Reflecting on our Presentation

On January 19, me and my group voiced our presentation to our tutors. We took all the research we had done since the beginning of the project and condensed it in to a fifteen minute presentation on Prezi. Click here to view the presentation.

Overall the presentation went quite well. It was timed at 13 minutes which was ideal. I think that the presentation that we put together looked appealing and easy to follow as we condensed all our material into basic notes on the slides and expanded into it more in our speech.

However, I do think that we could have added a little bit more detail in to some of the slides, such as those about the theorists we researched (Tito Hartmann and Christoph Klimmt). I think it would have been beneficial to expand on the studies that they did to support our own theories. I also think we should have put more detail in the slides that explained what we thought that Rebel Play could do to attract more women into playing console games, as this was the main purpose of our research.

Here is what we talked about during our presentation.

"Slide 1
Our presentation today is about the question set by Rebel Play and what the company can do to reach the desired target market of females. The question set for us was “Do media platforms & genres have specific gender appeal? Why don’t more women play console games?”.

Slide 2
To start our research on the question we looked at two theorists, Tilo Hartmann and Christoph Klimmt, who in 2006 did a study of german women to find the reasons for the computer game world being mainly male orientated. They came up with this quote which we used as the starting point of our own study: "On average, girls and women are less involved with video games than
are boys and men, and when they do play, they often prefer different games".

Slide 3
This is where we started our own study to find out the reason for women playing console games less than men, and answering the question given to us. We created a questionnaire and asked 3 different age groups questions relating to console games. The age groups were people aged under 16, 16-25 and over 25 years of age. In each of these age groups we asked 15 males and 15 females the same questions and compared the answers. The graphs on the next set of slides show our results and comparisons.

Slide 4 & 5
The first question we asked each age group and gender “Do you play console games?” with the results showing the significant difference between genders, with only 15 out of 45 females play console games compared to 38 out of 45 males who play.

Slide 6
We then asked those who play console games how often they play. The results showed that the majority of males played every day, whilst the majority of the girls only played once or twice a week. These results are already showing that the theory about men playing console games more than women is true.

Slide 7 & 8
When asked what consoles they played, we found very different results from each gender. Most of the females said that the play on the Nintendo Wii and DS, whilst men favoured the Playstation and Xbox. The types of games played were also different. Women said that they prefer platform games and games that involved solving puzzles or dance games, whilst men answered that they prefer to play shooting games.

Slide 9
We then focused a question to those people who said they didn’t play console games, which was generally more female participants. We asked them why they do not play console games and what we found out was that for both male and female the main reason was lack of time to play. However, more women than men gave the reason for lack of interest being the factor for not
playing.

Slide 10
The results from the questionnaire were what we
originally expected from the participants and agreed with the theory of Hartmann and Klimmt, who did a similar questionnaire to German women in 2006. The main points we found out from our questionnaire were that overall women do play console games significantly less than males do and that the main factor for not playing console games for women was lack of time and interest in the games. For women who do play console games, the Nintendo Wii is the most popular game console, and Platform, Dance and Puzzle games are the most popular genre of
games.

Slide 11 – Wii Advert Video
From looking at the results, it shows clear reasons for the choices to females playing console games, with Dance and puzzle games being more social and energetic games which attract females. The Nintendo Wii is the most popular choice of console for females, compared to Xbox for males. Nintendo’s way of advertising the games console is a lot more attractive for females, showing the console as a social and energetic console best played with friends and family.

Slide 12 – XBOX advert Video
The xbox advert is the complete opposite to the Wii advert and has been advertised in a completely different way. The advert is not appealing to females, with the main character in the advert being male and is displayed on his own the whole way through the advert, which is the opposite to the wii advert which had groups of people playing the game at the same time
together. The xbox advert appeals to males who tend to enjoy playing games consoles on there own more. The colours used in the advert are very dark and grey scale, which relates to War and shooting, which is a popular choice of games for males. The wii advert used bright colours and spacious rooms showing a more fun and social approach to playing.

Slide 13 – XBOX Kinect advert video
The advert for xbox Kinect uses the same styling as the Nintendo wii, showing the console as a fun, lively, energetic and social way of playing, using bright colours and both female and male characters and families. This has more appeal to females and shows the way xbox are aiming their console to a more female audience than before.

Slide 14
Nintendo of America said that 80% of female gamers in the U.S. prefer Wii game console over other video game systems. The company claims that this is a result of purposeful effort to enlarge the video game market. “This didn't happen by accident. It's the result of a deliberate attempt to expand the market,” said Reggie Fils-Aime, the president of Nintendo of America.

