History Main / DateMyAvatar

* ''Manga/RecoveryOfAnMMOJunkie'' revolves around two MMO players who fall in love, but with a twist: they're both using avatars of a different gender, and neither wants to admit it. However, the main issue for both of them is their guilt over lying rather than worrying about the other's identity - in fact, Moriko already seemed to be crushing on Lily before realising she was played by a guy, [[BiTheWay but didn't mind at all when she found out.]]

* Inverted in one ''WebVideo/FiveSecondFilms'': A girl agrees to date a guy in [=WoW=]. When he shows up, he is the actual avatar (as in, he shows up as a ConspicuousCGI purple-skinned [[OurElvesAreBetter night elf]]).

* These days, online relationships are getting to be more and more common. Sadly, some people invoke this trope and decide to act and look nothing like their offline personas. On the other hand, the relationship sometimes works out anyways.

* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaLinksAwakening'' has this come up as part of its ChainOfDeals. One part of the chain has you taking a letter from a lady (who asks you to after you give her a hibiscus flower) to Mr. Write, her pen pal on the other side of the island. When you deliver the letter to him, he lets you see that it's a picture of her. The only problem? The picture is of [[Franchise/SuperMario Princess Peach]] - but his actual pen pal is an anthropomorphic ''goat''.

->Do you wanna date my avatar? She's a star, and she's hotter than reality by far...

-->Online I live in Malibu
-->I posed for Calvin Klein
-->I've been in GQ
-->I'm single and I'm rich
-->And I got a set of six pack abs that'll blow your mind

->You know, actually it's kind of funny. Because every time I would mention some obscure singer or band, you knew so much about them. But not right away. It was, like, a few minutes later. Maybe to give you enough time to look them up on the web? Jeff... you used the same phrases about Goldfrapp as they do on Amazon.Com. Busted. By the way, I fucking hate... Goldfrapp.
-->-- ''HardCandy''

* In ReadyPlayerOne, Art3mis breaks off her relationship with Parzival because she feels that he doesn't know the real her at all. [[spoiler: Her personality is exactly the same, and her looks are the same except for a birthmark on her face. He loves her anyway.]]

* Dave of ''{{Narbonic}}'' once had an online girlfriend who turned out to be [[spoiler: an artificial intelligence.]]

-->-- '''TheGuild''', "[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urNyg1ftMIU Do you wanna date my avatar]]"

* Music/TheGuild's song "[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urNyg1ftMIUDo Do You Wanna Date My Avatar?]]" is the TropeNamer. See page quote.

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* These days, online relationships are getting to be more and more common. Sadly, some people invoke this trope and decide to act and look nothing like their offline personas. On the other hand, the relationship sometimes works out anyways.

* In ''Anime/DotHackSign'', Tsukasa and Subaru start a relationship while Tsukasa's consciousness is stuck in the virtual reality game called "TheWorld". As it turns out, [[spoiler: Tsukasa ends up being a girl in the real world, instead of the boy her avatar was. Luckily, Subaru doesn't mind and after the anime, when Tsukasa is freed from the game, they get together in the real world]].

* In ''HardCandy'', this goes both ways. We have this charming guy and this sweet young girl, and they have so much in common. But they are both faking it. They are really predators, trying to lure each other into a trap.

* In ''Beastly'', Kyle tries to get around the whole looking like a monster thing by looking to date a girl online. Kendra tells him that it would never work out the way he wants it to, because while relationships can start online, he'd have to meet the girl in real life eventually, if he wants to break the curse. She then points out how Kyle posted several lies (or at least stretched truths) about himself online, to try to be more appealing to potential girlfriends. After that conversation, Kyle uses his magic mirror to see what the online twenty-something-year-old girls look like in real life. They turn out to be an old man, a middle-aged police officer, and a twelve-year-old girl, to name just a few. The young girl gets pissy when Kyle calls her out on her charade.

* TheGuild's song "[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urNyg1ftMIUDo Do You Wanna Date My Avatar?]]" is the TropeNamer. See page quote.
* BadReligion's song "I love my computer" rolls with this. "...'cause you are just a number and a clever screen name."

* Inverted in one ''FiveSecondFilms'': A girl agrees to date a guy in WoW. When he shows up, he is the actual avatar (as in, he shows up as a ConspicuousCGI purple-skinned [[OurElvesAreBetter night elf]]).

* The whole point of the documentary ''Catfish'', about a New Yorker who strikes up a romance over Facebook with a girl from Michigan [[spoiler: only to find that she, and all of her friends, and all of their friends are [[SockPuppet Sock Puppets]] for an eccentric middle-aged mother.]]

* ''EarthStarVoyager'' plays this trope straight, but in reverse chronological order from usual. [[SpaceshipGirl Priscilla]] is the ship's computer, a large box of plastics and metals. Thus, Huxley is simply annoyed when she falls in love with him. However, when she shows him the picture of the MadScientistsBeautifulDaughter that her personality was based on (possibly recorded from), he's amazed that a woman who looks like ''that'' would go for him. (Which doesn't change the fact that ''this'' Priscilla is, and always has been, plastics and metal.)
* The impetus of the plot of ''SexDrive'', where the main character has been lying about being some handsome buff guy and owning a classic [[CoolCar 1969 Pontiac GTO Judge]]... which actually belongs to his brother. {{Subverted}} in that she was lying about many of her details and assumed he was too. [[spoiler: DoubleSubverted because it was [[HoneyTrap all a plot]] to steal his car.]]

* In ''Film/{{Chatroom}}'', the female lead starts falling for the male lead, based only on how he has presented himself online. The reality is for darker then she is willing to see.

* Will #2 aka "gay Will" of WillGraysonWillGrayson gets his storyline kicked off by going to meet Isaac, an AIM buddy that he's fallen in love with. [[spoiler:Isaac turns out to be a front for a female friend. To say that Will is heartbroken and angry by this would be an understatement.]]

On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog. Actually, nobody knows ''you'' at all. So it's easy to create an Internet identity that reflects what you ''want'' to be -- someone much smarter and sexier then you are in real life. Just lie a bit about yourself and use a photo that is photoshopped, misleadingly cropped, or not of you at all.

** It did look like him in the first place, although it was made from his twin brother's DNA.

* In ''HackSign'', Tsukasa and Subaru start a relationship while Tsukasa's consciousness is stuck in the virtual reality game called "TheWorld". As it turns out, [[spoiler: Tsukasa ends up being a girl in the real world, instead of the boy her avatar was. Luckily, Subaru doesn't mind and after the anime, when Tsukasa is freed from the game, they get together in the real world]].

* The whole point of the documentary ''Catfish'', about a New Yorker who strikes up a romance over Facebook with a girl from Michigan [[spoiler: only to find that she, and all of her friends, and all of their friends are [[SockPuppet Sock Puppets]] for a crazy middle-aged mother.]]

On the Internet, we can relatively easy come across as much smarter and sexier then we are in real life. Just lie a bit about yourself, and use a photo that is either photoshopped or not you at all.

And thus, in online romance, people might end up dating illusions and make-believe personalities rather then real people.

Sometimes turns into AnAesop, either about trust and the virtue of playing it safe or about seeing past the superficial stuff.

* ''Webcomic/{{Keiki}}'' has a Valentine's comic in which Ivan courts a "Cassandra Catfish" over the Internet. [[spoiler: He eventually discovers that Cassandra [[ReallyGetsAround has claimed several other men as her boyfriends]]. The news then expose her as not a high school cheerleader who resembles Emmy Rossum, but Music/TaylorSwift with a fake name and profile picture.]] TheReveal leaves Ivan disgusted.