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[phubans]

On the subject of male VS female psychology that Eres touched on in his last post... I find that women in gaming are a LOT less competitive... Many are just there to have a good time and they don't really care whether they win or lose most of the time. This has been my observation in L4D2 (I've been playing with a lot of females lately; for some reason the community seems to be getting a lot more of them)... Well, I know the men who play L4D2 are extremely competitive (including myself) and aren't really having fun unless they're winning.

I think that's why I was always a little skeptical when women got into male-dominated things like sports and video games, because a lot of them seem to like the attention that comes with it. I mean, if you compare Steam profiles of men VS those of women, I'd say only 1 out of 20 men post a picture of themselves in their Steam profile, while 1 out of 2 women will post a picture of themselves.

So yeah, there are genuinely good and subject-interested women in these fields, but they're often overshadowed by the ones that just like being surrounded by men and compliments. This isn't meant to be a sexist statement; most people enjoy the attention and affirmation from the desired sex. If men could abandon their reservations and social stigmas about entering a female-dominated arena, then I'm sure he'd be quite wise and virtuous. Men just aren't that flexible, though.

In conclusion, video games and sports-watching are things that anyone can pick up, but programming and designing games requires a lot of time, skill, and effort... So, the wheat is separated from the chaff in fields like these, and only the most truly genuinely interested women make it.

[Gimym TILBERT]

@derek

Yep but it is "fair" to play with an handicap?

Imagine a fighting game or only your opponent can take god tier character and you can only take low tier character. And beating the god tier character is a feat that is barely attribute to you but to luck. The only way to get recognition is to beat everybody with your low tier character in strike of at least 3. If such a player exist you bet you will have more people that is in the handicap camp who will try to emulate it, but most won't bother because they see the situation as inherently bias.

So yeah saying to everybody to do their best is fine and an unattackable plan, but miss how the game plays. And yes identification and role model are important, cave story and minecraft have a word for a lot of indie (me it was noitu love 2).


also

http://farukat.es/journal/2011/04/576-translation-general-misogyny-uncomfortable-truth

[Superb Joe]

Sorry If I misunderstood
It look like you made a point about Caruso's point that men made more breakthrough.

I mean, maybe this is true in certain fields. Certainly, in game design, it seems like, up until this point, most of the major breakthroughs have been made by men.

That said, to underestimate a woman because of that? It seems stupid. Some guys seem to treat, say, Albert Einstein being a genius, as some kind of victory for them, just because they share gender. Einstein was an exception by definition. The fact that you and he both have dicks is pretty meaningless.

Personally, I think the guys that root for men based on the actions of men better than them are just reinforcing their own mediocrity. The greats stand on their own, they're not part of the male or female "team".

My advice for anyone who feels like they're in a minority or is being underestimated: treat it as a challenge. It's more reward for you when you eventually end up on top. Be the only girl in a male-dominated field/community and kick ass. You will get respect from the people whose respect matters.

girls do not exist

[Derek]

I don't know about that argument, Gilbert - I don't think of women like they're playing with low-tier characters. Do you feel like they're being barred from using the tools necessary to design great games?

Anyway, here's a quote from Roberta Williams, about being one of the first women in the game industry:

http://classic-web.archive.org/web/20070311121225/http://www.womengamers.com/interviews/roberta.php

It had its pros and cons - as does everything in life. I, personally, never felt any disrespect or resentment from any of the other 'guys' in the computer game industry with my being a woman. I was never held back and, generally speaking, my ideas were well received. Oh…I suppose there was an odd guy now and then who might have felt that I didn't know what I was talking about, or resented the fact that I was who I was, had so much clout, or - horrors! - was married to the CEO of the company, but…overall, I didn't have any problems. I think my main problem was being married to the CEO of the company, not the fact that I was a woman. Some people, over the years, thought that I only achieved what I had achieved because of my husband, but, I always countered those people that the company was started because of a game that I wrote…not something my husband wrote. Therefore, it could be argued that he was there because of ME, not vice versa:>)

Also, in working with people, men as well as women, I have few chips on my shoulder, I stay pretty cool under pressure, and I let things slide off my back. I think those are good qualities for people in order to succeed. If somebody says something negative, generally, I ignore it, and then just work even harder in order to prove them wrong. It's very satisfying to prove someone wrong and then see the egg on their face - especially, if you had done it in a very calm, cool, and professional way, and not ever gave them the satisfaction that they had ever rattled you.

