Video Games and the Female Audience


Episode Six in my series of video “lectures,” with special guest star: Gamasutra’s Leigh Alexander! Enjoy the new title and credits! I can be reached at floydo_animation at yahoo dot com. Leigh can be reached at leighalexander1 at gmail dot com. Read more by Leigh at: sexyvideogameland.blogspot.com Like the intro/outro music? Download the full tracks here! Penguin Cap www.carbohydrom.net Test Dummy ocremix.org

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25 Responses

  1. EMIRIzilla Says:

    @fafee88 Yup. I pretty much don’t play FPS games unless I have a friend playing. I have regular servers that I know most of the community, so there’s minimal asshattery, but you still get it every now and then… And of course the community will gossip about you (wondering how hot you are, talking about your voice, what you say to them– etc), whereas if you were male you’d go unnoticed… I hate the extra attention, but playing an FPS team game without using voice-com sucks…

  2. EMIRIzilla Says:

    A+ great video.

    I particularly like the mention of girls who use games to feed their desire for attention (See: people who use their photos for their gaming id…) Additionally, for all the girls out there– creating separate “female clans” is ridiculous! “Separate but equal” doesn’t work. I thought we already learned that.

  3. mishamcbride Says:

    @MutantWren Same here, I’m female also and I now play male toons exclusively, I tell people my mic port is broken so they don’t hear my voice. If you look female not only will you get harassed, guys act condescending and patronizing and assume you can’t play the game well. I don’t need that shit in my video games, I play to have fun and get good loot. Only when I play a male toon do I get treated as an equal. Sad, isn’t it?

  4. MutantWren Says:

    Sir, you are a genius. You hit almost every nail right on the head!

    Only other point I wish you’d touched on was harassment in multiplayer settings. I’m female, and I will, almost without exception, play male characters in MMOs, and I know a few female friends who apparently have ’sexy voices’ who have invested in cheap voice-changers or just avoided using a mic because of getting constantly hit on and otherwise harassed by random guys.

  5. MayuZane Says:

    @MarilynFilth Just ignore the person. It’s either a troll, a close-minded chauvinist or an imbecile and not worth your time.

  6. Lostfaith1980 Says:

    No no… I cant agree. Breasts are an integral part of gaming. As are butts, nudity and hyper-sexualisation. ^_^
    This trend MUST continue! For the sake of all mens love of the female body. ^_~

  7. ert637 Says:

    ironic how there is a play boy masion game cover at 8:33 for ps2

  8. MarilynFilth Says:

    @snipessssss I play video games because I enjoy them more than clubs or other social venues that are no fun to me. I’d rather have a lan party with my boyfriend and friends than have a kegger and loose brain cells, sorry.

  9. MarilynFilth Says:

    @snipessssss What do you mean women didn’t help to build? Yeah there have never been as many women in that field, but at the same time there have always been female programmers, IT execs and designers.

    No-one wants your games to suffer, just realise that women enjoy playing games too that’s all. Allow women to join! Fuck where are you from?

  10. GLaDOShugger Says:

    i loved this video, i totally agree with him and he really discussed and considered most or all of the aspects invlolved pretty well

  11. themagicalemi Says:

    I am a female gamer, I LOOOOVE Bioshock and Halo!
    i am also devoted follower of the Final Fantasy Series and drooling fan of Kingdom Hearts.
    It’s true that, being a female gamer, i am quite alienated by my female piers, but the more open gamer males accept me readily. The few female gamers i have met have become some of the best friends i have, and my small group of gaming friends is all i need to stay happy. That, and my games, of course:)

  12. snipessssss Says:

    Why exactly should we allow women into an arena in which they did not help to build?

    This whole video game industry is something that men have created for men. Why the fuck should we all of a sudden allow women to join? Just because they say so? Hell, no. I’m not letting the genre of games that I like suffer just so a bunch of pussies can try to act like dudes.

  13. snipessssss Says:

    @MarilynFilth Guys who play video games are usually people with nothing productive or better to do and have a lot of free time. Girls who play videos games are even bigger losers with no lives at all.

  14. fireguardianTMNT Says:

    Let women fight for themselves men just mind your own business and let’s continue viewing them as just sex objects :D

  15. areeb10000 Says:

    CASUAL GAMES SUUUUUUUUUUUUCK

  16. MarilynFilth Says:

    @bigalexk2008 Many women go on halo, WoW and online UT now and don’t even say they are female, it’s just too hard; either we don’t get taken seriously or they want to baby us and protect us. It can be very frustrating, there are only a few guys in my guild who I trust and tell and they’ve never cared either way they just treat me like a person, which is all I want.

  17. MarilynFilth Says:

    @fireguardianTMNT I am a woman you blithering idiot! I am glad so many companies bethesda, blizzard, Epic Games etc include great female characters, and that their are so many intelligent men who see women enjoy playing video games as much as the “boys.”

    Fuck you’re a tool.

  18. fireguardianTMNT Says:

    @MarilynFilth

    Like I said, if you care about something else that you’re not so much…go join them.

  19. zombieDAYe Says:

    Absolutely loved this presentation.

  20. SuperRocketPenguin Says:

    @MarilynFilth yea unreal tournament one of my all time favs :)

  21. deathhound7 Says:

    I’m a guy, and over-sexualized females can be a put-off for me if it smells of trying to draw people in on sex alone. I don’t want to play some dim-witted piece of shit that banks only on excessive machismo and boobage. Boobage is nice, but only as mere aesthetics IMO, I need characters I can genuinely care about, and games I can genuinely play.

    My sister is into JRPGs (So am I), I’ve had no luck converting her to FPS and A/A games.

  22. MarilynFilth Says:

    @SuperRocketPenguin That’s why Unreal Tournament has always been such a great fps. They have always had the choice of male or female characters in all their games. I wish they would bring out the choice of male and female in more fps though because those and rpgs are my fave.

    It’s not hard just do what mass effect did, name the lead with their last name and then the player can chose the gender of the character.

  23. MarilynFilth Says:

    @fireguardianTMNT Wow, I can tell your a decent, rational human being.

  24. MarilynFilth Says:

    @airbeyonder18 This is why I love the people who made Oblivion, fallout 3 and the one’s who made NWN2 and Dragon age, mass effect. They have strong male and female characters, all with personal stories and the lead characters can be male or female.

    There are heaps of games that know there are many female gamers Unreal have always catered to men and women because they realise if they don’t they are losing almost 50% of their profit. Blizzard is a good company too, always included women.

  25. fireguardianTMNT Says:

    Well since you care so much about the girls on this planet why don’t you go get plastic surgery and join them then and start a riot with them then…faggot.

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