Lady Geek

“38 percent of video-game players are female, and most of the industry doesn’t know — or care — what they want” according to an article in Yahoo this week.

They review “Babyz” is one of Ubisoft’s “Imagine” series of girl-oriented games, which also includes “Fashion Designer,” “Animal Doctor” (can you believe that they didn’t want to use the word veterinarian as they thought it would put children off?) and “Master Chef.” I haven’t tried any of the games so can’t agree or disagree if its as dire as the reviewer makes out. What I do know though, is with the amount of “shovelware” targeting this group needs a deep understanding of what young girls want and like and this goes beyond the superficial of make it pink, girly and princess like. Young girls are so grown up these days, I am often shocked like most parents I imagine, at how sophisticated and complex my 8 year old niece is.As one woman writes in womengamers.com, “Most of the content sounds like “girl sanitized” versions of other games. I think this stuff is dreamed up in the minds of clueless marketing people that just see a marketing demographic and strategize how to make a game more “girly.”

Whilst there is clearly a market for this genre of games, otherwise games companies would not keep churning them out, there are girls out there who do not respond to this and companies have to be brave and be amongst the few to really push the boundaries and not end up sanitizing the game play. Lets hope that the Imagine range goes onto show a true understanding of young girls and the imagination of the marketers behind it.