The Interactive Content Exchange (ICE) is a media business event focusing on interactive content where the attendees have the chance to network with others of the same industry. Mobile gaming, indie games, advertising, cross-platform development, games for children, blogging and the internet were some of the topics covered in the 2-day schedule of events.
The invitation to be a panel speaker at this conference came as a really big surprise, straight from ICE’s Director of Conference Programming.
How could I possibly say no? Especially when it concerned women and games.
My initial thought was that I probably wasn’t the best person to represent women in gaming, since I don’t usually play the traditional games for girls. But looking again at the title of this panel, it was just meant to be: “She got game”? That’s almost our site’s motto!
It was with a great deal of tension that I waited for the time to go by. Knowing that I would have to be on a stage in front of people with a microphone and all was really making me super nervous. Hell, I had trouble speaking in front of a class in a regular presentation, let alone this. Oddly enough, after we started the nerves seemed to disappear.
As we were introduced to the assistance, I couldn’t help giggling. “We all know women don’t play games, and that those who do play don’t really exist”, said our announcer, explaining that we were there to basically dispell the myth of the female gamer.
Our panel consisted of Claudette Critchley, Studio Manager at Big Blue Bubble and also our moderator; Jennifer Cristani, VP, Splashworks; Alana Reid and Sarah Bustoz, respectively founder and member of the Girlz 0f Destruction clan; and yours truly, Editor in Chief and PR of this wonderful site you’re reading.
After introducing ourselves and having a quick show of hands to see who has played some of the newest titles in a Top 10 Most Rented list, we started off with our discussion. What do women play and why do they play it? What factors are most important when choosing a game?
The answers were as varied as our individual backgrounds.
Jen mentioned advergames and casual games, since most of the players are moms who don’t have much time to spend in front of the computer. They like being able to play for a bit and go back to prepare dinner or get the kids ready for school, and come back later to play some more. She also added that even though they play on their spare time, they still feel somewhat guilty about it.
Alana and Sarah are driven by fun, competitiveness and the social factor. They enjoy their FPS sessions, they like being better at it than their opponents and they especially enjoy the social aspect of it all, be it chatting online or going to the LAN parties and tournaments.
Competitiveness isn’t for me, and like I tell my husband many times, I play for fun, not to win. The social aspect of a game doesn’t affect my choices in playing something. In fact, I am very anti-social in games, particularly MMOs. I hate depending on people to go somewhere or kill something. The more I can do on my own, the better. It may seem selfish, but at least I know that when I screw up it’s my own fault, and not someone else’s who doesn’t know how to play.
Claudette asked us if we usually played games by going through the tutorial first or just jumping right in. I used Minions of Mirth as a bad example of a tutorial, since there were plenty of text boxes, but they were very badly organized. Personally, jumping right in is my most favorite way of playing, unless it’s a game that involves a lot of menu options, then in that case I will have a look at the manual.
The controls in a game are important too. If we try to give someone who usually doesn’t play games a complicated system (Battle for Middle Earth II on the 360, anyone?), they will probably just grow frustrated with it and put it aside. Start with something simple, then move on to more complex controls once you’re comfortable with the controller’s basics.
We all agreed that that casual games are a good starting point for women and any non-gamers. So are systems like the Wii and the Nintendo DS, which are easy to pick up and use and require no previous knowledge of videogames. Anything that gets more people into playing games, female or not, is worth it.
Somewhere around here, we got lost in a sea of questions from the audience, which was great. We were asked about mobile gaming (something we really should start covering here), about our favorite genres, about games for girls and the lack of them for rental. This particular member of the audience said she wanted to rent something to play on the Xbox, but all she kept being recommended was a Sponge Bob game. That’s just sad that the store staff couldn’t even engage on conversation and offer suggestions based on whatever genres she might be interested in and has previously played.
When we think or hear about games for girls, what we usually get are games for young girls. Companies creating games for girls are aiming at a particular age group, usually teen and pre-teen. And not all “girl games” are good examples. I had to review Bratz Rock Angelz at some point and I tried so hard to write a coherent review. But what I really wanted to say is “This game sucks, and it’s teaching little girls how to dress up like sluts and blow all the money they can get their little hands on on slutty clothes and tons of makeup”. Yep, because that was what the game was all about. Not a very good example for girls, is it? I told the woman in the audience she was actually better off with Sponge Bob.
I can’t believe I actually said “slut” in front of all those people. But seriously, we need better gaming examples for young girls. Like everGirl, which I forgot to mention.
We had an outline for what we would be discussing, but half of it ended up left behind due to the amount of questions coming from the audience, which kept us chatting back and forth for quite a while.
One aspect that I think is important to mention here is what is causing the increase of the female gamer population. I believe this brings us to what we mentioned before, casual gaming and systems that are easy to pick up and play, but also family games and a large increase of gaming websites and communities specifically aimed at girls.
We also had individual questions that we never got to, so I can at least now answer the one that was directed at me: how does a review written for/by a female differs from a male’s review?
Personally, I don’t think it does. And if it does, it shouldn’t. The review should concentrate on getting across what we thought of the game. As long as the author is a good writer and has good knowledge of the game he/she is reviewing, as well as enough attention to detail, the gender of the reviewer won’t make a difference. We may have more women interested in reading our reviews because we have other women writing them, but that doesn’t mean our reviews are better or worse.
It’s also true that some female reviewers may be looking for certain aspects in a game that a male reviewer won’t (i.e. strong female character presence, female character depiction, obvious female stereotypes), but that doesn’t necessarily make them better writers. A review should only differ from good writer to bad writer, and nothing else.
Left to right: Jen, Sarah, Didi, Alana, Claudette
Overall, I was very pleased with how the panel went. I was even more pleased they would have something like this at this event! But the discussion could have gone for hours, and in fact, girls in gaming could even be the theme of an entire conference.
There is a lot to be said about the topic, but the more I think about it, the more I think I wasn’t the right person to talk about what women like or want in a game. Because I don’t have a particular favorite genre, because I will play almost anything, because I like games that aren’t “tailored for girls”. I’m not the conventional girl gamer, and I like it that way.
We don’t need a Halo Pink Edition, GTA: American Top Model or any more Barbie or Bratz fashion and makeup games to get us playing. Women already play games. All sorts of games, as we could see by the diversity of this group of panelists. If more publishers, developers and advertisers could concentrate on making GOOD games and stop advertising specifically for one gender or the other, then the gaming world would be a much better place for girl gamers to live in.
Related Links:
ICE 07
Girlz 0f Destruction
Big Blue Bubble
Splashworks