The Hunter and Gatherer

"Do media platforms and genres have specific gender appeal? Why don't more women play console games?"

Is there a social element to consider?

In this weeks Applied Media Research lecture we were joined by Rebel Play game publishers. They came in to discuss the reason why women don't play games consoles. However, according to statistics around 58% of gamers are men leaving the other 42% to be women. So is this merely a preconception? An article from the BBC goes further in discussing this "Would all women gamers please stand up!". It talks about how it is easy to assume that women don't play video games, due to stereotypes and certain gender ideals which have been created over time. To begin with you have to think about the aesthetics of gaming, are they important? For example many of the consoles out right now are either black or white, is there a reason for this? Are white consoles supposed to appeal to women more, or is this too merely a preconception. Another thing to look at are the controllers, from a personal perspective I often find the xbox controllers too complex, with the need for specific finger placement for some games it is hard to learn the combinations unless you are a die hard xbox fan, not only because all of there controllers are similar but because some games require a beforehand knowledge. Advertising also has a lot to do with this, the use of female hands in the Nintendo Wii adverts suggests that this product is for women and on the flip side, does this make men less inclined to buy this product? Therefore does this question require the need for a psychological interpretation, is there something at gaming companies can do about this?
From a woman's perspective I have my own reasons for not gaming, this is not to say that I haven't gamed and won't do so in the future. However for me gaming does offer a sense of achievement, it is almost true to say that it offers this kind of euphoric feeling, one of my proudest moments a few years ago was when I completed Fable II. This is the only game I have ever completed and looking closely at Fable II it offers a multi-sex user platform whereby you choose whether to be male or female. This worked for me, but did it work on a more universal level and so is this a format that works?
When Fable III finally came out and offered the same option of choosing your player it changed the basic playing process, it began to show the journey of your player along a path at the end of each challenge and in doing so it (for me) became much too achievement based.
This is another suggestion as to why more women do not play console games, most games are founded on this "sense of achievement" and that after spending a whole day fighting off army zombies you will/should gain some kind of prize. One thing that Rebel Play said was that women prefer to 'waste time' on something that will help gain skills for life, which is why intellectual social games such as Bejewelled has such a huge potential market. The male population will use gaming as a kind of social achievement eg. who will finish the new Call of Duty game first or, who will unlock the new level and so on. There is also online gaming which is hugely popular and interconnects players all over the world, this allows gamers to play against their friends and in a sense their "enemies", this web of players also pushes out this negative male dominated stereotype and in doing so, does this push away potential female gamers?
Why do people play games?
Is it due to "Sticky games", boredom, pursuit of  fun (specific), a pattern recognition (storyline)?

Here is an interesting video about gaming and although it is fairly unrelated to this question (although the fact that it is presented by a women is highly interesting). She talks about the importance of gaming itself and this sense of euphoria.

At one point in the presentation evolutionary psychology came into question, and after conducting some secondary research into this I found an article titled  "Women in Games" whilst this isn't the most informative document it touches upon the hunter-gatherer theory and it explains "how our behaviour is driven by three forces, with the cultural element dominating in a great many situations- but not all." This theory notes how men are drawn into shooting games due to skills gained in prehistoric times whilst hunting for food, and so they are better at focusing on long distant targets. Whereas women are better at seeing things that are in front of them, which is suggested why they focus on a more immediate response with a good and positive outcome that improves their life skills.

Going back to the question itself and linking it with University, what number of students are currently enrolled into creative media courses and is this a problem for the future of gaming, Rebel Play stated that the problem with getting more women playing games is directly linked to the fact that there are very few women in the gaming industry. Therefore would it beneficial for a company such as Rebel Play to infiltrate the local/national Universities and conducting focus groups or workshops with a sample of female digital media students. 

Another key point to assess is the change in technology, it has become far less computational and is now offered on a widely available level, the attitude to technology has also changed it has become an integral part of society.

One final statistic to consider is that the biggest emerging market in gaming is women over the age of 18, and so is the problem simply in how games are trying to appeal to women, are they put off by the rise and repeat element or are the mechanics of the game a turn off? 

I believe that there is a problem somewhere and it lies within the educational element of gaming, more needs to be done about positively representing the gaming industry and therefore reconstructing those archaic ideologies.