Female-friendly game design?

[Olgar Shiverstone]

My wife has played some D&D from time to time but has never really latched on to it, despite being a big fantasy fan. One of the turn-offs for her has been the increasing complexity of the game; she prefers more casual games and generally won't get very invested. At the same time, D&D (and RPGs in general, by extension) has a reputation for very low participation of women.

It's probably downright dangerous to try and draw some conclusions based on gamer gender, and I would speculate that most female gamers would put their emphasis on being gamers rather than being female. But my wife's experience does make me wonder: are there fundamental aspects of game design that could make RPGs more (or less) appealing to female gamers? It would be fascinating if we could get something closer to a 50/50 split across groups to be the norm (yes, I'm aware that there are many majority-female groups, though I suspect it's not that common).

My own hypothesis says the gender split in RPGs has little to do with mechanical game design and much more to do with social and group dynamics that tend to make women feel unwelcome when joining a group that then sours the RPG experience. I suspect underlying causes are societal norms, pressures, male gamer immaturity, fewer females involved in wargaming that underlies D&D's roots, and a whole host of other reasons probably unique to the individual.

Still, I'd appreciate views on the design aspects.

 

[halfjack]

Our game, Hollowpoint, was not designed with women in mind (or men for that matter) but it has a startlingly high female buyer (and player, and play reporter) demographic. Almost every play report I've collected has at least one woman at the table, most are closer to 50% and more than half are run by women. The buyers are split almost 50/50 from those that I can determine gender for sure. This is wonderful and surprising.

What did we do right? We made a game that is about violence and competence and betrayal and missions.

In other words I have no idea, but I do know that anything I might have deliberately designed for women would, by comparison, probably have been a complete failure. It might be that the game gives everyone permission (indeed it requires you) to be a complete badass. It turns out women like that at least as much as men.

 

[Umbran]

But my wife's experience does make me wonder: are there fundamental aspects of game design that could make RPGs more (or less) appealing to female gamers?

I don't think there's anything fundamental in the game design to make things more appealing to women, in general. Women don't all like like just one thing you can target, 'cause they aren't all the same. Female gamers vary as much as male gamers.

There's a lot you can do with game presentation to make it more appealing to women, but that's a different matter.

 

[edemaitre]

Women and role-playing

I agree that there are some cultural factors and styles that may affect the participation of female role-players. However, it's best to approach promoting your game to individual women and groups.

Is there a lot of locker-room, sexist humor? Some of the women I've gamed with were thick-skinned, others less so. Does your wife prefer more narrative-style storytelling to hack-and-slash combat or statistically maximized resource management? Again, I've know both men and women who preferred one over the other.

Blue Rose, Mouse Guard, and various games based on FATE or Cortex focus on building relationships and character development. Some of these systems are also less crunchy and thus more accessible to casual (vs. hardcore or competitive) gamers.

With any individual, Game Master, or group of gamers, it's best to find what rules set, subgenre, and style of play is most appealing. It's also a good idea to be patient -- a game in the style of Dresden Files or Game of Thrones usually won't capture the feeling or player interest in just one session.

 

[TanithT]

Don't use insulting art. A female fighter wearing a chainmail bikini is a no-go; it's obvious that what she is wearing is designed for attracting men, not for actually fighting. It depicts her as an ornamental object with no power who is good for nothing but looking pretty.

I'm not quite sure how to convey exactly how frustrating, insulting and rage-inducing it is to be told these things without a single word being spoken:

1. As a female, you are powerless - you are good for nothing and can not actually fight even if you are supposed to be a fighter. You can only stand there and look pretty in fake sexy armor while the real people get real stuff accomplished.

2. You exist to be judged on your appearance and exploited for it. Comments will always be made on what you look like and how big your bazongas are, not on anything you actually do or say. Only what you wear is important.

3. You are not a real person and can not just be treated like a person. You will be treated and judged solely on the basis of your sex. You have absolutely no chance of being seen or treated like a normal, ordinary human being.

Seriously, that is the message that is being sent with every depiction of a female fantasy character who is being shown as passive and powerless - eg, wearing fake armor that might as well be silk stockings and a bra for all it covers. Just don't do it, please.

 

[Zelda Themelin]

I have noticed that female players vary like male players. Most like being skillful and kick ass. Most females really hate system that forces them to play "females roles" and get sub-par stats because of that. Male players tend to have more female characters in those systems than femele ones, if allowed.

You really can't make game for gender. Maybe to some culturally brainwashed little girls and boys but that really goes before people start playing rpg:s.

Curiously I've noticed that many females including me kinda like named magic items. Some unique name for sword/armor etc and some little quality more than +1 to back it up is something really cool. Appearance of gear is secondary to that. IME females and males pay about same amount of interst for character looks, some are all over such little details, and some coudn't care less, as long as stats are ok. Apperance likers are ones more likely to hide helmet/shouders in World of Warcraft MMO even if they otherwise wear things that look crappy just for stats.

There are about same amount of femele min-maxers than males.

Most female players have one female friend that also plays. And they almost always pair up as type A and type B personalities. B is the one that just doesn't learn the rules and relies on other people what to roll. A-types are there to play rpg, B-types often socially hang and often get datinig someone in the group. I say often, since IME it has been pretty damn common.

Avoid any "special rules" for girls. They exist to screw us up. No only-for females rules, unless you wish to make rules about pregnacy and childbirth, which might come up. In last game I played that caused so many stupid arguments I wish there had been rules.
And with that never ever force that on character. It's annoying and should happen anyhow on personal (not-adventure) time.