Also, about the "female market" in games:

Until somebody comes up with a gaming category that women really like in droves - and don't expect those guy game computer designers/programmers out there to do that! - I don’t see much change there. It might be up to women to figure that one out. I think that if you wait around for the 'industry' to do something about it, you’ll be waiting a long time. I think, though, that this rather 'unfortunate predicament' could also be an opportunity for some entrepreneurial women! There was no such thing as a female presence in the computer industry until I came along and made the adventure game category a big and important thing. It may now be up to some other enterprising and creative woman to come up with another big idea to capture all of those women out there who would just LOVE to play a computer game!

That's an attitude worthy of respect! And personally, that's the tack I'd like to see women take, rather than the "it's not encouraging enough for women in the game industry" route. Not just women, but everybody. The lack of X in gaming means that there's a huge hole waiting to be filled! It's a big opportunity!

Roberta Williams is awesome.

[Headless Man]

I thought it was bad enough when people were discussing Murray Rothbard quotes - now we're onto Roberta Williams?

[Gimym TILBERT]

@derek

It depend on what you put in the low character tier metaphor and where you accept to stretch that metaphor.

Roberta Williams is great and was lucky.
But exception are not rules?

Let me find a counter example, yet an achievement Brenda Bailey:
http://www.slidetoplay.com/story/women-in-gaming-an-interview-with-brenda-bailey-gershkovitch

STP: Have there been any significant barriers or challenges you've had to overcome primarily because of your gender, and can you give some advice to other women who may face these issues in their own endeavors?

Brenda: One of the toughest challenges is working with funders. There is a decided bias against women-run tech start-ups, even though the stats show that starts-ups led by women have a higher degree of success. Silicon Valley is not as female-friendly as one might hope. Our hope is that once our games are successful, our product will help us break through this barrier. See the Forbes article on this topic here.

Here is the low tier character


The forbes articles:
http://www.forbes.com/2010/06/30/venture-capital-women-finance-forbes-woman-net-worth-business.html

When Cindy Padnos was trying to raise money for investors on Vivant, a software service company she founded in 1999, she noticed a troubling trend. During meetings with venture capitalists, the investors would ignore her and pose questions to her two male vice presidents.

"The typically all-male investors on the other side of the table would frequently turn to them and ask questions that should have been asked of me," Padnos recalls. "For example, 'Can you tell me a little bit about the capital structure of the company?' You don't ask that to a VP of engineering to begin with, let alone someone who's not a cofounder."

That's not idle speculation. After founding Illuminate, Padnos spent six months studying the performance of women-led businesses, combing through more than 100 academic papers and surveying the field independently. She distilled the results into a 15-page report, and what she discovered surprised her. "We found overwhelming evidence that women found companies with lower amounts of capital and that they fail less frequently," Padnos states.

So where does all the money go? Industry insiders often refer to an infamous line from venture capitalist John Doerr: "white, male nerds who've dropped out of Stanford or Harvard and have no social life."

Here is the god tier character


Also
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18uDutylDa4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZymFMmpOa0

[Superb Joe]

there is Literally no such thing as a female, nor has there been at any point

[phubans]

there is Literally no such thing as a female, nor has there been at any point

Solipsism and virginity sounds like a pretty depressing combination.

[starsrift]

I mean, maybe this is true in certain fields. Certainly, in game design, it seems like, up until this point, most of the major breakthroughs have been made by men.

 

Anyway, here's a quote from Roberta Williams, about being one of the first women in the game industry:
http://classic-web.archive.org/web/20070311121225/http://www.womengamers.com/interviews/roberta.php

Brenda Brathwaite is one of the most important female game designers.

The first programmer was a female: Ada Lovelace

 

[speeder]

Returning to topic...

CAROL SHAW IS AWESOME! SHE INVENTED VERTICAL SCROLLING SHMUPS, AND PROCEDURAL COMPLEX MAPS, AND SHMUPS ARE TOTALLY AWESOME! AND PROCEDURAL GAMES ARE AWESOME TOO!

[DjangoDurango]

I don't necessarily think there is or will be any genre that women want in droves. Many of the girls I know enjoy RPG's and puzzle games. Many of them also like third and FPS's and this is the genre I personally prefer. My middle sister likes management games. My youngest sister likes Facebook ones. I once worked with a girl who only played DDR.

If you are trying to appeal to women, maybe it's not the genre you should be looking at, but just what your game says and does in general, particularly with your female characters, the representatives of your game when it comes to giving a female player someone to relate to on the most simple and base way before they even play a game. I mean, I play tons of games with male protagonists and cheap female characters, but that's because I'm used to that and I know that I can't really be picky within the genre I like most.

