention it will gain
“It’s weird, it’s random, and people don’t understand it. And a lot of the time when people don’t understand things, they talk about it, they share it — the likes, everything blows up when people are just confused,” she said in an interview with CNN.
Because trends come and go, she anticipates the NPC trend to continue within the next five to six months.
