Are there girls who like to play Video Games?

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stephanej
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20 Oct 2013, 1:36 pm

Are there girls who like to play Video Games?

I'm wondering. If yes. Which games do you like the most?



Verdandi
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20 Oct 2013, 2:51 pm

45% of people who play video games are women.

http://variety.com/2013/digital/news/wh ... 200569882/

The games I like are not a function of my gender, though. Lots of men and women like these games.



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20 Oct 2013, 3:19 pm

I'm part of that 45% :P

I play a lot of different kinds of games. I like shooting games (Call of Duty, Timeshift, Medal of Honor, Resident Evil, Battlefield...), fighting (Dead or Alive, Tekken, Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Darkstalkers, Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3, Skullgirls, Super Smash Bros...), virtual pet (Nintendogs, Neopets...), racing (Need for Speed, Burnout etc...) and a lot of other games. I also like RPG and Strategy games

Deadpool, Twisted Metal, Final Fantasy, Destroy All Humans are really good games. My favorite "classic" games are Centepide, Tempest, Breakout, Pong, Pac-Man, Dig-Dug, Xevious and Galaga. I play these games on the DS, but one time I went to an actual arcade. Oh, man...I just couldn't decide on what to play.


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20 Oct 2013, 4:05 pm

Grand Theft Auto, Silent Hill, Harvest Moon, The Sims, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater.



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20 Oct 2013, 4:11 pm

Super Mario Bros. series
Sonic series
Zelda series
Super Smash Bros series
Spyro series
Megaman series
Pokemon series
Bloody Roar series
Tetris
Pac-man
Ms. Pac-man
Galaga
Space Invaders
Frogger
Arkanoid/Breakout
Pong


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20 Oct 2013, 4:27 pm

I'm a guy and play DOTA 2 mostly. Male dominated game but lots of female players!



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20 Oct 2013, 4:43 pm

Seems that they mostly play social-media oriented games, plus that reports includes smart-phone games, which must include a huuuge chunk of female gamers.

I often wonder why you don't see many women involved though... Sure there are anecdotes of "Hey, I played with a girl once!" But there definitely isn't ay density.... I think that's because games are very much like sports or the military, especially mmos. Each person has a role to perform that can effect the entire outcome of the team. If somebody isn't pulling their weight, they get left behind or reprimanded, people need to be hardened and conditioned, much like how the military works.

I think that do or die mentality is contrary to what women have, which is to nurture a deficiency, and I think that is VERY good thing to have since we don't have to rally soldiers to fight off the injuns/mongol hordes like in the past... but I think that might be way women aren't often involved, games are too bloody/team oriented, they don't want to destroy, they want to create.



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20 Oct 2013, 5:12 pm

I'm a girl, and my favourite games are Dota2, Terraria, Mass Effect 1-3, Dragon Age Origins & 2, Avadon: The Black Fortress, The Binding of Isaac, BioShock, Dear Esther, The Path, To The Moon, Plants vs Zombies, Sonic 2, Skyrim and Silent Hill 1 & 2.

But girls do definitely play video games, and in my gaming social circles, the majority of us are women. It's important to note, however, that both men and women play smart phone games. For example, my boyfriend only plays smart phone games so is a "gamer" in that respect - but if he said he was a gamer, just how many people would kick up a fuss and say he wasn't a real gamer and bet he only played smart phone games right off the bat? Yet I've had this happen to me countless times - "I'm a gamer" "Oh, so things like iPhone games?".

Games are marketed towards men, seen as a 'guy thing' and gaming circles tend to be a hostile environment for women to be in. I think sexism is a big influence over the lack of/seeming lack of women in gaming.



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20 Oct 2013, 7:36 pm

I used to play MechWarrior games, various flight sims, some fighting games.

Now I play mostly Prince of Persia and Skyrim. I don't have many newer games.



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20 Oct 2013, 9:10 pm

Klowglas wrote:
Seems that they mostly play social-media oriented games, plus that reports includes smart-phone games, which must include a huuuge chunk of female gamers.


I don't think this is quite as true as it is often presented. I usually see it stated by men who are trying to rationalize something about video games and who's really playing them.

