(no subject)

[sophiaserpentia]

In light of Activision-Blizzard's RealIDFail, it's dawned on me that there is a sizable void.

There are lots of women who play games. There are no developers catering to them.

Gaming has been historically extremely male-centered. The stereotypical gamer is a teen boy in his parents' basement hunched over an XBox or a Nintendo. The stereotypical game designer is a man who, ten years ago, was that boy. Game designers target boys' and men's idea of fun. Game advertisers target the interests of boys and men. And, as RealIDFail demonstrates quite clearly, game developers have little interest in the specific concerns of women online, where those concerns differ from men's, or in the specific ways in which women use social networks differently from men.

I'm cherry-picking my examples here for emphasis, but as anyone in the wide world of woman-gamer blogging can tell you, dealing with misogyny -- as well as racism, homophobia, and transphobia -- in the gamer universe or in game advertising or content is an everyday thing.

So... why should we? Make that trade-off to play games we enjoy, I mean?

If there are any development studios with an anti-racist, anti-sexist, anti-'phobic perspective, I want to find out who and where they are. A very cursory google search does not reveal the names of any studios developing from this perspective.

If there aren't... I want to play a role in founding one. Anyone else interested?

Comments

[alobar.livejournal.com]

I never figured out why anyone spends huge blocks of time playing on-line games, or spends money to do so (except maybe for teens who have no real outlet for adventure or creativity).

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

*shrugs* It's not for everyone.

[ovary.livejournal.com]

For $12 a month, I get many more hours of entertainment from gaming than I would from seeing 1 crappy movie in the theater.

Because not everyone can be as cool as you and

[sammhain.livejournal.com]

Because it's fun for them would be my guess.

[azaz-al.livejournal.com]

Because we're all uncreative blobs without a shred of the cool spirituality or all the neat, busy making things you have to do. We should bow before your awesomeness, and feel ashamed.

[leafshimmer.livejournal.com]

Funny. To me the stereotypical gamer is a thirties-forties gay or straight-hipster-geek male who wears World of Warcraft t-shirts to the office and has a serious black hole going on around his home computer...

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

Hehehe. Sounds like the stereotype I described, just 15 years older. It may also vary by location and social circles...

[dovewing.livejournal.com]

Count me in. *waves*

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

*waves*

WIGI and some studios...

[shava23.livejournal.com]

I would have to say my #1 studio for women-inclusive gaming would have to be Bioware, whose KOTOR and Mass Effect series have had awesome gender parity without making the women into guys (although, in Mass Effect, they're tough military women). Bioware's DragonAge had bi and I think gay characters in it, and they took the heat for it.

Close second would be Turbine, makers of LOTRO and DDO -- who although they won't commit it to print, have warned and banned people for using "that's so gay" as a derogatory, and don't allow *any* in game marriage relationships supported by the system, so they don't have to take heat (being a MA company) for having inclusive marriage.

But Blizzard is just like Facebook -- they are too big to fail, they don't have to care about privacy and so on. They probably think they are saving time for their community managers. Some of the changes to network access and the OpenID question show me that they aren't concerned about negative feedback.

Of course, there's our little indy studio, which is doing a very different sort of game, but as CEO I expect we'll be very open to whatever sort of gender issues.

There's also WIGI, Women in Games International, which is the professional organization for women in development and administrative and art and whatever other roles in the games industry. WIGI has been bringing a lot of these issues to the fore, but it's slow to change.

56% of online gamers are women, now, including all the folks playing Zynga and various casual games. It's no longer ok to paint things pink or make pretty outfits to make it a girl's game or a game that will appeal to women. People are incorporating mature kick-ass female role models into games, without them having to have Laura Croft's boobs, or dance like a night elf.

But there's a lot of inertia.

Re: WIGI and some studios...

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

And fantasy gaming in particular represents a genre which should be able to accommodate both goal-oriented content and things like character development.

Re: WIGI and some studios...

