Silicon Sisters Say Game Industry Still Doesn't Understand Women

[Princess Rose]

I'm going to sort of put you on the spot here, since I'm a male gamer and really have no idea what would make games appealing more to women: Can you name any SPECIFIC changes or additions you'd make to a game like Dragon Age: Origins or Mass Effect (1 or 2) so that you'd find it more appealing? Or failing those, another game that you can think of? Alternatively, aspect of games that make you say "...And they wonder why there's so few women gamers..."?

Okay, in Dragon Age 2, you have, like 8 different "attitude" icons (although you only get to choose from 3 or 4 in any given situation). Most of the time, this is used to interact with party members. That's great - loved that aspect of the game, and being able to tell generally what I was going to say.

However, when you encounter enemies, they instantly want to kill you. Some might monologue first, but generally there is no option for talking your way out of a situation. Or, for that matter, to gain advantage by talking to your enemy.

You can't distract the enemy by talking about something that the enemy cares about while your party members flank him (or stab him in the back). You can't demoralize the enemy, giving them a penalty in the following combat. You can't convince one group of enemies to turn on another group.

For that matter, you can't play a thief, bring two thieves in your party, and stealth past encounter. You couldn't do that in DA: O either.

Some of that would obviously be difficult to program, but not all of it. In a few specific encounters, you can do maybe one thing (there's a guy you can turn against his master with the right dialog) but most of the time when you approach the enemy turns red and attacks.

That's not to say Dragon Age isn't fun - it is. Love that game. Just would have liked options other than "rain fire from the sky" whenever I bumped into... well, pretty much anyone. ^^;;

Mass Effect 2 actually does a nice job with the Paragon/Renegade interrupts. But again, they're too few and too far between. ME1 had the conversation with Saren. I feel like Bioware "gets" this - they just don't include the option often enough.

Oh, and I should say, this isn't necessarily a "woman" thing - it's a role playing thing.

Although, on the FemShep makeup thing - that I didn't mind. But they SHOULD have allowed MaleShep to wear makeup as well. And let FemShep have scars. ^^ Some slightly less garish makeup would have been nice, though.

Anyway, more in general... I'd like to see more games like Catherine. Killing is all good and fun, but sometimes I'd like to play a game where killing isn't the goal. The fact that Catherine is about a relationship in peril is unique and interesting. More of that please. ^^

 

[spartan773]

But we have Cooking Mama! How do we not know what they want?!

Spoiler: Click to view

I am a terrible, terrible human being for that joke. Absolutely terrible. Please ban me from these forums. I do not deserve mercy

I have even more terrible news.

They're making Camping Mama.

they also made babysitting mama and (i think, i dunno, please correct me on this) crafting mama.

 

[spartan773]

Persuasion is fine, but isn't that a bit low saying "to persuade using your body?" Who says a female can't demand and be as vicious and violent as a male can be?

 

[RatRace123]

Women don't want shooters or drivers or sporters, women want kitcheners and relationshippers and simsers.
I mean, women could never appreciate a game that involves shooting or killing right?

Oh wait, no they would. And what does that mean "female wrapper around a game that's really designed for men"? Is the concept of shooting a gun or jumping on a platform or swinging a sword inherently male all of a sudden? I'm pretty sure guns fire whenever you pull the trigger, not just when you have a penis.

I get what they're trying to do, but it seems like they're going about it the wrong way.
But what do I know, I'm a guy. Maybe girls really do prefer talky persuasivey relationship sims or something.

 

[Sulgoth]

No shit, they don't even get men usually, what makes you think they'd understand the gender with a greater understanding of the complex?

 

[squid5580]

Funny story. I have a 360 which my gf has never really played. She watched me play Bulletstorm and loved it. She watched me play Lego Pirates (and played for 1 level with me) and hated it. Now she wants her own so she can play X-Blades cuz she adores it. Yes that X-Blades lol

 

[Treblaine]

"I use persuasion as an example. That's something women are incredibly good at: persuading people with our words and our thoughts and our bodies... and how do you translate something like that into a mechanic?" she said.

I'm a guy and I find that depressingly sexist.

Sorry if I'm being harsh but that just sounds like a slut-simulator. One nasty stereotype of women is they use their sexuality to mainpulate people at the cost of demeaning themselves. I don't know, maybe like violent video games it works as a release mechanism but I really worry that such attitudes that women really get satisfaction from this should be pursued.

PS: not all games are shooty-blasty-racing stuff:
-Portal 2
-Civilisation V
-Flower
-Braid
-Mirror's Edge
-Flower
-Echochrome
-Minecraft

Don't tell me that Minecraft's satisfaction of building is purely a male quality. Even if that's true I think that's an instinct that would be good to instil in all females

I hope she is hideously hideosly wrong, but then I consider my sister and the only game she ever liked was The Sims, where she would micro manage and tormet these poor gibberish people's lives. Like a god.

