Exploring Mispronunciation Of English Terms In Multiplayer Online Battle Arena Games Among Indonesian Players

Abstract

This study investigates the types of mispronunciation produced by Indonesian Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA) players in pronouncing English game-related terms and examines the communicative impact of those pronunciation deviations during gameplay interaction. This research employed a qualitative case study approach involving 12 Indonesian MOBA players. Data were collected through gameplay voice recordings and semi-structured interviews. The pronunciations were analyzed using James’ (1998) theory of pronunciation errors and supported by Gilakjani’s (2016) classification of segmental and suprasegmental features. The findings revealed five categories of pronunciation deviation, namely sound substitution, omission, addition, misordering, and combined mispronunciation. Sound substitution appeared as the most dominant type with 36 identified data, followed by misordering with 5 data, omission with 2 data, addition with 2 data, and combined mispronunciation with 4 data. The findings also showed that mispronunciation did not always cause communication breakdown during gameplay interaction because players relied on intelligibility, contextual understanding, and shared familiarity with game-related vocabulary. Overall, successful communication among Indonesian MOBA players depended more on intelligibility and contextual familiarity than on pronunciation accuracy itself.