Plus, those games are as valid as any other.

Anyway:

http://www.theesa.com/facts/pdfs/ESA_EF_2013.pdf

This also states that 54% of video game purchasers are men, and 46% are women.

Quote:
I often wonder why you don't see many women involved though... Sure there are anecdotes of "Hey, I played with a girl once!" But there definitely isn't ay density.... I think that's because games are very much like sports or the military, especially mmos. Each person has a role to perform that can effect the entire outcome of the team. If somebody isn't pulling their weight, they get left behind or reprimanded, people need to be hardened and conditioned, much like how the military works.


See, this makes no sense to me. I have encountered a lot of other women in games, to the point that I'd say my experiences come fairly close to the 45% of video gamers are women statistic. I am not even talking about that attempt of yours above to locate women playing only certain categories of games.

Your comments about "games are very much like sports or the military" are nonsense. Women play these games and we play them in significant numbers.

Quote:
I think that do or die mentality is contrary to what women have, which is to nurture a deficiency, and I think that is VERY good thing to have since we don't have to rally soldiers to fight off the injuns/mongol hordes like in the past... but I think that might be way women aren't often involved, games are too bloody/team oriented, they don't want to destroy, they want to create.


I think this is an unwarranted generalization. Games aren't the military, they aren't a war, they're entertainment.

I find that I often comment minimally or rarely on some video game-related forums because I often encounter hostility toward women or ignorance about women presented as authority. Or threads about whether women play video games get hijacked by men explaining why they are absolutely certain women aren't wired to enjoy video games, or make jokes about making sandwiches or how there are no women on the internet. When I do comment frequently, I end up challenging casual sexism and outright misogyny on a frequent basis.

So I'll tell you why women have been slower to play video games than men:

http://fatuglyorslutty.com/

Misogyny.

Men acting like video games belong to them, and treating women like intruders and interlopers who need to be put in their place.

Getting stalked or hit on by guys with no sense of boundaries and a perception of women as being sexually available for his pleasure.

Because many video games are aimed and marketed at men. I don't mean that stuff you said about hardening up or sports or being in the military. I mean consistently making the main characters men, tokenistic inclusion of women, if a woman is the main character, she is often hypersexualized. Video games that are essentially designed for the male gaze. This is changing over time, but it is still an issue.

http://finallyfeminism101.wordpress.com ... %E2%80%9D/

But despite this 45% of video gamers are women. And then we get things like your post, framing women as not playing the kind of games you like, and then offering pseudoscientific and unbacked claims about what women are like to explain women's alleged absence from these games as if it's a thing that just ~happened~ with no sociological reasons, like, say, misogynist hostility from men who are overly territorial.



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21 Oct 2013, 5:12 am

^ thinking about it, too, do games really require that "do or die" mentally (that women don't lack - surprise surprise, we're all different individuals with different attitudes)? Sure, maybe things like CoD and games like it. But a lot of the games a play are based around the story and even the MMOs I play are about co-operation with my party to complete the current objective.

Also, it's really easy to say "I've seen no women in gaming". In games like LoL, or Dota2, or MMOs, where she doesn't come on the mic, we always tend to assume an anonymous screen-name is a man. That's pretty screwed up. There are probably more women than people give credit for.



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21 Oct 2013, 5:50 am

As mentioned in another post already. "Sims...I tried it once...its sooooooo lame. ^^ Rockband caused me learning drums. ^^

Other genres I like: From now and then I am into MMORPGS. Adventure games like "The Book of unwritten tales" or "Chaines of Satinav". Classic and traditional RPGs... (so Mass Effect or Skyrim is for me already on the border to a third person shooter with story.) Tactical/building games like "The Settlers", "Heroes of Might and Magic" or "Age of Wonders". Horror Games like the first two Resident Evils or Doom III (Genre is less important then Thrill.). And among friends we play Shooter from now and then, but we prefer the tactical ones, less CoD or such stuff, ...

Things I hate: Jump and Run, Sports and Racing, mindless shooters like CoD, so called Action-RPGs, Grinders like Diablo, Asia Grinder MMORPGS, Asian "sweetheart-fairytales" RPG (I want my axe/repulsive blaster and my beer. ^^)..."

