Female Gamers Duke It Out

It's March, and that means that Women's History Month has rolled around again. The latest event put on by 'Women in Games International' was held in February; Both Wired and Gamasutra have rundowns on the event. Wired's coverage highlights the two camps of female gamers, the 'Frag Dolls' and the 'Casual Gamers' that populated the event. Gamasutra's piece discusses the exploration of women in all gamer roles. That, indeed, was the focus of the event: Women as players, designers, and gamers. From that article: "Margaret Wallace (Skunk Studios), also on the panel, railed against the industry for disenfranchising women. 'There's a push against women gamers from within the game industry,' she said. Games have been made 'with puke-humor' thought to be edgy, she said, wondering why developers don't see the direct correlation between the 'sophomoric' humor put into the games and women not liking them. 'They treat women as a mysterious nut to crack.' Wallace's advice: 'Make a game mechanic accessible.'" GameSetWatch also a blog post linking to some advice for female FPS players, especially 'aggressive young girls'.

Comments

Two things:

[Pantero Blanco]

1. Some females play video games. We've gotten that for YEARS; it's about as revolutionary at this point as minorities going to college.

2. Disliking "sophmoric humor" in games isn't a "female" thing. It's an "I'm-not-twelve" thing.

WAS held in February

[kuwan]

Held in February!!! Why wasn't it news before it happened? How are we going to meet any girl gamers now?

You trot them out once a year from the depths unknown and then tell us about it after it happened!?

Under-represented!

[ossington]

Sure, everybody talks about the women who like Tetris-style games (my own mother is one of them), and the "tomboys" who like blood and violence are a big deal, but what about the third camp? The big secret behind women: we like to play God. Give me SecondLife or The Sims or Black and White any day of the week. I think it's a control thing.

Re:Under-represented!

[Hannah E. Davis]

I'm with you on that one... to some extent.

Let's just say that I was up until 6am on both Friday and Saturday nights last week because I finally got Black & White 2 to work on my computer. That game is just amazing -- probably one of the best I've ever played.

I like other genres too, though. I've wasted long hours on adventure games (King's Quest, Space Quest, etc.), virtual pet games (Petz, Creatures), and various multiplayer RPGs (MUDs in the past, WoW these days). I enjoy Civilization too, and I used to play Prince of Persia, Commander Keen, Duke Nukem, and Castle Wolfenstein when I was little.

I'm not sure if there's any one big secret behind female gamers. Just as there is no one genre that all men want, there isn't any one thing that every woman will like/want/buy. I mean, we're half the freakin' population -- why do people expect us to somehow NOT be as divided in our likes and dislikes as our male counterparts?

Seriously, just make good games in a variety of different genres and girls will play them.... and at least then you won't lose your entire male audience (along with a lot of girls as well) by dumbing everything down and coating it with pink.

A hint to some women.

[SmallFurryCreature]

Why do game makers put stuff in that appeals to some guys that offends some women? Because that is their market stupid.

DOA Beachball or whatever it is called is aimed at the guys. There are 3 billion of them and while not all guys like DOA beachball even if a mere 10 percent likes the idea that is still a shitload of games.

To these women who wonder why some games are not aimed at them I ask them this. Why were there no carchases in Titanic? No sword fights, no half naked ninja killers asian teenage girls? We guys NEED THAT. The crappy soppy romance crap without any of the hardhitting political criteque that was in the original offends US!

There a guy games and their are girls games and their are gender neutral games. Just as for every other piece of entertainment. Soppy mindless romance drivel movies for the girls, crappy senseless violence for the boys. Or not.

Why do all games have to appeal to all people? Frankly the women becrying the guy games seem to want to turn all men into women. Not going to happen ladies. Especially not since those same women will be raising the next generations of crotch scratchers.

Don't blame game designed for guys that they don't appeal to girls unless your 100% sure games designed for girls appeal to guys.

I hate to see a game that appeals to everyone. Disney tries that. Ewh.