Slide 15
The original theorists we studied were Tilo Hartmann and Christopher Klimmt who conducted a paper-and-pencil survey administered among 317 females aged 18 to 26 years. They came to the conclusion through researching in Germany and looked further in to the reasoning for women’s choice of games and found out that the most popular choice of games for women involve many social interactions with other virtual interactions, a non-sexualised role for a female protagonist and non-aggressive content. Their results and theory’s agree with what we found out from more age groups.

Slide 16
From our own research through a questionnaire and research from theorists we have found out 3 factors that could help rebel play sell more games to females. The main thing that attracts women to games is to have a female protagonist to take control and have social interactions during
the game. Another factor would be to create games that have real life social interactions, games
that can be played in groups of friends or family. Also, games with less violence involved attract females more. These factors could help Rebel Play open up a a new female market".

What could Rebel Play do?

Our task was to answer the question that Rebel Play posed for us when they visited, and suggest what they could do to attract more females to the gaming market. From our research, this is what we came up with.

• Use more females as main characters. In games such as COD, the main characters are dominantly male. It was suggested in some of the initial research that we did online, that girls feel more powerful when they see games that have a female protagonist, such as Lara Croft in Tomb Raider.
• Social interactions in real life and the games. Studies show that girls are more social than males. This is one of the reasons that girls do not play console games; they prefer to go out and socialise with their friends instead. It could be said that a solution to this is already being developed, as a lot of games consoles now allow for people to interact with each other. The Xbox and newer Playstation consoles allow for online multiplayer gaming, whilst the Nintendo Wii and DS are good for playing games with other people in close proximity.
• Less violence. The majority of these online multiplayer games are shooting games and sports games. It is a typical stereotype of males to be into sports and violence. If more games were developed involving more female interests (see questionnaire results; females enjoy platform games, adventure and puzzle games, and dance games), then girls may feel more inclined to play them.

Games Console Adverts

In my initial post about this question, I mentioned how the advertisements for games consoles seemed to be aimed at specific genders. We found these games console adverts on YouTube which support this theory.



This advert is for the Nintendo Wii. Whilst some men appear in this advert, a lot of the people are women, showing that it is aimed at both males and females. The Nintendo Wii is advertised as a console that is best for multiplayer gaming. Research suggests that females are more sociable people and like to interact with other people, which could make this advert appealing to women.



This advert for the xbox, on the other hand, has only one person in it, which may suggest that the xbox is best for solo play. The character is male, and the advert could portray males as more independent people.

Questionnaire Results

Me and the members of my group went out and gave our questionnaires to people of our assigned age groups. Once we had given out 20 questionnaires each, we brought our results together and put them in to graphs, comparing them by gender.

Do you play console games?
Female Yes: 17
No: 28

Male Yes: 38
No: 7

As expected, more males who we asked played console games that the females, already supporting the theory that males are more interested in console games than females are.


If Yes
How often do you play (per week)?
Female Every day: 4
3-6 days: 6
1-2 days: 7

Male Every day: 15
3-6 days: 13
1-2 days: 10

There is a significant difference in the results on this question when comparing the two genders. The top answer for the males is "every day", whilst the majority of the girls answers was just "1-2 days" of game play per week.

What games console(s) do you play?

Female Nintendo Wii: 12
XBox: 5
Nintendo DS: 8
Playstation: 3
Other: 8

Male Nintendo Wii:9
XBox: 17
Nintendo DS: 5
Playstation: 15
Other: 3

Other popular answers were Facebook games (Farmville), online games and phone apps.

Here it is shown that the theory that certain games consoles are aimed at specific genders may be true. Females tended to play the Nintendo consoles (Wii and DS) more than the XBox and Playstation, which were more popular with the males. The Nintendo products, as shown in earlier posts, were mainly advertised by girls (girls hands holding the console, Girls Aloud used in TV advert), whilst the Playstation was advertised with men.

What type(s) of game do you play?
Female Sport: 2
Racing/ driving: 3
Shooting: 2
Platform: 8
Other: 7

Other games mentioned were adventure, puzzle and popular dance games.

Male Sport: 14
Racing/ driving: 12
Shooting: 22
Platform: 9
Other: 5

Poker and other gambling games were popular in the 'Other' category.

As we predicted, shooting games, racing games and sports were more popular with the males who were given the questionnaire. Females tended to lean more toward platform games, and they told us that they also enjoyed adventure and puzzle games, and those involving a dance mat.

If No, why?
Female Lack of Time: 12
Lack of Interest: 10
Too expensive: 5
Other: 1

Male Lack of Time: 4
Lack of Interest: 2
Too expensive: 1
Other: 0

We also asked the people who said that they do not play console games their reason(s) for this. Both genders mainly answered "lack of time" or "lack of interest", however there was obviously a higher percentage of females answering this question.