Klowglas wrote:
But there definitely isn't ay density.... I think that's because games are very much like sports or the military, especially mmos. Each person has a role to perform that can effect the entire outcome of the team. If somebody isn't pulling their weight, they get left behind or reprimanded, people need to be hardened and conditioned, much like how the military works.

I think that do or die mentality is contrary to what women have, which is to nurture a deficiency, and I think that is VERY good thing to have since we don't have to rally soldiers to fight off the injuns/mongol hordes like in the past... but I think that might be way women aren't often involved, games are too bloody/team oriented, they don't want to destroy, they want to create.


I met in MMORPGS pretty much woman. Starting with WoW I began with WoW Launch in a guild, that made it to be the third-best on our fraction and server, then Warhammer and MMORPG I played was Star-Wars Old-Republic online. I agree that woman dont like to play with people that are hysterically into that fight or die mentalitiy, instead of them being aware that its only a game, so there is no reason for that mentality. But the reason why such people play less with woman, seems in my oppinion to be more about ignore-lists, then about the amount of woman playing such games. I play to enjoy the game. If there is some hysteric lamer, getting his issues for 10 minutes, whenever something happens wrong in the group, I dont enjoy that. So people like that, get on my ignore lists. If failure happens, nothing bad about trying to solve it as a group, discuss the reasons for the failures, seek solutions ... thats what constructive raiding is about. But if people mismatching a game with something serious, hysterically screaming around at group members with no reason, are not worth ruining my free time. ^^ And conditioner I get in the shower, no need for that while raiding.



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21 Oct 2013, 9:46 am

Meet them constantly in MMOs. I usually play a healer in MMOs and some of the best healers I ever meet were girls. I just chalked up me losing to having to raid lead as well just to get the impressions I saved face if I lost :)


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21 Oct 2013, 11:55 am

I'm a female, and I play games (but not MMO's or smartphone apps with other people). I mainly play RPG's, with a mixture of male and female protagonists. My RPG's post-digital include Oblivion, Skyrim, KOTOR, ME2, Blue Dragon, and the old Harry Potter OOTP open RPG that came out for Xbox. Too many to name prior to those (because I was a kid with many hours of play time). Given the choice between an RPG and a simulation/strategy game, I will generally choose the RPG. That said, I crave Harvest Moon. My simulation/strategy games (besides Harvest Moon) include XCOM EU, Fire Emblem, Viva Pinata, some of the LEGO games, and I also love match-3 puzzles and logic puzzles (Toki Tori and the new Stanley Parable are good examples).

Video games are amazing for my sanity.



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21 Oct 2013, 2:09 pm

"I usually see it"

"My experience is"

These are the anecdotes I'm talking about which suffers from something like tunnel-vision. Seriously i've been playing online videogames long enough to know that it's most definitely intensely male-saturated, and I don't really see the benefit in anyone trying to falsify teh truth as if there's some benefit to that. Are there women? Yes, are there as many as guys? Not even close. I don't have any graphs or anyting to make my own anedotes any better though.

Verdandi wrote:
Klowglas wrote:
Seems that they mostly play social-media oriented games, plus that reports includes smart-phone games, which must include a huuuge chunk of female gamers.


I don't think this is quite as true as it is often presented. I usually see it stated by men who are trying to rationalize something about video games and who's really playing them.

Plus, those games are as valid as any other.

Anyway:

http://www.theesa.com/facts/pdfs/ESA_EF_2013.pdf

This also states that 54% of video game purchasers are men, and 46% are women.




Types of online games played says it all. Puzzle/Boardgames are a first, if you were to ask what games were most played on a videogame forums, all the posters would say action games as they are mostly all male, but puzzle/boardgames are a first because it's mostly women there. But purchaser graphic doesn't really say all that much as it can include women who buy games for their children but don't necessarily play them, and a lot of online games aren't really 'purchasable' in a traditional sense...ultimatley I don't think that website can say much about whose playing what to be honest...interesting site nonetheless.



