Games for girls, or how the industry just doesn’t get its customers

Those who have been following the game industry during the last ten years or less shouldn’t slowly realize one thing; modern games are soulless pieces of software engineering, that are void of content and proper value.

Coincidentally, most games aimed at female audience are just that. Note that I’m using the word game in its looses possible meaning.

Let’s just bust one urban myth; there is no “girl gamers” or the like. There is no girl readers or girl movie watchers, just readers and watchers. A well made game will be popular and sell regardless of customers’ sex. The whole discussion is moot really. Most stereotypically girl games are described as cute, colourful, easy, somewhat short and easy to get into. Then why Super Mario isn’t considered as a girls’ game? Or A Boy and His Blob? Or LEGO Star Wars?

Women, just as men, like good games. Whether or not developers get it, they are making games for the audience, not to themselves. Their audience consists of male and female humans. I haven’t seen any animal ever playing a video game. “But Aalt, most game developers are men and they naturally do games that attract more men than women players.” Basically true, but this doesn’t hold water. The Skies of Arcadia is a game made mostly by women, and you wouldn’t know it unless I just told you. The story, gameplay, world design or anything else in this game does not scream to either favouring direction. Mario games are still popular with female players, and that game was made mostly by men. So was Zelda. And Pokémon. And Sonic. And Mega Man. All these games have a huge female following, but I’m not going to get into if those fanbases have a healthy obsession or not.

I guess I’m hammering the point in too hard. It’s all about personal taste. I know women who play Counter Strike and other games usually associated to men. There are games that are aimed at girls, but these games most likely are some sort visual novels disguised in graphical interface with choose-your-own-story, or are just plain adventure games. Theresa Duncan designed few games directed towards girls. Ever heard of Zero Zero or Chop Suey? No? To be honest, the games are adventure games without no red thread in them and no real gameplay. In Zero Zero you “experience” the nigh time Paris just to experience night time Paris. Sounds exciting enough, as Paris offers all kinds of interesting to see. The game shines for a moment, until you realize that it is nothing less than a slide show of images and somewhat interesting strings of text and occasional naughtiness from the main heroine. Actually, Duncan wanted her main characters to be less girly and wanted the players to do things that their parents wouldn’t allow them normally to do. The game box itself promised to be a small introduction to French history. This is something that has more or less plagued games directed at girls; they’re almost automatically made to be educational. If a girl wants to learn about French history, she most likely reads a books or watches a documentary about it. Games, by their very nature, are not tools for education, but that does not mean that games can’t be educational.
Note that nowadays you can barely find any information about Theresa Duncan’s work as she committed a suicide 1997, and only few authors remember her. Mostly female authors, as Duncan’s games were, after all, directed at girls.

If I were to recommend a game to a woman or girl who never haven’t played a game before, I’d recommend more than one game. The games I’d recommend would be Super Mario Bros., MYST, PACMAN, Muramasa Blade and Metroid Prime. Perhaps even some RPG akin to Dragon Quest V, simply because it’s story elements are perhaps one of the finest of the bunch. RPG’s tend to take about 40 hours to complete, so I wouldn’t suggest this at first.
All above games have one thing in common; they have content and are rather easy to get in. Metroid Prime might seem like a strange pick. The reason for that is that the game as a lot in common with girl games; it has unique atmosphere, controls are simple and direct, and story is mostly in text form. It is different in sense that the player is alone in the world, whereas it is accepted that female players like to play more games that are social than not.

Most FarmVille players are female. FarmVille is like Harvest Moon LITE, but what makes it more popular is that you can play it for a few minutes and be done with it… AND share your stuff with your friends. Girl culture loves the idea of secret gardens, a place silence where individual can be herself and do whatever she wishes, say whatever she wishes and write whatever she wishes. Traditionally only boys are allowed to be free in their actions. For better or worse these chains have been falling down during the last decade or so. I can’t verify this from proper sources other than from books, but girls, and women, are more keen to use chat programs and play games that include a lot of interaction with other people, whether they be real or virtual. Perhaps that’s why you might find yourself a wife inside World of Warcraft.

Take another look at the list I made. I’d recommend all those games to anybody regardless of their sex. The game industry has always been gender neutral, but people want to see games made towards the other sex for some reason or the other. They should just make good games, it would solve all the problems there is. A lot of good games with different variety. Back in the ATARI and NES era we had that. We also had the games like Barbie for the NES because girls weren’t allowed to play Turtles 2. At least girls were allowed to play Chip n’ Dales and Ducktales. It isn’t always about the industry or the audience. Sometimes it’s about the values at large.

I agree; there are bunch of games that are aimed at men and less games are solely for women. However, most games that are directed at men solely tend to be pornographic with male lead. There are change things around, but they all are mostly just text based visual novels. Value of these software isn’t high and I do not regard them as games, but they have everything women stereotypically like; a lot of text, a variety of characters, deep and complex plot, a lot of options to change the story and use friendly system with no fighting. They’re not games thou.

Games for girls like Chop Suey were marginally successful within its targeted market. It’s not a remembered game at all, because it is a bad game ultimately. Super Mario is remember because it was massively successful with both boys and girls, and practically saved the game market. Simply make a good game, and you’ve made a game for girls and women alike. You might want to use something that they can relate to. Then again, how many women relate to Mario as a character?

Above; Music from a game that has a strong female following.