The Female's Preferred Experience in Gaming.

In his book A Theory of Fun, Raph Koster claims that the the point of playing games and winning them is "mastering abstract formal systems, which is something generally enjoyed more than boys and men than it is by girls and women." To argue this statement, there is no necessary proof that games are of a male activity than a female one. However, there are certain games that are particularly more popular with women than they are men. A variety of virtual world experiences can attract both genders. As gamers, both sexes equally seem to enjoy the story of the game. There are also various complexes and opportunities to be creative, educate ourselves, and socialize within the world of gaming.

As Jesse Schell suggests in The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses, five main interests for males and for females are listed. The text mentions that men enjoy games that evoke more mastery, competition, destruction, spatial puzzles, and trial and error. Without any kind of relevant purpose, females do not seem to prove as much interest in mastery. Females are also not as competitive and sometimes puzzles become to frustrating to them.

 As a result, Schell notes that females learn towards the experience of emotion and social discovery that they often apply to real world situations.  He mentions that females like to see emotion, real world, nurturing, dialog and verbal puzzles, and learning by example.

"There is certainly no difinitive master list of what each gender prefers. The important thing is that you realize that there are some important differences, and that you carefully consider whether your game has the right features to delight the audience you are designing for." Jesse Schell

Girls like to explore their emotions therough gaming and tend to lean towards meaningful entertainment. Schell notes watching children play certain games when they are young. Females will often play as real world characters such as nurse, pop star, etc. whereas boys will convince themselves that they're the Spidermans of their time. The Sims game series have a great amount of female players than male because of the real life situations, social interactions between characters of the "real world."

photo by: motivateplay

"The percentage of women playing games has steadily increased over the past decade. Women now slightly outnumber men playing Web-based games. Spurred by the belief that games were an important gateway into other kinds of digital literacy, efforts were made in the mid-90s to build games that appealed to girls." Henry Jenkins, The Video Game Revolution

One may also note that sometimes females are not as competitive because of our natural nurturing tendencies to a point when we will sometimes sacrifice ourselves for another player instead of concentrate on winning. Notice that many females also enjoy learning by the examples in tutorials that are presented within video games.

"As digital technology has evolved to the point that videogames can now support emotional character portrayals, richer stories, and the opportunity to play against real people while talking to them, the female audience for videogames has been commensurately growing." Jesse Schell

photo by: gamerlimit

 

In her book, Reality Is Broken, Jane McGonigal states her game design abilities on the theory that games are in fact capable of bringing out the best in society. According to McGonigal, games make us more pliable. As gamers (male or female), we have the means witness nearly hopeless positions not with failure, but with an optimistic approach that we are capable of discovering solutions. With that in mind, she has made games for the less fortunate world. McGongigal's optimistic outlook suggests that positive cooperation conquer negative cooperation. Perhaps women's reasons for gaming are not as crazy as some may think they are. McGonigals theory proves that playing games to solve world issues and bring out the best in us by socializing is a great example of how females tend to make games meaningful in their play.

 In her game Evoke,  two women protagonists are immensely different from the typical portrayal of females in games. The girls are heroes globally travelling to help solve problems such as diseases.  The women actually have careers. The struggle she faces much like the struggles presented in action games. She is also South African which is not traditionally shown throughout games. McGonigal's design works in the narratives and stories of various real life issues that women and girls face today.

McGonigal  is  a designer  of alternate reality games, in which your virtual world gaming can be applied to reality. McGonigal acts on the synergetic side of games while aiming to relieve world issues like poverty and starvation. Hence, a game gives players an issue, and the players come up with strategies to solve that issue.

The Validity of Female Related Game Design and the Altercation of "Girl games"

Game design has grown beyond the arcade room based shooters.Games are constantly adopting characteristics that attract female players. The ever recent convergence of the female into what is known as a male avocation may give better awareness into the architecture of educational atmospheres that adhere to gender inclusive appraisals in the composition.

There are various explanations as to why digital games have arisen as a "guy thing." However, the increased amount of female games that are designed for girls may condone women to see technology such as computers as good instruments. The question is to how valid this argument really is.