Then when I blow up an alien invaders head to save the world from apocalypse she is like:

"Oh, why can't you play a nice game like The Sims"

Sorry. But as far as I'm concerned games like The Sims are softcore torture porn. It's not a game where the aim is to make them happy, they are playthings to manipulate and toy with.

They are not saying anything controversial and the list of games you cited does not further your argument of there being actual some meaningful choice involved one bit b/c I could easily cite a different one where all you do is blast shit.

They are all plainly pointing at the elephant in the room which is the simpole fact that games are made to cater to male tastes, mainly. Most of the action in the industry is geared towards a forceful form of agency; hence why many women prefer to exhert theirs in different ways like in The Sims where-while it may indeed be torture porn-they may choose to not play the part of the torturer; or in Mass Effect where shooting shit is not the most important aspect of the story; or, yes, neutral Minecraft, where they can play the game without an invisible arbiter enforcing strict rules upon them (the same as everyone else who likes the game irrespective of their gender).

Males and females do not approach agency in the same way. Our brains are wired differently. What is so wrong in acknowledging that? If you notice, games that are less constrained by specific mechanics are the ones that are more well liked across the board by different demographics.

And...so what if they wanna play a slut simulator?

"Males and females do not approach agency in the same way. Our brains are wired differently."

I'm going to need some specific and tested Scientific evidence to support that before you can expect me to believe "group X is different on a fundamental level". And no your word as a dude is not enough.

It's pretty easy to prove that males and females diverge in sexual thought, but beyond that? How can you say it is in the brain and not the result of society? But to say women find it fundamentally unsatisfying to use agency of force... you are going to have to answer to all the female gamers here who like games of forceful agency.

 

[The Random One]

I am offended by this. The gaming industry sure as hell doesn't understand me.

I don't need every female character to have a massive pair of boobs, gaming industry. I am fully capable of paying attention to women with normal proportions.

 

[ms_sunlight]

Let me explain why this is so offensive.

It's the spurious evolutionary psychology - saying women have evolved to deal in subtleties. It's just one step away from saying men are evolved to be hunters and women to stay in caves looking after babies. It's offensive, and all the more offensive because it's so widely believed even though there is no reason to believe it's true.

It's completely unscientific but it does serve a purpose; it pigeonholes women and ties them down to narrow cultural niches rather than letting them feel free to explore the whole range of things they might be and do and enjoy. It's the same "men are from Mars, women are from Venus" bullshit that is used to keep us in our place and sell us products. It tells us that men and women are irreparably different rather than rational creatures that can learn to get on together and achieve great things.

My favourite game of all time is probably Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines, my favourite genre action RPGs. Yes, I love the "subtleties" of stealth kills and shotguns in my games. If I want to manipulate people's emotions I have real people to play with.

In the meantime, I heartily recommend the fabulous debunking book "The myth of Mars and Venus" by Deborah Cameron [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Myth-Mars-Venus-different-languages/dp/0199214476] which elegantly shows why this crap won't fly. Thank you.

 

[SouthpawFencer]

I get what they're trying to do, but it seems like they're going about it the wrong way.
But what do I know, I'm a guy. Maybe girls really do prefer talky persuasivey relationship sims or something.

Some girls do. Of course, a lot of today's "gamer girls" ARE fans of games like Bulletstorm, Mass Effect, etc. If they weren't, they wouldn't be gamers.

Silicon Sisters is trying to appeal to a potential market who might not be as interested in the types of games that currently have a AAA production budget behind them.

I can't say for certain if they're right or not. School 26 looks about as fun to me as a root canal, personally, but the producers seem to think that there's a market for it.

Hopefully we won't get the gaming equivalent of the Twilight series: crap that sells because nobody is making a better quality product aimed at that particular demographic.

 

[MatsVS]

I don't really see why so many get offended by this. Sure, the "research" is flimsy and clearly based on faulty premisses, but at least there is someone out there attempting to quantify what makes certain aspects of games appeal to certain people. Surely, that can't be a bad thing?

If they are given the opportunity, perhaps a great game come from this.

 

[Cat Cloud]

Like hell they know what women want. I'm a women, and I don't want a game devoid of gameplay that focuses on building superficial relationships between fashion obsessed preps. I do like games like persona 3 and 4 where you build relationships but there was actually game play in these games.

