Line #25 Main/InCharacterLetsPlay


1	When most people do a LetsPlay, they usually do it as themselves. No acting, no work of fiction. They are just playing a game and providing commentary on it. However, there are some people who decide to pretend to be somebody else for their let's play.
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3	Not the characters in the game they are playing, but characters completely unrelated to the game. While a regular Let's Play is made as an entertaining {{walkthrough}} to the game, these kinds of Let's Plays are almost purely made for entertainment.
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5	As such, these people will often goof around and pretending not to know how to play. Sometimes though, they will take gameplay seriously while keeping in character of whoever they are pretending to be. These kinds of Let's Plays don't finish the games they are playing very often with each game being played as a one shot. Some games do get played to completion like a normal Let's Play, but the focus is mostly to entertain by showing what it would be like if certain fictional characters played video games.
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7	That being said, some of these still have the gameplay and voices recorded simultaneously, so there is often a big chance of the actors unintentionally but noticeably [[{{Corpsing}} breaking]] [[OohMeAccentsSlipping character]].
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9	See also {{Virtual YouTuber}}s, dedicated streamers/content creators who depict themselves with an animated DigitalAvatar with varying degrees of {{Kayfabe}}, which also features some overlap with this trope.
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12	!!Examples:
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14	* Believe it or not, ''WebVideo/TheAnnoyingOrange'' has a [[https://www.youtube.com/user/MidgetAppleAO gaming channel]] which features the cast of the series playing games as their respective characters.
15	* On ''Blog/DasSporking'' member Silais' sporks of ''VideoGame/ChronoCross'' and ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'' (the latter hosted on his own blog) are framed as if the games are being played by the casts of ''{{VideoGame/Neptunia}}'' and ''VideoGame/BreathOfFire'' respectively.
16	* {{WebVideo/EthGoesBOOM}} is, to quote his [=YouTube=] channel, "a gaming [=YouTuber=] guy who makes silly voices". He dedicates a majority of his videos putting on different voices, acting as the various animatronics from ''Franchise/FiveNightsAtFreddys'', playing games and reacting to videos. Sometimes said videos even devolve into their own little stories that can span throught several episodes.
17	* ''WebAnimation/HomestarRunner'':
18	** The episode [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZ7-TKdt9BU "Videlectrix - Halloween Waggle"]] has the two employees of the fictional company Videlectrix stumble their way through the Atari game ''Haunted House''.
19	** The series "Disk 4 of 12" features strong Bad doing lets plays of games that appeared as floppy disks throughout ''WebAnimation/StrongBadEmail''.
20	* ''WebAnimation/KizunaAi'' is a VirtualYoutuber known for writing blogs and [[https://www.youtube.com/@AIChannel/videos doing Let's Plays]]. Little to nothing is known about the team that created her and the person who provides her voice.
21	* ''WebVideo/MarikPlaysBloodlines'', a spin-off of ''WebVideo/YuGiOhTheAbridgedSeries'', in which Creator/LittleKuriboh plays ''VideoGame/VampireTheMasqueradeBloodlines'' in-character as Marik from ''Manga/YuGiOh'', with occasional interjections from Bakura from the same.
22	* A [=YouTuber=] going by "The Nerd Gamer" is sporadically releasing episodes of a ''VideoGame/RepublicTheRevolution'' [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lsTGK-JOeM&list=PLGYKWqwrusOEer8DAJ9jVWVCyDJ3gt2MF&index=1 LP]], where he both plays and talks in-character as a suitably ideologized pro-Communist party leader the entire time.
23	* ''WebVideo/TheNostalgiaCritic'': In one episode, The Nostalgia Critic (in character, not as Doug Walker) decides to do a Let's Play of ''Bart's Nightmare'' after getting requests to do more video games.
24	* ''WebVideo/{{Petscop}}'' is a Let's Play of a fictional game known as Petscop by a character known as Paul.
25	* [[LetsPlay/StephenPlays Stephen Georg]]'s ''Ninten Speaks'' channel[[note]]A channel where he dressed, acted as, and spoke about various topics as his version of Ninten from ''VideoGame/EarthboundBeginnings'' that he voice acted in Starmen.net's radio play ''[[Fanfic/FobbiesAreBorange Loids are not Christmas]]'' [[/note]] had a 55 episode ''"Ninten plays VideoGame/{{Minecraft}}"'' series.
26	* ''WebVideo/TwoBestFriendsPlay'' was this in the early years. Their videos involved Matt and Pat playing exaggerated versions of themselves, with lots of scripted jokes and heavy editing. (And for some reason, they pretended to be Americans and tried to hide that they were actually Canadians.) After they started doing multi-episode, full game LP's, they dropped the fictional personas and just played as themselves.
27	* ''LetsPlay/TwoSaiyansPlay'': The franchise started with Takahata and Lanipator from Creator/TeamFourStar as Nappa and Vegeta playing video games. It later had spin-offs with Lani also voicing Krillin and Creator/MasakoX voicing Goku.
28	* ''WebVideo/{{Vannamelon}}'' has a series of Let's Plays where she roleplays as Fluttershy from ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic''.
29	* ''WebVideo/GloveAndBoots'' had a (sadly now inactive) seperate [[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKKTT20-NqBt2SNS_IoZMLw gaming channel]] where puppeteers Damien Eckhardt-Jacobi and Vincent Bova livestream games as their characters Mario[[note]] No, not ''that'' [[Franchise/SuperMarioBros Mario]][[/note]] and Fafa.
30	* Creator/CartoonNetwork uploaded short [=YouTube=] videos of ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'' characters playing ''VideoGame/SaveTheLight'': [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjNnHtbe-dI Peridot,]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zL_hwzth9g Pearl and Amethyst,]] [[TheUnintelligible and even]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wthJl_kc19I Onion.]]
31	* Creator/JoelHaver did [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQkrLg7KEBc a livestream speedrun]] of ''VideoGame/DarkSoulsIII'', in-character as Caleb, a small-town dudebro from [[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKtIcOP0WvJB_gxBiTJk-2cgRBL2GPeYE a few prior videos]]. A bit later, Caleb did [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZVHX_EW9G0&t=1s a followup livestream]] of ''VideoGame/EldenRing''.
32	* ''WebVideo/SonicTheHedgehog2SpecialEdition'' is an LP by Docfuture of another game that doesn't exist, allegedly an upgraded port of ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2'' to the Platform/Sega32X. This one parodies Let's Plays as a genre, the Sonic fandom, and the EasterEgg hunting and conspiracy theories surrounding the real ''Sonic 2'' in particular.
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Context Main / InCharacterLetsPlay