Quote:

Quote:
I often wonder why you don't see many women involved though... Sure there are anecdotes of "Hey, I played with a girl once!" But there definitely isn't ay density.... I think that's because games are very much like sports or the military, especially mmos. Each person has a role to perform that can effect the entire outcome of the team. If somebody isn't pulling their weight, they get left behind or reprimanded, people need to be hardened and conditioned, much like how the military works.


See, this makes no sense to me. I have encountered a lot of other women in games, to the point that I'd say my experiences come fairly close to the 45% of video gamers are women statistic. I am not even talking about that attempt of yours above to locate women playing only certain categories of games.

Your comments about "games are very much like sports or the military" are nonsense. Women play these games and we play them in significant numbers.


Well what is the goal in videogames? More often than not, especially in team-oriented videogames the players act as unit where strategy and tactics are needed in order to achieve an objective...boys want to do this much MUCH more than girls do as it imitates the military, something that has been male-oriented since the dawn of man... Women much prefer things that are more oriented towards creating and cultivating, such as puzzles and social media games (which is just as important a function).

Quote:

Quote:
I think that do or die mentality is contrary to what women have, which is to nurture a deficiency, and I think that is VERY good thing to have since we don't have to rally soldiers to fight off the injuns/mongol hordes like in the past... but I think that might be way women aren't often involved, games are too bloody/team oriented, they don't want to destroy, they want to create.


I think this is an unwarranted generalization. Games aren't the military, they aren't a war, they're entertainment.

I find that I often comment minimally or rarely on some video game-related forums because I often encounter hostility toward women or ignorance about women presented as authority. Or threads about whether women play video games get hijacked by men explaining why they are absolutely certain women aren't wired to enjoy video games, or make jokes about making sandwiches or how there are no women on the internet. When I do comment frequently, I end up challenging casual sexism and outright misogyny on a frequent basis.

So I'll tell you why women have been slower to play video games than men:

http://fatuglyorslutty.com/

Misogyny.

Men acting like video games belong to them, and treating women like intruders and interlopers who need to be put in their place.

Getting stalked or hit on by guys with no sense of boundaries and a perception of women as being sexually available for his pleasure.

Because many video games are aimed and marketed at men. I don't mean that stuff you said about hardening up or sports or being in the military. I mean consistently making the main characters men, tokenistic inclusion of women, if a woman is the main character, she is often hypersexualized. Video games that are essentially designed for the male gaze. This is changing over time, but it is still an issue.

http://finallyfeminism101.wordpress.com ... %E2%80%9D/

But despite this 45% of video gamers are women. And then we get things like your post, framing women as not playing the kind of games you like, and then offering pseudoscientific and unbacked claims about what women are like to explain women's alleged absence from these games as if it's a thing that just ~happened~ with no sociological reasons, like, say, misogynist hostility from men who are overly territorial.


Oh my, hot-button issue for you? I apologize if my post sounded misogynistic (which I am no where near). I even stated several times that I prefer that people become more inclined towards creation, most videogames are really designed to feed into a males aggression; they're about domination; destruction; dominion or what have you... which is another reason why I think you see sluttier and sluttier looking women, it's pure fan-service...but It is what sells.

I really don't think the gender lines can be blurred in regards to whose a gamer (and I really don't see the benefit in doing so), boys want to play with the trainsets, girls want to play with dolls, (as if dolls are a bad thing, as I stated earlier its better that people are geared towards cultivation rather destruction, especially in this day an age where no-one needs to be forced into the military). Neither is superior to the other as both form an important role for society.

But My point isn't that women can't enjoy videogames, it's that there are A LOT more males playing videogames (and to be fair, CERTAIN videogames, which I mean action/rpg/adventure)...

Heck, I mean look at the steam user id swap thread below, look at the Users exchanging ID's....nothing but males, which is heart-wrenching because I know precisely how lonely they feel, but I really don't see any benefit in lying to them. It's really depressing because these guys are also looking for girls to share this similar interest with, but just isn't any female density, thus there aren't any women looking for friends, even if there is an occasional women, she is utterly dwarfed by the sheer amount of guys.



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21 Oct 2013, 2:17 pm

Klowglas wrote:
boys want to play with the trainsets, girls want to play with dolls


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