Do girls play video games?

[Blaze]

Speaking of early games, does anybody know where they still do repairs on SNES's anymore? My old one just started showing only black and white the other day. It will occasionally flip back and forth between color and black and white. I need to send it in somewhere.

[tikki_tikki2000]

Yours just now started doing that? Hehe, welcome to the world of blowing into the cartridge and jiggling it around.

[Blaze]

Doesn't help, obviously. I know ALL about black console magic. No no no, it plays fine. This does not help. It is internal.

I grew up on NES, my dear. I know ALL about console black magic.

[RadicalDreamer]

Hm... Looking at that "turning girls on to games" thing... I think the best genre would be a light-gun game, like House of the Dead. It's simple, fun, easy to get into... I think it just might work!

[Deacon]

[quote="Blaze";p="237551"]Speaking of early games, does anybody know where they still do repairs on SNES's anymore? My old one just started showing only black and white the other day. It will occasionally flip back and forth between color and black and white. I need to send it in somewhere.[/quote]
Hmmm...mine works perfectly. How much you give me for it?

[Blaze]

Nothing. This is mine and I wuv it!

[Gikk]

Hrm..

Honestly, Blaze, I'd suggest getting a new one; I don't know anyone who repairs them, anymore.

And girls do, too play video games. I'm living proof.

[ChibiBecca]

my megadrive used to flicker between b&w and colour as well.

i took it as a hint that it was dieing as it never worked again after a week of color loss. o.o;

[Sir Spankspeople]

Blaze: my PS2 does that every now and then. Turns out the video cable is just loose, and jiggling it helps. If that doesn't work on your SNES, might I reccomend buying a new video cable? Shouldn't be hard to find, as Nintendo standardized on a video cable with the SNES, so you could buy a Gamecube one. Hell, I gave up on using RF for my SNES a while ago, and my SNES, N64 and Gamecube all share the same S-Video cable... I just swap depending on what I'm using.

[Blaze]

I'll look into that. Thanks much!

[Phantom Snowcat]

pfftt i could 0wnz0r Grav in some Halo

[daemon princess]

Interesting little article about how video games alienate female audiences here. Most notably:

The reviews and previews obsessively focused on the male gaze traversing her body more than the gameplay. That turned me off immediately. She's just a toy, to be played with, manipulated in an environement, not an avatar to identify with, a personality to inhabit. The message wasn't, "Hey, girls, an empowered woman to play in a game!" but rather, "Hey, boys, check out this chick's boobs while you lead her around a dungeon!" I consider this the great wasted potential of Lara Croft: she could have transformed the videogame cultural landscape. Eidos, you really blew it - you alienated all the girls who would have *loved* this game.

That scene they make fun of in Baldur's Gate is duplicated in far too many video games. It seems a little self-defeating that they'd cut out 51% of their potential customers.

[Accer]

I felt there was a distinct difference between the second and first Tomb Raider games. The first one I liked Lara - she was strong, cool, and went for adventure over money. She had a friendly voice in the training part of the game. Hey, I'd hang out with her.

In the second game she became all sultry and… different. She didn’t act like she did in the first, quite, and I didn’t get the buddy-buddy feeling I got from the beginning of the first game. Now she had that ridiculous braid, among other enhanced assets, and many of the cut scenes were about teasing than telling story. I became disinterested quickly.

[daemon princess]

I adored TRII, but it was getting really annoying how she grew a cup size with each new release that came out. TRII didn't really seem to be about sex at all and I could relate to it wonderfully - which is really hard to find for a girl gamer. It did seem like they were pushing the female audience further and further away with each one that came out, though. Stupid since it was such a rare commodity with soooo many elements that appealed specifically to females.

[dmpotter]

[quote="daemon princess";p="240040"]That scene they make fun of in Baldur's Gate is duplicated in far too many video games. It seems a little self-defeating that they'd cut out 51% of their potential customers. [/quote]
I dunno, I think it cuts out some of the male audience too. I don't like being pandered to... I'm less likely to get a game when I think that the developers figured that playing off sexual imagery would somehow make the game more enjoyable. I don't mind a character being "sexy," but when it's obviously one of the primary selling points *cough*Final Fantasy X-2*cough*, it suggests that something else is probably lacking. Give me a good game, with good characters. If I wanted porn, I have an Internet connection... I want a game, not something to stare at.

Although there are now games with half-naked men. Raiden runs around naked (briefly) in Metal Gear Solid 2, and in Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time the Prince slowly loses his shirt. Kirk would have been proud.

On a related note, did anyone else notice that the music in the female character creation screens for Final Fantasy XI seemed to be based on porn grooves? Even if you've created a character, you can click on the "Create Character" button and rewatch the character intro screens. (Yes, even if it's greyed out and you don't have another Content ID. You just can't complete the process, not that you need to.) Start creating a Mithra...