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

I didn't know that about the 56% figure, that's fascinating. I know that somewhere around 30% of people who play MMORPGs are women. That's a number that could be bigger too, and I think is likely to grow.

That's good to know about Bioware & Turbine. I would, a few years ago, have included Blizzard, because at the outset, WoW was fairly woman-friendly. Female toon models were not disproportionate caricatures, and there was nothing in the game content that implied, anywhere, that women are less capable and less fully empowered. That came from the players, who brought their sexism, racism, and 'phobia with them from Earth... and by degrees, over the years, Blizzard has done less and less to stop them from spewing it in-game.

Thank you for the nod to WIGI -- I will look into them.

[theflamecrow.livejournal.com]

If I could somehow help out, just poke me. :3 I dunno what I could do besides concept doodles... Am sure I could learn more though.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

Well, if this gets off the ground there will be needs for people of many diverse skill sets and abilities and interests.

Honestly, I'm still just starting to acquire the skills myself. Though, now if I keep this goal in mind, it could shape the direction of which skills I go after.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

This Realid thing is just atrocious and I don't think the corporate privateers at Activision will respond to anything short of mass-account cancellations. I know for people like me, it means that I never, ever post on their forums again once it comes in.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

Yes, this is an atrocious mess.

I've seen some hints that it could be sort of forced on them by new laws in South Korea requiring people to use their real names when posting to massive forums, and China requiring people to game under their real name.

But, yeah, if they thought they could write code aimed at those markets and then turn around and present it to Americans as some great new thing and be well-loved for it, they missed the mark.

Where A-B messed up on this is that we know, we *know*, this whole thing about using real names to discourage forum trolls is a total red herring. If they won't be upfront about the reasons why they're doing this, how can we trust that other currently-optional aspects of RealID will always remain optional?

Re: RealID: JANE SIXPACK JENKINS

[theflamecrow.livejournal.com]

Roommate forgot trans people...

Re: RealID: JANE SIXPACK JENKINS

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

The semi-comprehensive list I assembled yesterday of people largely affected by this was:
* women
* transgender folk
* gay/lesbian/bisexual folk
* people whose names ID them as belonging to an ethnic minority
* people with unusual names
* famous people & celebrities
* people who work in law enforcement
* soldiers & military officers
* government employees
* people in the witness protection program
* professionals
* academics
* registered sex offenders
* minors (though I think minors aren't allowed to have an account in their name)

Re: RealID: JANE SIXPACK JENKINS

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

It is because the most recent generation has grown up under CONSTANT SCRUTINY.

Yes. They also are unlikely to have experienced some of the pitfalls that come with blindly trusting people.

Our society is shifting, by degrees, to a state where privacy doesn't exist. Each change acclimatizes us just a little bit more to the post-privacy world. Some have been talking about the RealID controversy as an historic event. That could be overstating it, but they may be right: what happens this week could very well decide the future of privacy in online gaming, which in the last ten years has become very suddenly an iconic aspect of American society.

Interestingly, I've been reading that teenagers are not embracing Twitter. They may not be quite as eager as we think to live under continual scrutiny. We'll see.

And... oh yes, any endeavor I launch will NOT be a fucking Barbie doll makeup dress-up game.

[akycha.livejournal.com]

I'm actually part of a small group of women who work in the game industry -- mostly writing and editing -- and we have been considering putting together a company to try to break into game concepts which are geared towards a larger audience. (The problem is that this is a second job for all of us, and we all have to concentrate on the primary job in order to eat and pay rent.)

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

*nods* That aspect of this will make it difficult. Investors will not flock to our doors, at least in the beginning, so for a while it will be a labor of love/activism. Still... please keep me in mind. I believe in this very strongly.

[tori-vixen.livejournal.com]

Sign me up.

[akaiyume.livejournal.com]

I currently have time. And willingness. Not sure what I can do.

Perhaps childling conscription. He has actually done some volunteer labor for a small mmo game that he was into for a while.