As Michele D. Dickey notes,

" The main problem with developing games specifically targeted for girls and women is the question of whose notion of female is being portrayed in the game. There is danger in perpetuating cultural values that limit female roles and participation." Michele D. Dickey, Girl Gamers: The controversy of girl games and the relevance of female-oriented game design for instructional design.

Hence, it is significant to cross-examine whether the benefits of female apertures will defeat the conceivable disadvantage. Games such as Disney and Barbie definitely feed into specific stereotypical female interests.

"Interestingly there are many commonalities between elements of female-oriented game design and the types of tools and opportunities in constructivist learning environments. Many games are increasingly constructed as representations of 3D spaces, allowing players to move and interact in stimulated realistic or fantasy environments." (Dickey)

With that being said, for the composition of learning atmospheres, it is very important for apprentices to seek contingencies for investigation and direction to advance their building of understanding. Various games are also developing socialized atmospheres where global players may consort to one another and create gaming strategies. These days characteristics of female-oriented design are indeed integrated in contemporary massive multiplayer online (MMO) role-playing games such as World of Warcraft. Not to mention, women are commonly known to be drawn to different aspects of this type of gaming than men are.

"In massive multiplayer online games, men are significantly more likely to play games due to the possibility of great achievement and the ability to manipulate the game environment for personal gain, where women are significantly more likely to play games due to their desire to interact with fellow gamers and form meaningful relationships." Nicholas Maisonave, Gender in Gamer Culture and the Virtual World.

Much is to be learned regarding what exactly draws both males and females into specific aspects of game design. Taking a look at how females converge into what was once known solely as a male pastime gives insight, methods, and strategies in educating game designers how to communicate experiences and atmopheres to students of both genders.

Fight Like A Girl--Female Opportunity arises in social online atmospheres.

The relationship between gender and gaming is intricate and functions in a variety of layers. It is significant to see gendered gaming beyond its text.We must also take a earnest course to the female gender's influence. Within distinguished and constant ideas, femininity and masculinity are not themselves.Hence, communication and interplay between the two conveys a meaning. It is clearly obvious that gaming customs are experiencing an increase in fast communal and mechanical adjustments.

Jo Bryce and Jason Rutter's Killing Like a Girl: Gendered Gaming and Girls' Visibility indicates differences in the females' construction of a text's meaning through computer gaming. The banal representations of women game characters takes an apathetic stance of constructed meanings in conjunction to feminine and masculine representations within games.

"It is possible that females construct different meanings in relation to the themes of computer games, may play games in a masculine fashion, and/or may construct their own oppositional meaning of game texts." -Bryce and Rutter

                            

As for real world aspects, most gaming has frequently been connected to the mannerisms of "bedroom culture." This relates to a stereotype that females do not play in the same atmosphere that males do.

"Originally conceived as female use of domestic space, bedroom culture highlights the manner in which girls are restricted from full access to many social spaces and are instead left on the periphery of public social spaces (such as playgrounds)"-Bryce and Rutter

Developing proof shows that many females actually prefer taking part in gaming within homely conditions such as with their partners, family, and friends. One may note the significance of social leisures for women who play. Massive multiplayer online (MMO) games may have an effect on the overall female participation in games. Not to mention, a majority of the increased amount of online players are infact girls.

"It has been suggested that females are more affilitative and nurturing, preferring leisure activities which have a stronger social aspect."- Bryce and Rutter

Females may feel free of gender discrimination online as their physical attributes are anonymous. This perhaps deducts the banal behaviors that may attack female gamers. Opportunity arises for females if their identity is masked by the anonymity of online gaming. Hence, women are benefit in competing against guys without being discriminated against.

"Because 'girl gamers,' gorgeous or not, are still considered rare, regardless of consistent evidence to the contrary, women gamers gain a fair amount of recognition and attention through the social power of gender." Elizabeth McMenomy, Game On Girl: Identification and Representation in Digital RPG's

All in all, women who play games hold an important place in the ever developing culture of games all around the world. Girls that game are a very large and growing force in gaming culture which challenges the overall stereotypes associated with video games.

