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[Tycho Brahe]

Hopefu this will be a good think for the mainstream games industry. I for one would like to see new unisex games, and less at either en of the spectrum; ie the gears clones and the pink barbie lookalikes.

[Iamthejuggler]

Hang on, is it even legal to have a female employee only company? I know you'd be pretty screwed if you tried that in the uk.

[Gagege]

Makes sense to have a female games company, that way the men can focus on making quality manly games.

You win.

[Chromanoid]

Hang on, is it even legal to have a female employee only company? I know you'd be pretty screwed if you tried that in the uk.

sure? being female seems to be a nescessary qualification for making female minded games that are made by females. are there such antidiscrimination restrictions even for newspaper columns for women by women?

i wonder if the company name is a sarcastic allusion to breast implants...

btw pls rename the thread title to "Sexiest game studio [...]"

[Iamthejuggler]

The difference is that when they hire for the position of "column writer for a women's magazine" they can't say that the job has to be taken by a woman. A woman would probably get it because they are better suited (maybe). You can't say this company only hires women right out. Equal rights gets a bit nuts at times. Like you can have adverts for women only car insurance companies, and yet guys aren't allowed to have men only clubs? The bertrum wooster in me goes 

Anyway, if the game's main design and vision is done by women i don't see why that means everyone in the company needs to be a woman. Seems like fighting fire with fire, but whatever. Good luck to em. The little darlings!

[Geti]

Makes sense to have a female games company, that way the men can focus on making quality manly games.

You win.

If you think this is good humour kill yourself.

[phubans]

I think they confused games with sandwiches.

[AndroidScholar1]

Sexism in games is flawed, as are feminist analyses of games. If there's an evil woman who's good to look at, then the game is sexist as it portrays women as evil and having to look good. If there's a good woman who looks fugly in the game, then the game is sexist as it objectifies women as ugly and having to be good.

A studio that goes out of it's way to aim towards a specific gender is in itself sexist, because it's stereotyping the gender into a single personality that they can aim at.

This annoys me at a level that's half-way between "completely non-annoying" and feminism.

[brog]

Anyway, if the game's main design and vision is done by women i don't see why that means everyone in the company needs to be a woman.

The article doesn't say that everyone in the company is a woman, or that they only hire women.  Just that it's owned by two women and that currently all the designers are women.

[Iamthejuggler]

Anyway, if the game's main design and vision is done by women i don't see why that means everyone in the company needs to be a woman.

The article doesn't say that everyone in the company is a woman, or that they only hire women.  Just that it's owned by two women and that currently all the designers are women.

Ah yeah, good point. 

[Oddball]

All the women I know play video games and non of them have ever complained that there aren't enough games that cater to their tastes. In fact most of them have larger game collections  than me. I don't even think that the majority of games that are released are macho FPSs. I think it just seems that way due to the mainly male orientated gaming press/marketing dept. focusing on those games.

[Zaratustra]

Lansing, what the hell is up with you? If it was a only-male company making games for women you wouldn't be all up in arms about it.

[Chromanoid]

I think it is generally a good idea to focus on special target groups and to obtain a company image. Brandings like "especially for women/men" etc. are very powerful and useful for consumers to recognize a product as interesting.

I don't think it is sexist to make games especially for women. This is the same like making games especially for young boys or students. Look at the anime industry - it just works...

People are heterogenous - we can not tell what somebody likes - but we can guess with data like sex, age, culture group etc.

[Seth]

All the women I know play video games and non of them have ever complained that there aren't enough games that cater to their tastes. In fact most of them have larger game collections  than me. I don't even think that the majority of games that are released are macho FPSs. I think it just seems that way due to the mainly male orientated gaming press/marketing dept. focusing on those games.

you do realize that your anecdotal experience is quite atypical, right?

[moi]

controversy = publicity.

[floatstarpx]

well... it's not like by and large most video games aren't aimed toward guys

No, I don't think people who design games say "let's aim this game towards men".

well, they kinda do. in AAA they will say "look, this is our core demographic for this game - male 22-30. they generally like and know these brands, and read these magazines, and watch these TV shows". etc..

[Gnarf]

And aiming product at a particular target audience isn't necessarily sexist.  This is just some people making the games that they want to play; good for them.

Uh. Aiming at a particular target audience is not the same as just making games you want to play.

Just making a game you want to play yourself is a bit of a fuck you to target audiences and such. And it results in better games. Silicon Sisters are instead going to make bad games. I mean, they must necessarily be games that they themselves will consider worse than the games they would have made if they just made stuff they wanted to play.

[brog]

And aiming product at a particular target audience isn't necessarily sexist.  This is just some people making the games that they want to play; good for them.

Uh. Aiming at a particular target audience is not the same as just making games you want to play.

It is one instance of it, where the target audience is "self".

What I got out of that article (though I may be placing my own interpretation on it) is that the founders of Silicon Sisters
- are female gamers who feel inadequately catered for in their game tastes by both mainstream (male-targeted?) games and "girl games"
- intend to target their games at female gamers who feel inadequately catered for in their game tastes by both mainstream games and "girl games".

The glass is half-full.

[The Monster King]

i thought about it and maybe they'll do any game any other studio would've made with the fact that they're women not changing anything

zing bam women like the same games

[Rob Lach]

I'm all for hiring women, even if they decide to hire only women. It will cast a positive light that being a woman developer is a legitimate career path. The point will be even further punctuated if they are a great success and the mainstream studios will have to take on and compete with their viewpoint.

Then again, I will be entirely disappointed if they release some sort of fashion or doll house game.