A lot of women won't. That's why many, if they play games at all, play things like The Sims and Farmville. Not because they don't like other genres but because genres are usually created within on the assumption that only guys play them and everything serves to appeal solely to them. The genres that are believed to appeal to women are not female-oriented; they just aren't overtly male. Additionally, your game need not be made for women. You're honestly probably better off not trying unless you have both the skill to do it well and also aren't planning to reach a wide audience until you get recognized for it. Not because women wouldn't play it but because games for girls have a shitty track record. Even as a child, I could tell game titles made for girls were largely patronizing affairs.

Re: Left 4 Dead 2, it is one of my favorite games and what I like about it is that it is competitive, but how well you do is based on how well you work with your team. Even when playing Versus as an Infected, you want to collaborate to get the job done. Also, neither Zoey or Rochelle are created to be sex objects or even to play second fiddle to the guys and that helps a lot. I don't always play them. In fact, I prefer to be Louis in L4D and I switch between Nick and Rochelle in 2, but it makes a game more accessible if I can go into a game and the women aren't all big tits and string bikinis.

[Gimym TILBERT]

Good stuff

Which have been said and not hear so many times:
http://youtu.be/R8ZVZRsy8N8
Multiple times:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/2868-True-Female-Characters

Yet ...
The point is also that don't need male swap "strong women" either (or only them) Marge, Lisa, Daria, Leela are all different and just interesting character beyond being female. Except whenever there is a female it fall somewhere between "Later" lara croft (which had a good start in the male swap department in the first game), dead or alive jiggly boobs and submissive samus other M.

Aquaria is a good start but his still half naked (you can argue it make sense in the context, but the problem then is we only thought context where nakedness make sense). It's okay to have them, it's not okay to ONLY have them, as a male it bores me to death.

Less lazy cheap please, more effort.

@derek
Also Mc Gonigal who create Gamification (now gamefulness), she operate in a totally new genre (arg) and was behind Portal 2 massive ARG. Why do you only remember male who made breakthrough?

[Derek]

Gamification and ARGs aren't really... video games, are they? It's more like applying ideas related to video games to other types of activities?

Anyway, that's not really the point. It just seems to me like most of the breakthrough games up until recent history have been designed by men. Not all, but most.

There aren't really (m)any well-known Chinese or Asian American designers, either. It's been mostly Japanese and white guys.

[Paul Eres]

side note, but i don't get the idea that there are videogame 'breakthroughs' -- videogame *technology* breakthroughs yes, but that isn't videogames per se, but other than that it's just the art of design, or the introduction of mechanics which are cloned because they were in popular games. but miyamoto and sid meier etc. are not scientists discovering things, they're artists weaving imaginary worlds, so it doesn't make sense to talk of breakthroughs, as if videogames were a science or a technology -- we talk of breakthroughs when it comes to video cameras or special effects in movies, but not when it comes to the movie's screenplay or story. so i don't really think there *are* any breakthroughs when it comes to games (or other arts) aside from developing conventions which become popular (which is not a particularly notable achievement and not something to celebrate)

[Destral]

I just showed up here. Three questions:

1) Why are gendered brain differences being discussed in a topic on female game designers?
2) Is someone actually suggesting that gendered brain differences are responsible for fewer female than male game designers?
3) If yes to 2, why is anyone taking the time to argue against that? Dumb and irrelevant arguments should not be given the time of day, lest their proponents fall under the delusion that they actually have a point.

Here's a more useful direction for discussion towards which you can turn this thread: talk about what Tigsource, as a male-centered community, can do to encourage more female game designers, both within the TIG community and in the game industry at large (hint: one obvious answer to that question is "pretty much the polar opposite of what you're doing in this thread").

FIRST WE NEED TO FIND OUT THE BRAIN-RELATED CAUSES THAT MAKE YOU ALL SO DIFFERENT SO WE KNOW HOW TO START COMMUNICATING WITH YOU

and also call eachother misogynist and tell eachother how little the other has ever spoken to girls. to prove that _I_ have at least SPOKEN to the girls! As opposed to YOU.

' 0 ' it would be nice if a thread like this could work. Maybe it would have to have the findingsolutionstoproblems kind of wording right in the thread title so people wouldn't be too derailed. Well I don't know.

YAH, I DON'T SPEAK VENUSIAN, ONLY MARTIAN. I CAN'T UNDERSTAND YOU VENUSIANS. IT'S LIKE YOU COME FROM A DIFFERENT PLANET.