that is the best experiment ive herd of but did they realy need to spend 4 years doing that when i know it now and most people do but we can still do the same things but have differnt views on it.

and who do you think buys all those bad barbie and my little pony games they just play differnt types genraly ( i know thats a bit of a genralisation)

Wasn't actually an experiment. The parents were just convinced they could raise them to be the same.

Then it doesn't really mean anything. Odds are good that they didn't treat the kids exactly the same - not because of the outcome, but because it has been demonstrated that people do act differently toward boys than they do toward girls.

I wrote a bit about this subject a while back on my web site.

I've been a gamer for a very, very long time (I'm old, what can I say), and I've been a woman for -- well, okay, all my life. Women gamers are much less of a rarity these days than they were ten years ago, and they span all genres. I don't think that women have any inherent bias against RTS games, and I don't think that RTS has any fewer female gamers than any other genre out there. And I do'nt think that girls are inherently better or worse at one genre than another.

I do believe, though, that many women -- not ALL women, just many of them, so women here may be an exception, just as I am myself -- want different things out of their video games than many men, but, as I say in the linked article, I don't think that there are "girl games" and "guy games".

And by the way, I'm convinced that in another ten years we won't even be having this discussion and it will seem silly that we ever had it. I watch my 11 year old niece and ALL her female friends and they spend 90% of their time on their Nintendo DS or their Xboxes. Give it another decade and the next generation of girls will laugh at the idea that they were once considered rare or special.

This is such an interesting thread. 

I think it's already silly

It's silly that women gamers are sort of treated as novelty, and for a lot of guys it's almost something to brag about if they know a woman gamer. This is so apparent when playing MMOs that you can't miss it. Granted, MMOs are not, in general, known for having a high degree of maturity overall among the playerbase. But, having seen what some women have to put up with if they let people know, I'm not surprised at all that a lot don't bother to and prefer to stay low-key.

But why is it such a big deal if girls and women play? What difference does it make? Gaming is a hobby above all else. In a lot of cases it happens to be a social one especially with most games having an online component, but why is it so difficult for a lot of guys to not make a huge deal of finding out that a real girl is playing?

Online, I tend to play female characters. Yes, yes, I know all the taboo of "Why would a guy play a girl", but there are plenty reasons besides "Omg, boobs" or similar that we get accused of. Regardless, I also tend to use a lot of smileys in everyday chat. This should come as no surprise to anyone who reads my posts on the Sins boards . Not long after Age of Conan launched, I went with a pickup group to do a dungeon. We had a tank (guy who's job it is to keep all the enemies off the rest of the team, for those who don't know MMO-speak) that kept talking about his kids. Now, I was a tank in World of Warcraft, so I tend to like talking tank-related stuff. I sent the guy a few tells to chat about tanking in AoC, and a few happy-face smileys. Next thing I know, every tell he starts sending me ends with "hon". I stopped talking to him pretty much immediately. I never said anything that could've been misinterpreted or confused, but he made the assumption - and this was not his first MMO, either, so him being clueless is out of the picture. And if I was, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have wanted to be called 'hon' all the time by a supposed married guy with kids.

I guess at this point I can come out and say that I find it pretty disgusting how women gamers are commonly treated. Not always - there are mature online communities and groups, but I'm sure most can agree that maturity is a fairly rare trait online and certainly not the norm. If only women gamers were treated like normal people who happen to like games too instead of something to be awed over and worshipped - maybe, just maybe, we'd all find that there really are a lot of them who play. They just don't broadcast it because they know what it can ultimately lead to..

There isn't many reasons to play a female char other than how they look, you just want tha boobies! lol Personaly I only play female chars because they look nice, I "identify" closer with my male chars (im male) but these MMOs simply don't give you the options for a good male char.

Those options are thigh length boots, big floppy hats and bare chests. I like the kilts in AoC though...

