[MUD-Dev] Girl appeal (was: Boys and Girls)

[rayzam]

From: "Marian Griffith" <gryphon at iaehv.nl>

>   What is it that makes girls play a particular game?

Building. Time and effort results in a noticable change in the
game[world]. This occurs for everything from SimCity to Civ to
crafting in a mud to RollerCoaster Tycoon to socializing in a
mud. Boys are more into destroying, along with creating.  There is a
subset that want to compete with boys, too.

>   What is it that makes girls play games at all?

That's a tough one. Do you think it's different than 'what makes
boys play games at all'? Or are the underlying motivations the same,
but society and culture produces boundaries between the genders?

>   What is it that makes girls NOT play games?

As above: some society and cultural pressures. This is changing over
time, as most societal mores do. But the same is also true for men
vs. boys.

> Assuming that we can find out what qualities a game should have to
> appeal to girls What game genres (as opposed to target audience)
> could emerge that would give games that, as a rule, appeal
> primarily to girls?

Is it necessary to have a game that appeals primarily to girls? Why
not have games that appeal equally to both genders? One assumption
is that games that appeal primarily to girls won't also appeal to
boys. Looking at it pseudostatistically, there are more boys playing
games than girls. If a game designed for girls appeals to a subset
of the boys playing games, then the numbers may actually be equal.

There is only one case where this matters, and that's the case as
you brought it up. Taking a game and repackaging it for women. Take
a game that's based on racing with weapons. You could go to one end
and make it Twisted Metal, which is biased towards boys, or make a
Barbie Racers biasing towards girls. Or you could make Crash Team
Racing, which appeals to both.  The base game design has to have
appeal to both, then the spectrum of varieties can be made [and if
the game is successful, will be =P].

> Can we combine these qualities with games that up to now primarily
> appeal to boys?

Which would be changing the base game design. Sure, why not?

    rayzam
    www.retromud.org


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