Introduction
Game streaming, as a novel form of interactive media, has transformed digital entertainment by turning players into content creators and facilitating real-time engagement with audiences. Beyond serving as a platform for leisure, it has become a space for the emergence of new cultural practices, virtual communities, and the redefinition of concepts such as identity and power. Globally, platforms like Twitch and YouTube have established creative economies worth billions of dollars annually by enabling direct interaction between streamers and audiences. In Iran, however, this ecosystem operates under unique technical, cultural, and political constraints. Despite the rapid growth of digital gaming and evolving media consumption patterns, live game streaming has become a primary site for digital interaction. In 2024, more than 18 billion hours of live streams were viewed on Twitch alone, demonstrating the emergence of a lifeworld based on moment-to-moment representation, direct audience connection, and digital identity construction. Iranian game streaming, though widely embraced by youth, is shaped by infrastructural limitations, regulatory oversight, and socio-cultural tensions, creating a space where streamers emerge as cultural agents navigating complex challenges.

Materials & Methods
This study adopted a descriptive phenomenological approach to explore the lived experiences of Iranian game streamers. Descriptive phenomenology emphasizes faithful representation of participants’ experiences without imposing pre-existing theoretical frameworks, focusing on uncovering subjective and cultural meanings. Six streamers (four men and two women) were purposively selected based on long-term streaming experience, weekly activity, and a minimum of 500 followers, with the support of the National Foundation for Computer Games. Participants included three professional streamers earning over 20 million Iranian rials monthly and three semi-professional streamers earning below 10 million rials, with diversity in gender, age, education, and game genre specialization. Data were collected via semi-structured interviews addressing platform usage, audience interaction, challenges, content creation, and identity formation. Interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed using Colaizzi’s seven-step method, including deep familiarization with the texts, identification of significant statements, formulation of meanings, clustering into thematic groups, structuring major categories, drafting a comprehensive description, and returning to participants for validation. Credibility was ensured through participant validation, detailed documentation, and triangulation with researcher observations. Saturation was reached after six interviews, consistent with prior phenomenological studies indicating that major themes typically emerge within 5–6 interviews (Gust et al., 2006; Saunders et al., 2018). An illustrative example of the analytical process includes the statement “Streaming allows me to be myself and express freely,” which was conceptualized as “self-expression and sense of freedom,” later grouped with similar concepts to form the semantic cluster “self-expression and digital identity construction.”
Discussion & Result
Analysis revealed that Iranian game streaming constitutes a complex, multi-layered, socially embedded practice shaped by cultural, technical, economic, and psychological factors. Five major themes emerged: (1) critique of local structures and digital divides, (2) identity and representation in digital spaces, (3) human connection and emotional bonds, (4) creative and media performance challenges, and (5) streamer lifestyle. Collectively, these themes provide a comprehensive depiction of streamers’ lifeworlds.
Findings align with international studies highlighting entertainment, interaction, and identity formation as key motivations (Hilvert-Bruce et al., 2018), but introduce new insights specific to Iran: streamers navigate structural constraints including platform limitations, content oversight, and gender disparities rarely addressed in Western contexts. Streaming remains a space for identity expression and social belonging (Lin et al., 2019), yet Iranian women streamers experience dual dynamics of opportunity and restriction: they gain visibility, skill recognition, and independence, but face societal pressures and stereotypes. Additionally, Iranian streamers contend with dual constraints—algorithmic biases on global platforms and content regulation on domestic platforms—resonating with findings from Edwards et al. (2022) and Kenny (202).
This study contributes to knowledge by framing game streaming as a cultural-media experience, using descriptive phenomenology to capture raw participant perspectives, and analyzing gender and power dynamics. It bridges global and local research gaps, demonstrating how Iran’s cultural, political, and technical context shapes streaming practices. Practical implications suggest policymakers should develop domestic platforms with higher technical quality and flexible content policies, provide targeted support for female streamers through training, funding, and legal recognition, and recognize streaming as a culturally meaningful and socially impactful activity. Researchers are encouraged to conduct larger-scale quantitative studies, explore audience-streamer dynamics, and undertake comparative regional analyses. Limitations include the small, urban, highly educated sample and exclusive focus on streamer perspectives. Future research should expand geographic and demographic diversity and examine interactions between streamers and audiences to gain a more comprehensive understanding.
Conclusion
Persian game streaming in Iran constitutes an emerging cultural-media ecosystem in which streamers act as both content creators and cultural agents. They navigate technical constraints, cultural sensitivities, and gendered dynamics while creatively constructing professional identities. Streaming offers spaces for self-expression, emotional engagement, community building, and social interaction, yet it also poses challenges related to structural limitations, visibility, and competition. Iranian streamers operate within multi-layered power structures encompassing platform algorithms, domestic regulatory oversight, and socio-cultural norms. Nevertheless, they exercise creative agency by using VPNs, forming informal support networks, developing locally adapted streaming styles, and cultivating emotional communities. These practices illustrate the applicability of de Certeau’s “everyday tactics” (1984) in digital contexts. The study underscores that game streaming is a significant socio-cultural phenomenon, with implications for policy, education, digital economy, gender equity, and the formation of a distinctive Persian subculture influenced by both global streaming cultures and local cultural norms.