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Old 10-14-2005, 01:11 PM   #6
Aj_
Beyond Belief
 
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Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Blighty
Posts: 2,186
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What's love got to do with it?

Not a lot. There is a segment of games, the majority aren't great, and they include immature representations of women (Dead or Alive), or add in a gratuitous sex scene just to show a female character naked (Fahrenheit). NFSU incorporates a "story" (a very loose definition of one) as an excuse to add movies with women wearing very alluring clothes in them between racing. If those games sell for that, then no one should stop them from being sold.

This is representative of entertainment out of games. Action movies have female characters in them that are obviously written by men. Scenes are added to movies just because an actress needs to be naked to attract more viewers. Models are paid to come to racing events.

Gender roles.

A lot of women are discouraged from playing computer games because they're seen as abnormal for wanting to do so, and not being normal is seen as automatically bad. Professions such as being a racing driver, working in the military, or professional sports athlete aren't taken by women, in part because generally women aren't interested, and in part because they're discouraged. Men are generally interested in those things.

Games being about racing, fighting, and sport are made because they're easy to make. The actions can be simulated. One thing that women are interested in is people, and The Sims, a virtual dolls house, that has character interaction, looking after your sim, decorating/designing the house as some of its gameplay. The Sim City series had the basic principles, but I don't think that game was as readily sold to a female audience. The adding of relationships, shopping, and decorating seems to be the main factor. Clearly marketed towards a stereotype of women, and it worked. The problem is that these games are much harder to make, and I think they will develope slower, and there will be fewer ideas and opportunities in this area.

So there.

I don't think anything should change in the gaming world, I doubt it could, without sweeping changes to culture and that just isn't going to happen. Aslong as men like to see pretty women with large breasts while playing a game then that's what will be in games. While women aren't generally interested in combat, sport, or racing then they're not going to be interested in the games that simulate them.
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