4 ms·

Animal Crossing would be another game that has a massive female audience from a AAA studio. > Despite the fact that there has been a huge industry push in the

Animal Crossing would be another game that has a massive female audience from a AAA studio. > Despite the fact that there has been a huge industry push in the last 10-15 years to make a game that draws in tons of female players Ultimately its poor marketing. They want to make Call of Duty and get that audience, but also get girls to play Call of Duty. Instead of making a game with mass appear to both boys and girls.

bluefirebrand 7mo ago
> Instead of making a game with mass appear to both boys and girls. Or admitting that there's just no such thing as universal mass appeal
- ecshafer 7mo ago
  Stardew Valley and Minecraft are probably the closest of any games I have seen that has universal mass appeal. But even they aren't really universal.
  - bluefirebrand 7mo ago
    Not even remotely universal, honestly. They appear to have a reasonably balanced playerbase but that doesn't mean universal at all. Your average COD player doesn't give a rats ass about Stardew Valley, for instance Universal implies more than just 50-50 split between sexes, imo. It's an impossible standard to reach for any consumer product
    - saltcured 7mo ago
      Could you imagine a game mechanic complex enough to have these different audiences participate in the same "universe"? I.e. the FPS players could embody the military forces in a complex society where more RPG players are doing the diplomacy and strategy, others are playing in engaging "home front" social environments, someone is off doing city-planner/factory logistics stuff, etc. There could be some deep-diving, dungeon-crawling sub-games within all these realms, but also more casual modes too. But, crucially, it is all tied together in a unified simulation so that these different player groups are actually steering a coherent story and state space for the shared world. The outcomes of diplomacy, warfare, industry, trade, local social groups, etc. should all have impact on each other.
      - lstodd 7mo ago
        It's what Eve Online was in better days.
      - Am4TIfIsER0ppos 7mo ago
        The timescale between shooter and strategy layers sounds too great for that to work. Imagine playing Civilization like that. You build and set your army to attack the enemy but then you have to wait for the hour long shooting match in Battlefield to resolve. Sounds as exciting as playing multiplayer Civ where you have to wait for the others to spend as long resolving their turns as you did yours.
        saltcured 7mo ago
        I see. I didn't really think about the temporal, multi-user aspects. To be honest, I'm mostly a solo FPS player. The immersive feedback loop is pretty much the whole draw. I would be open to a broader range of story/plot genres if they could provide this satisfaction. I don't need the "shoot" part of FPS, just the first-person part where my real-time, 3D movement and perspective gives me agency, objectives, and entertaining experience. I naively imagined some game universe that could integrate multi-user input to adjust or build the story in a shared fashion. Like some kind of crowd-sourcing variant of a procedural generator. So your high level strategy would go through the filter of people like me trying to enact it. But, I didn't really thinking about the real-time aspect of coupling user interactions. I wonder if there is some kind of statistical simulation model that could bridge these worlds with latency masking. I don't need a continuous 24x7 real-time simulation. I just need a coherent state model during my session and preferably some coherent story for how the sessions connect together...
        Am4TIfIsER0ppos 7mo ago
        From what little I've heard one of the recent MMO shooters is a bit like that. You're fighting part of a larger war so if you win in the shooting game you move the "front line". I think an older one from Sony (maybe?) also had a similar larger conflict. I might have been thinking too literal with my examples. One could possibly make it work with some sort of averaging of people's play. I can't say what that might be like. I've not played online since Battlefield 2 except a bit of friendly Stellaris (which didn't go well).
- torginus 7mo ago
  I think there is, but if there existed a topic that was a kryptonite to women, its tacticool grey and brown 'dark and gritty' misery porn.
  - mghackerlady 7mo ago
    I mean, I think that can be cool but there really isn't much substance to the games other than the repetitive "shoot people" gameplay and occasionally decent story. I liked Modern Warfare and World at War I guess, but if you've played a COD you've played them all
- TulliusCicero 7mo ago
  Not truly universal, but some games like Minecraft get pretty close. At the same time, it's not realistic to aim for that level of appeal with every game. Most games are going to aim for some sort of niche, just like any other media.
  - bluefirebrand 7mo ago
    Yep. Majority of games targeted Men because that's who was buying and playing games. That's starting to shift a little. But there is probably no way to release an Assassin's Creed or Call Of Duty that is going to appeal to women as much as men. That's just not a realistic product goal imo. Games need to know their audience, and franky they have been very successful targeting young men for decades. My take is that most times they try to target "both men and women" they flop. There are rare exceptions like Baldur's Gate 3 that seem to reach everyone. But it's rare
    - TulliusCicero 7mo ago
      Even BG3, do we have actual numbers on men vs women playing?
      - birdsongs 7mo ago
        Anecdotal, but me and most of my circle of women friends all love(d) BG3.
- Forgeties79 7mo ago
  Hollywood figured it out decades ago. Video games can definitely do it
- torginus 7mo ago
  I mean the existence of stuff like Roblox, Minecraft or the aforementioned games shows there kinda is.
  - bluefirebrand 7mo ago
    I know Minecraft is not a universal game because even among my friends who love games I can barely get anyone to play it with me Modded Minecraft is really cool these days.