Actually, I had always thought that RPGs, Strategy games, and even Action Adventure games were made for for girls, while shooters, racing games, and sports games were for guys. I have quite a few girl gamer friends, and they all play RPGs and Strategy games almost exclusively.

But it would be nice if there were more things about games that were geared towards women. For example more female main characters and fewer sexualized females.

 

[Torrasque]

If they're complaining that people don't understand what women want, welcome to the general opinion of 99% of guys, period.

This article is so damn WHINEY. I could make a jab at womens there, but I won't.

But we have Cooking Mama! How do we not know what they want?!

Spoiler: Click to view

I am a terrible, terrible human being for that joke. Absolutely terrible. Please ban me from these forums. I do not deserve mercy

"It took 30 years to really perfect the three things that males seem to really love, which are shooting, and driving, and sports"
Yeah, well, it took a single game called the Sims to perfect everything a woman would ever want in a video game?
See what I did there? It's called stereotyping. It's not nice.

Thank you sirs for making my sick lungs seize up for a minute, in an effort to rofl xD

In all seriousness, the fact that its considered serious "research" and money was spent on it, to get to this result, is truly saddening.

That reminds me of the article I read a while ago where scientists discovered that a full set of plate armor is really tiring...
I was thinking exactly this:

OP: Mrs. Gershkovitch and Mrs. Forbes, you are retarded. I can't nail down the specifics because there are so damned many (especially after checking out your site), but rest assured that I will hire a team to nail down the exact reason you are retarded, and hopefully in 30 years, we will have some results!

 

[FFHAuthor]

"persuade using our bodies." ?

Uh...wait...

Don't women get mad at men who enjoy playing THOSE kinds of games? (sex games) Or the Feminist lunatic fringe (the kind that spells woman, womyn) goes insane over the portrayal of a woman using her body and sex appeal to influence men...or maybe I should say, a game that portrays a woman's body or sex appeal as something to be noticed and appreciated in any form?


Setting down the stereotype that a woman can only be passive and manipulative, using her body or her words to get what she wants kind of fly's in the face of everything that the Women's Rights movement has been fighting for in the past century and a half. Congratulations Silicone Sisters, you've managed to do more for hurting gaming ideas towards gender than the 'Dead or Alive' series, or even the vast majority of female characters in games. At least the portrayals were recognized for what they were, objectification of women to provide for the desires of a particular demographic; Teenage boys, give them boobs, sexual innuendo, and what have you. Obligatory shower scenes, revealing clothing, and breasts that defy the laws of anatomy and physics.

We all know what that's about, you don't have to like it, you don't have to enjoy it...but you know why it's there. It's for juvenile male desires. Passive sex objects, no more, no less. Silicone Sisters has done worse than that juvenile pandering. They're not just saying that's accurate, they're saying that's what women WANT to be, that's the roles they desire, that's what they want to fulfill with gaming.

'Male' games (to use the rather sexist stereotype) that they referenced, shooters, racers, sports, glorify the male want for competition, triumph, open engagement of the opposition and defeating them. The plot lines in games reinforce that. 'Female' games according to this developer should cater to a woman's inner desire to be manipulative, passive, underhanded, and seductive, getting their way by becoming objects and puppet masters of others. Is that really what anyone here with a young daughter would want her to grow up to be?

 

[Metalrocks]

dont want to sound sexist but i think they dont know what they want either. this game which is for 12-16 year old does not indicate what women want.
30 years to tell what men like in games are shooting, driving and sports???
weird. i dont like driving games or sport games. i dont even watch soccer.
what about mass effect? you can play as a female and still be nice without shooting anyone.
already when i read "silicon girls" i ask my self what kind of girls they are.

 

[Motiv_]

Sorry, tried bringing my wife into this discussion, Silicon, but she's a tad busy playing Left 4 Dead at the moment. I'm sure she'll be finished shortly, turn into a "Real gamer girl" and will gladly proclaim her love for Wii Fit, Cooking Mama, and Sims 3.

Never have I seen such arrogant talk from a company with exactly 1 game, which has received exactly 1 review thus far, it being a 2 star rating. You claim to know how women think, and what they want in a game? You make me laugh.

Also

"I use persuasion as an example. That's something women are incredibly good at: persuading people with our words and our thoughts and our bodies... and how do you translate something like that into a mechanic?" she said. "If that's something that we're good at and gives us a visceral sense of satisfaction, then how do we turn it into gameplay?"

So basically, Digital Sluts 3? Give me a fucking break. I know that some women have different tastes than men when it comes to games, just like some men have different tastes from other men, but please get me a more experienced game developer to produce such games.

 

[gyroscopeboy]

...what? First of all, the name Silicon Sisters...really?

Maybe they also make "female friendly" breast implants?