Video games are an incredibly popular pastime on this campus, but I just haven’t seen any I want to play. I couldn’t put my finger on why these games appealed to my friends and not to me until I read an article by Sophia Dembling in Delta’s in flight magazine, Sky. The article introduced me to “chick click” and pointed out the obvious: Right now, video games are designed by men, for men. As of 2005, less than 12 percent of game developers were female.
As if you did not know this already, research has proved that men and women play differently. Michael Savoie, director of the Center for Information Technology and Management at the University of Texas, investigated how girls and boys ages 6–12 play games. While the boys blasted through setup, girls tended to spend more time on setup than the actual game. Research on adults showed that women like to play cooperatively. While men will work in teams to accomplish a goal, women cited that aspect as something they enjoyed about the game. Also, men and women equally enjoyed beating a system, such as moving up a level, but women got less enjoyment out of beating another player, while men got more. Other insights were that women gamers enjoyed planning and beautiful environments. I am not morally opposed to killing things on a screen, but I don’t get what’s so fun about it. Georgia Institute of Technology researcher Celia Pearce thinks that I am not alone. She says, “I think a lot of women find those games just boring. The game mechanism is not that interesting, and they have a hard time getting motivated. Boys just like shooting. Girls don’t get an inherent thrill out of shooting unless there is another reason.”
The game industry is quite lucrative, but there is this large audience that has not been designed for or marketed toward. To be fair, few games directed toward females above the Barbie level have been successful, but I argue that this is not because of the women but because of the games. While the makers of Madden football games fail to sell similarly designed ice skating games to a female audience, smaller companies with female designers have seen success. In the 1990s Megan Gaiser created Her Interactive Inc. and a line of games designed for teenage and adult females, but “no one would touch it.” She was able to self-publish and sell on Amazon.com, making good profits. I have an impossible time even thinking of Christmas gifts for my uncles; why would I think that that a 40-year-old man would design a game I would enjoy, much less want to spend money on? Until women are more involved in the designing process, there are going to be many female buyers spending their money on other forms of entertainment. As any female in the Game Design major at RPI already knows, there has been great progress recently. In February 2008, the Game Design Challenge panel at the Game Developers Conference included a woman, Brenda Brathwaite, on the panel for the first time. More games offer female avatars than ever before. My brother sometimes even plays as a female in Soldier of Fortune because it gives him more speed. Games like Guitar Hero and many games for the Nintendo Wii are at least gender-neutral and are enjoyed by many females.
Video games might sometimes get a bad rap for violence, but I’ve also seen how they can be a bonding experience for brothers or a healthy way to unwind after a stressful day. I look forward to the evolution of “chick click,” and applaud the members of the “gaming suffragette movement.”