bluefirebrand 7mo ago

> Instead of making a game with mass appear to both boys and girls. Or admitting that there's just no such thing as universal mass appeal

ecshafer 7mo ago
Stardew Valley and Minecraft are probably the closest of any games I have seen that has universal mass appeal. But even they aren't really universal.
- bluefirebrand 7mo ago
  Not even remotely universal, honestly. They appear to have a reasonably balanced playerbase but that doesn't mean universal at all. Your average COD player doesn't give a rats ass about Stardew Valley, for instance Universal implies more than just 50-50 split between sexes, imo. It's an impossible standard to reach for any consumer product
  - saltcured 7mo ago
    Could you imagine a game mechanic complex enough to have these different audiences participate in the same "universe"? I.e. the FPS players could embody the military forces in a complex society where more RPG players are doing the diplomacy and strategy, others are playing in engaging "home front" social environments, someone is off doing city-planner/factory logistics stuff, etc. There could be some deep-diving, dungeon-crawling sub-games within all these realms, but also more casual modes too. But, crucially, it is all tied together in a unified simulation so that these different player groups are actually steering a coherent story and state space for the shared world. The outcomes of diplomacy, warfare, industry, trade, local social groups, etc. should all have impact on each other.
    - lstodd 7mo ago
      It's what Eve Online was in better days.
    - Am4TIfIsER0ppos 7mo ago
      The timescale between shooter and strategy layers sounds too great for that to work. Imagine playing Civilization like that. You build and set your army to attack the enemy but then you have to wait for the hour long shooting match in Battlefield to resolve. Sounds as exciting as playing multiplayer Civ where you have to wait for the others to spend as long resolving their turns as you did yours.
      - saltcured 7mo ago
        I see. I didn't really think about the temporal, multi-user aspects. To be honest, I'm mostly a solo FPS player. The immersive feedback loop is pretty much the whole draw. I would be open to a broader range of story/plot genres if they could provide this satisfaction. I don't need the "shoot" part of FPS, just the first-person part where my real-time, 3D movement and perspective gives me agency, objectives, and entertaining experience. I naively imagined some game universe that could integrate multi-user input to adjust or build the story in a shared fashion. Like some kind of crowd-sourcing variant of a procedural generator. So your high level strategy would go through the filter of people like me trying to enact it. But, I didn't really thinking about the real-time aspect of coupling user interactions. I wonder if there is some kind of statistical simulation model that could bridge these worlds with latency masking. I don't need a continuous 24x7 real-time simulation. I just need a coherent state model during my session and preferably some coherent story for how the sessions connect together...
        Am4TIfIsER0ppos 7mo ago
        From what little I've heard one of the recent MMO shooters is a bit like that. You're fighting part of a larger war so if you win in the shooting game you move the "front line". I think an older one from Sony (maybe?) also had a similar larger conflict. I might have been thinking too literal with my examples. One could possibly make it work with some sort of averaging of people's play. I can't say what that might be like. I've not played online since Battlefield 2 except a bit of friendly Stellaris (which didn't go well).
torginus 7mo ago
I think there is, but if there existed a topic that was a kryptonite to women, its tacticool grey and brown 'dark and gritty' misery porn.
- mghackerlady 7mo ago
  I mean, I think that can be cool but there really isn't much substance to the games other than the repetitive "shoot people" gameplay and occasionally decent story. I liked Modern Warfare and World at War I guess, but if you've played a COD you've played them all
TulliusCicero 7mo ago
Not truly universal, but some games like Minecraft get pretty close. At the same time, it's not realistic to aim for that level of appeal with every game. Most games are going to aim for some sort of niche, just like any other media.
- bluefirebrand 7mo ago
  Yep. Majority of games targeted Men because that's who was buying and playing games. That's starting to shift a little. But there is probably no way to release an Assassin's Creed or Call Of Duty that is going to appeal to women as much as men. That's just not a realistic product goal imo. Games need to know their audience, and franky they have been very successful targeting young men for decades. My take is that most times they try to target "both men and women" they flop. There are rare exceptions like Baldur's Gate 3 that seem to reach everyone. But it's rare
  - TulliusCicero 7mo ago
    Even BG3, do we have actual numbers on men vs women playing?
    - birdsongs 7mo ago
      Anecdotal, but me and most of my circle of women friends all love(d) BG3.
Forgeties79 7mo ago
Hollywood figured it out decades ago. Video games can definitely do it
torginus 7mo ago
I mean the existence of stuff like Roblox, Minecraft or the aforementioned games shows there kinda is.
- bluefirebrand 7mo ago
  I know Minecraft is not a universal game because even among my friends who love games I can barely get anyone to play it with me Modded Minecraft is really cool these days.