If you can't be mature about such things avoid such rules altogether.

I recently got into this new group that uses highly vulgar language and tells nasty in-game jokes. I am fine but I wouldn't ask my sister to play with these guys.

Best kinda roleplay system for femeles is guite gender-neutral one. Sure it can have sexy things, I meant in way system doesn't differiate sexes a lot, but allows players to do that if they want to.

Also system should support more combat focused game and more story-focused game equally White Wolf games did that quite well, even if rules kinda, um, failed sometimes.

Don't assume that all female gamers come from same mold.

Also make the universe you write have some interesting qualities. Basic D&D universes are kinda boring. We have seen those. If you want to attact new gamers in any system use some old that works and add some new to get people interested.

Also, we want "awesome powers". Most femeles dislike realistic historical simulations. There are those out there too, but they often have picked different hobby than rpg:s. Fsntasy is supposed to be, like, fantastic. All females I play with give you roll-eyes if its called "dungeons & dragons" and doesn't have real dungeons and no dragons. Femeles tend to draw deep conclusions about impressions.

And we don't play games like Blue Rose. First of all its too uh... not really avarage female idea of cool/romantic. Plus the world was lame. Girls who are into relationship/romance fantasies do that with books/movies/famious unreachable people. White Wolf game worked because it was game about violence/politic/relationships of supernatural horrors. Who looked hot or at least bad-ass. But were not weak or vunerable. Or petite and virginal. You were crusider fighting for your purity if you were that, within system that was thinly veiled laws of the jungle. And those games had lot of example character types ripped from movies/literature and they had inspirational guide for books/movies at end of each book. And it world similar to this one.

Roleplaying is however quite quiet where I live, no more new players, and if, they are rare and often related to oldie rpg-players as their kids who maybe recruit some friends or just play with pap and hide the shame.

I think we need new coming of rpg:s if we want more of anything to like our games. But there is so much compettion for our time now and roleplaying games take lot of time.

 

[Morrus]

Not that I feel qualified to speak for anyone else, let alone 50% of the population, but my gut reaction is that game design isn't the issue; it's attitudes of those playing the game. A game's a game's a game, and different folks like different types of games.

If there is an aspect of design which has a major effect, I'd nominate art.

 

[Yora]

Don't use insulting art. A female fighter wearing a chainmail bikini is a no-go; it's obvious that what she is wearing is designed for attracting men, not for actually fighting. It depicts her as an ornamental object with no power who is good for nothing but looking pretty.

It's an insult to men as well.

"You don't want think about reality. Here, be distracted by boobs!"

But otherwise, I havn't seen art that 1930s-awful as TanithT described anywhere. I can't remember any princesses that have to be rescued in either 3rd or 4th edition of D&D as well.


I am with Morrus here, that the rules really are not important at all. I've actually run games for two almost exclusively female groups with one or to male players dropping by on occasion, and both time we were playing D&D 3rd Ed.
It's all about the campaign and the adventures that makes the difference.

 

[Li Shenron]

I agree with those that say the game itself shouldn't change, because it both doesn't need and it doesn't help.

Gaming groups are the most responsible and eventually need to check their own behaviour on and off the table, if they care at all about gaming with women. Perhaps many gaming groups already start with a certain idea that "this is guys' corner", good for you but don't complain later.

My point being, someone should join the game simply because (s)he's interested in the game, but the social side of it is a damn important part of it! Otherwise you could just play a MMORPG. So you have to take care of your group's social identity... That's not a RPG-only thing of course, it's true with everything. If your bowling team, rock band or pub-crawling mob is all drunk-n-gross then expect to attract only drunk-n-gross people, not a literature professor or physics researcher.

The one and only thing the game designers can do, is check the artwork... how come nearly all the female characters are either hot, cute or otherwise creepy (sometimes all of these at once) and the male characters are much more normal (although there's many that are so exaggerately masculine that are attractive... for men!). Diversify the art, put more flat-chested or otherwise less-than-perfectly-slim women character, IOW more real women, so that your female gamer feels less guilty or threatened, and then put more male characters that women actually like.

Maybe a good starting point is hiring more female artists to do the artwork...

 

[Electric Wizard]

Most women I know are more amused than offended by how cheesy old-school fantasy art depicts women. That being said, I don't see a lot of that stuff in RPG art these days. I think there are lots of women who want to identify with sexy characters, as long as the characters also capable of holding their own and kicking ass/ruling the castle/researching magic. Almost all art for recent RPG's portrays this pretty well. You almost have to go back to the 80's to find many women portrayed according to negative stereotypes.

A few years ago I DM'd a group with two women. One played a Chaotic Evil tiefling cleric with 20 charisma who usurped the party leader position. The other played a soft-spoken eladrin wizard/aristocrat whose boyfriend played her bodyguard. Two very different people with very different characters, but the rules supported both, and they excelled at their roles.

The campaign worked while it lasted because we toned down the macho talk and dirty jokes. It was different than our typical "guys' night in" games, but we all had a great time. The campaign ended mostly because the tiefling cleric decided that the best way to settle a dispute with a corrupt landowner was to loot and burn down his house in broad daylight.

So I guess I'm casting another vote for "It's up to the group." I think as long as men are welcoming and respectful of social boundaries, women shouldn't have problems.