Sony Wants More Women Interested in PS4

[StewShearerOld]

Sony Wants More Women Interested in PS4

Sony thinks an increase in industry diversity could lead to more female-friendly games.

With the PlayStation 4 announced, Sony has been working hard to try and make the PS4 a more viable platform for a wider variety of games and gamers. A part of this includes making the company's new console a friendlier destination for women. According to Andrew House, president and chief executive of Sony Computer Entertainment, the steps to seeing this goal become a reality are more complicated than giving the PS4 a woman-friendly paintjob.

"We are not going down the route of making the console pink of course," said House. "I think the key is to have people - and increasingly women - with different sensibilities creating different games. It is not all about shoot 'em up games." House's comment touches on a problem the male dominated game industry runs into fairly consistently. It doesn't quite know <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/112508-Silicon-Sisters-Say-Game-Industry-Still-Doesnt-Understand-Women>how to make games for women.

Comparatively, when women are included in the development process, there is more than enough evidence that proves the benefits. Tomb Raider, Crystal Dynamic's reboot of the long running and popular franchise of the same name, was written <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/interviews/9968-The-Craft-Behind-Croft>by Rhianna Pratchett, a woman. The game has been since been <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/reviews/10207-Tomb-Raider-Review-An-Icon-Reborn>hailed by critics for its realistic and powerful representation of the journey of Lara Croft's character.

The extent that Sony will go to help bring more women into the gaming fold is yet unclear. That said, one tangible thing the company could do to help spur the growth of women in the industry (aside from hiring more of them) would be to invest in more games that give female protagonists top billing. Sony's library of home grown titles is largely lacking in this regard. Its various developers have crafted some wonderful female support characters over the years, but it's still the Nathan Drakes and Kratoses standing the spotlight.

Source: <a href=www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/money/4871224/PlayStation-4-to-appeal-to-women-too.html>The Sun






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[Daystar Clarion]

Okay Sony, here's what you do, come closer.


[sub]Closer[/sub]

[sub][sub]Closer[/sub][/sub]

[sub]Woman love killing giant monsters, skinnin' 'em, and turning 'em into weapons and armour so they can kill even bigger monsters.[/sub]

See where I'm going with this Sony?

Don't blow it.

 

[Doom972]

"We are not going down the route of making the console pink of course," - This could be just a simple joke, but it gives me the impression that this guy has never met a female gamer before.
I'm not so sure about the writer of the article either.

Those female gamers that already exist (what few of them there seems to be) seem to like the games that they play as they are - otherwise they wouldn't be playing. I don't think that there aren't that many female gamers because of games not being female-friendly enough, but because they just don't feel like playing video games - I know, it's shocking, but some people just don't find the very idea of sitting down and playing a video game fun, regardless of the games themselves.

 

[The Artificially Prolonged]

Have you tried making the console pink? I believe woman really like that colour?

 

[Doclector]

Oh god this is going to end up being embarassing.

Look, all you really need to do is show that the PS4 welcomes any gamer, regardless of sex or anything else. Don't try to make games to appeal to women, just try to make good games that don't always assume that the player is not only male, but easily distracted from gameplay flaws by jiggle physics, and try to create a friendly community, which is far easier said than done, but still, has to be said.

And for gods sake, if naughty dog want the female lead to take the top billing on the cover of "the last of us" then fucking let them, don't argue that it'll hurt sales because...well, that's bullshit. Check out the jimquisition about that for more detail.

Oh, who am I kidding, that would take far too much common sense...here comes "sonypony", the female marketed horse-riding game...

 

[Eclipse Dragon]

<---Female gamer

Purchased a PS1
Purchased a PS2
Purchased a PS3

Sony.... I don't think you have anything to be worried about.
I guess it's nice that they're trying, even if they're going about it all wrong.

Make good games and they will appeal to everyone regardless of gender. You don't need to make a concentrated effort. Making games that they think "will appeal to women" when they have no idea exactly what appeals to women, could end up being more of a mistake rather than a smart decision.


On a side note: I wonder how well Nintendo sold the pink GBA, DS and currently selling the pink 3DS, and what percentage of those buyers were female compared to the other colors.

 

[Something Amyss]

"We are not going down the route of making the console pink of course," - This could be just a simple joke, but it gives me the impression that this guy has never met a female gamer before.
I'm not so sure about the writer of the article either.

Personally, I think it just demonstrates a canny awareness of the large group of male gamers (be they a majority or an annoyingly vocal minority) who will lose their shit over the concept of trying to broaden acceptance. This strikes me as a way to diffuse some of the outrage before it starts.

Though, honestly, I'm interested in seeing what comes of this. Given companies in the past, I expect a "Playstation for girls!" line of products rather than any real broadening.

Which is a shame, because it would take very little to make things more woman-friendly. At least, as a start.

 

[Something Amyss]

Sony.... I don't think you have anything to be worried about.

Well, if you're the only woman in the world, then no, they don't.

If they're making a concerted effort to get more women to buy their products, however, which appears to be the case, they do have something to be "worried" about.

 

[Eclipse Dragon]

Sony.... I don't think you have anything to be worried about.

Well, if you're the only woman in the world, then no, they don't.