Video Game magazines also hint discrimination of women in games.

Monica Miller's 2008 article Gender Differences in Video Game Characters’Roles, Appearances, and Attire as Portrayed in Video Game Magazines analyzes video game magazine articles while investigating how characters are portrayed, with the focus on the difference in the sexes. The text's content analysis aspires to test messages portrayed in video games by examining the composition of video game articles from the three primary gaming console magazines in the United States—Playstation Magazine, Xbox Magazine, and Nintendo Power (which is soon to go out of print in December 2012).

After investigating these magazines, Miller found that male characters are made to be protagonist or hero, be more muscular, have more skills, hold more weapons, and have an overall dominant power. Females are frequently portrayed as auxiliaries.They are also more sexually attractive as they wear more revealing clothing. Comprehending the messages within these games is a significant path to understanding the effects games and magazines may have on our overall manners and dispositions as male and female.

photo by: joystiq

The article goes onto describe how mass media is capable of influencing many behavioral social standards that involve body image, sexual behaviors, self esteem, and gender identity.

"Studying video game magazine articles is important because this is a separate media than the games themselves. Knowing what kinds of images video games articles portray is important,just as it is important to study other types of magazines, movies, songs, and other media." (Miller)

Content analyses of video games and video game advertisements have consistently found that women are underrepresented, more frequently sexualized, more attractive, less powerful,and dressed more scantily than males.

As Karen Dill's Video Game Characters and the Socialization of Gender Roles: Young People's Perceptions Mirror Sexist Media Depictions notes, one may find  that women are scarcely represented in video game magazine articles and advertisements, with less than a quarter of featured photos of video game characters in these magazines being female.

"Consistent with past content analyses of video games that found most popular games to be aggressive, we found that the great majority of video game characters (77%) in game magazines are aggressive." (Dill)

Both articles point out a woman's potential to become socially depressed or obtain lower self-esteem levels if they are exposed to some of the articles and images within the magazines. Researchers observed how media can influence the negative behavior patterns of women.

"Women who are exposed to images of “ideal” (e.g., very thin) women in the media report increased levels of body dissatisfaction, negative mood and depression, and lower levels of self-esteem as compared to women who are not exposed to these images. The influence of the media on young women’s body image have led researchers to speculate that media might also play an important role in negative behaviors such as eating disorders." (Miller)

Miller's findings in video game magazines suggest the development of gender roles and attitudes of the human kind. Note that because of this, females may feel that women are too submissive and need a man to save them. The idea that there are subtle amounts of girl characters in games and even less female protagonists or heroes could also be disheartening to women. Males who see this portrayal of females could possibly develop adverse attitudes toward the female gender. Characters of both genders: female and male could understand the woman character's part as the idea that women are not important and can't be heroes. Hence,

"women will have to idealize male characters or endorse the more stereotypical female portrayals." (Miller)

Even if the majority of both men and women play games, the game companies aim to please an audience that is dominantly male. Thus, game magazines often accentuate the female's violence, sexuality and overall attractiveness.

As Karen Dill notes, "Sexualized and stereotypical sex role portrayals Females were categorized as sexualized/curvaceously thin if the image portrayed was consistent with Harrison’s (2003) curvaceously thin appearance ideal (e.g., large breasts and small waist) and if the figure’s sexuality was stressed such as by showing cleavage, wearing provocative dress, or displaying provocative poses, postures or facial expressions. For example, a female character from Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas licks her lips in a sexualized manner, while bending over, revealing tan lines and a tattoo under her bikini top."

Even throughout magazines, the sexual discrimination of even both genders can be shown. It's important to notice these things as advertisements can be just as effective as actually playing the game itself. From the way images are layed out in the magazines to the amount of content featured with in the articles themselves, all have effects on how we as women and men portray the world and the roles we're "supposed" to live by as genders

"Analyzing magazine articles provides more detail than analyses of either brief game play or advertisements used in past studies and thus allowed for greater exploration into the roles and appearances of characters."(Miller)