Generaly all my male chars are big strong naivie fools who don't want to be evil and are therefore the gaurdians of righteous power... Whatever. All the female chars are 'evil'. Which is to do with look and feel, evil men are usualy just thugs and are annoying and repative but evil females are hot and sexy - and they hate you for no reason. Just like real life!

Even my good female chars want to be hot and sexy and envy the evil girls - pink armour just dosn't... fit. To me how a woman looks says more about her than what she says (subconsciously you know), I don't really pay much attention to how men choose to represent themselves visualy unless its very dark, odd or something - which is what all my male chars TRY too look like, like I say they usualy end up look stupid with yellow boots or something. So when I play a female it dosn't feel right unless she looks like she 'feels'. All the details have to be right (and I don't mean breast size - what is it with people and huge boobs?). But how did I get onto this? Now im just rambling.


Have to say though, people who say "hun" are really annoying. The gender issue is always a soruce of good entertainment in MMOs though.

I started it so of course its interesting

Humble as ever, koscy.

Never said it did. Besides, for something like that, I'd take real world results as it would be pretty hard to duplicate it even if someone did do it scientifically. Not to mention that doing it scientifically would be both extremely hard and probably be considered illegal for various reasons.

I think this all boils down to a few key points:

1.) Chicks play games of all genres, and this trend will only go one direction: Up.

2.) Even a girl that isn't that cute scores big points with me if she plays games, especially ones that I also play. If she is cute, then all the better.

3.) If you are cute, feel free to make pics available. Like Hellchick, more pics of you in your dancy outfit. That certainly couldn't hurt your site traffic.

4.) I like playing counter-strike with a chick that has a mic and a hot voice.

5.) Is anyone even still reading these?

6.) I like the new blue mountain dew flavor.

Eww the Blue flavor (gagging) the Voltage flavor is superior in every way.

As for gaming ... my parents bought me an Atari when I was 4. I got a Commodore 128 for my 6th birthday (games on Atari were too easy)and my first PC (an XT model) when I was 9. Since I was 12 years old I have not been beaten at a strategy based game such as any of the Civs, or MOOs or Warcrafts (NOT WOW)unless the game was new or the opponent was (temporarily) better.
This is not to say that I play everyday for 8 hours, but I do play as much as I want of what I want. I will play puzzle type games (LOVE MYST saga and Sam and Max adventures), MMORPGs, FPSs, societal games, almost any game really though I haven't played any strategy games in awhile (read years) as no one local will LAN with me anymore.
Only recently started playing online games (started about a year ago) and had no idea there were FPSs available until I stumbled across one while looking for something else. My joy knows no bounds that I will finally have the ability to play against some new ... targets in a strategy based game. Please recommend the most complex strategy based online game you know of, Thank You.

The pics comment reminds me of why I don't play the first online FPS that I found any more. Some err ... individual was making comments on the shout chat and wouldn't stop. There were no GMs online and I left after he had been going on for about two hours and haven't been back. In the rare occasion that someone asked my real sex I bold face LIE (I use voice modulator software as well). I would rather deal with such comments by the male buddy buddy attitude than by having them (generally worse than under buddy buddy) directed at me.
I have been on MMORPGs where answering "girl" to a question of real sex will get you dropped from the party/guild (yes both have happened to me) and then PKed (very annoying).

In all honesty I think that the male/female gaming ratios are FOBARed. I personally know other women with the same attitude as I towards revealing "real" sex. As well as others who simply stopped playing any online game to avoid such overt behavior disfunctions.

If you're still wondering yes I am a girl. No I will not upload pics (scornful look).

Response to Inches:
1. Yah.
2. I can't blame you there.
3. No.
4. I'll be sure to get some guy using voice modulating software to play with you.
5. Nope.
6. I prefer the Orange Livewire.


Realtime: Sins. Turn-based: Not much experience there, but GalCiv, Civ if it does have online (I'd be surprised if it didn't.), maybe HoMM (Not so complicated, but it's a bit different.).