If they're making a concerted effort to get more women to buy their products, however, which appears to be the case, they do have something to be "worried" about.

What I'm trying to say is, make good games and they will appeal to everyone regardless of gender. You don't need to make a concentrated effort. Making games that they think "will appeal to women" when they have no idea exactly what appeals to women, could end up being more of a mistake rather than a smart decision.

 

[Thaluikhain]

What I'm trying to say is, make good games and they will appeal to everyone regardless of gender. You don't need to make a concentrated effort. Making games that they think "will appeal to women" when they have no idea exactly what appeals to women, could end up being more of a mistake rather than a smart decision.

Make good games and you will appeal to some of everyone. Make good games targeting the audience that exists and you'll appeal to more of everyone.

Having said that, yeah, making games targeting women specifically when you've got know idea what they want...taking the same thing and making it pink to sell to women is hardly unknown.

 

[Doom972]

"We are not going down the route of making the console pink of course," - This could be just a simple joke, but it gives me the impression that this guy has never met a female gamer before.
I'm not so sure about the writer of the article either.

Personally, I think it just demonstrates a canny awareness of the large group of male gamers (be they a majority or an annoyingly vocal minority) who will lose their shit over the concept of trying to broaden acceptance. This strikes me as a way to diffuse some of the outrage before it starts.

Though, honestly, I'm interested in seeing what comes of this. Given companies in the past, I expect a "Playstation for girls!" line of products rather than any real broadening.

Which is a shame, because it would take very little to make things more woman-friendly. At least, as a start.

Very little? The problem isn't women trying gaming and deciding that it isn't for them. The problem is that a vast majority of women dismiss it and never trying it - which is legitimate and understandable. Most guys would dismiss certain hobbies that women seem to prefer. For example, imagine trying to get an average guy to get into ballroom dancing - there are guys who would do it, but it's far more popular with women, and this hobby has existed far longer than video games.

 

[Eternal_Lament]

I'm not convinced that the problem has to do with the games necessarily. Or rather, I'm not convinced that it's the TYPE of games that are turning women away. There's no reason to assume that a female gamer won't be as interested in a shoot-em-up as much as her male counterpart will. Perhaps character representation is an issue, but that has more to do with how the stories play out rather than a matter of what type of game it is.

That said, one tangible thing the company could do to help spur the growth of women in the industry (aside from hiring more of them) would be to invest in more games that give female protagonists top billing.

This to me seems to be missing the point in two regards. The first is that the "hiring more women" part seems a little strange, in so much as it doesn't flow with everything we've heard so far. That is, the issue doesn't seem to be that game companies are going out of their way to not hire women, but rather there aren't a lot of women TO hire. The base problem here appears less as a hiring issue and more a matter of the percentage of women who pursue degrees in programming/design, and the percentage of how many of those women actually decide to go into gaming. The other issue is that, while it may help give the industry the look of a more inclusive club, simply having more female protagonists won't necessarily change much. Female protagonists that are well-received and/or in a high quality game? Yeah, that can definitely help. The issue of course is if we assume that all new female protagonists will be better protagonists compared to their male counterparts. Some will be better, some will be the same, and some will be worse. That's fine on it's own, but if the percentage of "worse" female protagonists becomes the majority of representation, then it may not really matter at that point.

Here's what I think Sony can do though along with looking at different game types. We seem to realize that, not only do women play games, but that a large percentage of gamers are female. The question then has to be asked: are the games turning women away, or is it something else? In this regard, maybe it is more of a community thing than it is a game thing. If women are willing to lay games but find the community surrounding it to be not worth their time or hostile, then maybe the solution should be Sony making a more inclusive community. I know, easier said then done, and in fact I'm not even sure how you would go about that. Still, it seems to me that the issue is more of a community driven one rather than an industry driven one.

 

[DTWolfwood]

Does the controller on the PS4 vibrate? if it does, give it an option to keep it on. might help XD

 

[Charli]

Make good games. That is all you need to do Sony.

Good. Games.

A female lead/better representation or a 'cartoony' theme can be in those, but that is the makeup after the structure is built.

Kingdom Hearts 3. For instance, will get you ALL of the titties. All of them, there are more women writing strange fanfiction about Kingdom Hearts on the internet than I care to think about.


So you pretty much just have to slam Square Enix into a door and beat him until he makes that game for you and your console is as good as sold.

 

[The Wykydtron]

MAKE A PINK VERSION! MAKE ONE! THEY WILL LOVE IT! WE UNDERSTAND THE WIMMINZ!

Ehh I guess this is better than not really doing anything at all I guess. It could backfire, it could be great, we could get Pregnancy Simulator 2014. Who knows?

Anyway, have we seen the actual hardware itself or is it still just videos of what it can run? It would be interesting to see exactly what it looks like. I'm not following the release of the next gen consoles very closely at all >.<

 

[conmag9]

Step 1: Create good games.
Step 2: There is no step 2.

Seriously, it's not that complicated. Difficult, perhaps, as good games are hard to pull off, but not complicated.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Well at least the moves Sony is pulling are there to appeal to more people. AAA, casual, indie and girls.
Unlike Microsoft who wants to appeal to masochists only.