Overall, our results came back with a positive correlation to our initial thoughts; that men are more interested in games consoles than females, and the stereotypes with regards to what consoles and games they play.

In-depth Research

After having lectures covering the three industry level questions that were posed for us, we were put in to teams of three and were given one of the questions to look further into and later give a presentation on.
The question my team was given was the question posted by Rebel Play in session 3:

Do media platforms and genres have specific gender appeal? Why don't more women play console games?

After discussing the question with the other people in my team and sharing the notes that we had collected in the lecture, we decided that a good place to start would be carrying out some quantitive research, so we created a questionnaire to give out to members of the public to find out who was interested in playing video games and who wasn't, and why?

We each took 30 questionnaires and decided on an age band that we would hand our questionnaires to so that we had an equal amount of results from different age ranges. I chose to give mine out to people aged 15-24, whilst my team mates gaves theirs to people below 15, and over 24. We also decided that we would give 15 of our questionnaires to females, and 15 to males, so that we could compare results equally from both genders.

Here is our questionnaire. When we next meet as a team we will analyse our results.


1.    Gender             Male        Female


2.    Do you play console games?        Yes        No


-    If Yes
3.    How often do you play (per week)?     Every day    3-6 days    1-2 days


4.    What games console(s) do you play?    Wii    Xbox    Nintendo DS    PlayStation


5.    What type(s) of game do you play?    Sport    Racing/driving    Shooting    Platform                    Other(Please specify) ______________________



-    If No
6.    Why?        Lack of time    Lack of interest        Too expensive        Other(Please Specify) __________________________________________________


7.    Do you play any other types of game? (iPhone apps, online games, facebook games, etc)

_________________________________________________________________

CBBC

In this lecture, we had a talk led by Jim Fleming of BBC Children's. He posed the question:

How can we create a safe environment for children online without discouraging participation?

Jim talked about the development of the CBBC and CBeebies websites, where children can sign up and take part in a virtual community and how they could combat the issues of children's online safety whilst still being able to give them a sense of individual identity.

The CBBC website is a community which is aimed at children between the ages of 6 and 12. It aims to provide a form of safe social networking for younger children, to prevent them from signing up to other social networking websites such as Facebook and Twitter, which typically have a minimal consent age of 13 years old and are not considered to be safe for people younger than that, due to the more open identity features, such as profile pictures and education/ location information.


Ideas that Jim Fleming had for encouraging children to sign up to the CBBC website were:

•  Holding hosted personality web-chats
• Personalised profiles/ identity
• Providing compelling content (Games, points systems, etc) 

He felt that children would enjoy being able to have their own unique profile that could be customised to suit their personality with colours and sounds. Children could also list their interests in order to find other members with similar interests to make friends with.
However, a problem that always comes with personal profiles is security and making sure that not too much of the children's identity is given away.
This could perhaps be solved by:

•  Not allowing children to use a photograph of theirselves as a profile picture to identify them, but letting them make a cartoon avatar to represent them.
• Instead of letting them type in their own username (because a lot of children still use their names or part of their names in their username), have the website generate a few different usernames when signing up for them to choose from. The new Pottermore website uses this method to ensure safety for their younger users. 
• Making sure that on sign up, parental consent is given through sending an email to the parent's email address to ensure that they are aware that their child is joining the community.

Jim described that members on the CBBC website had invented a concept called "E-Pets", where children would simply type out a description of a pet that they have invented:

About Pink Panthers: They are exactly like black panthers but are a dark, fiery, ginger-red colour. They live to between 30 and 45 years. They are able to be weened at 12 days,and all of these youngsters are 13-17 days old. When a Female has a litter, it takes up to a week for all the cubs to be born. Females are rare, as when you breed them there is only a 20% (1-in-5) chance of getting one. However, My female (Amber) has had a litter of 7 and 3, yes 3, are female! I'm keeping one of the females, but the rest are all for sale!

 They would then "sell" them to each other using an imaginary currency.
I think that this could be used as a basis for the 'compelling content' that the CBBC want to introduce to their website, as the children have come up with the idea themselves. Perhaps the children could actually create a virtual pet on the website, similar to Moshi Monsters and Neopets, where they can then play games to earn money to "feed" their pets, and trade them with other users.

Rebel Play

In this week's lecture, we were paid a visit by game publishers Rebel Play. The question posed for us was:

Do media platforms and genres have specific gender appeal? Why don't more women play console games?

As part of Rebel Play's presentation, we were shown that according to statistics, only 42% of gamers are women, wheras 58% are men. What factors could contribute to these statistics?

Firstly, I think age contributes to the reasons why women don't play console games. Speaking from a female's perspective, when I was around nine years old, I played video games every day. As I grew older, however, following the influences of older females around me, I became more interested in going shopping with my friends, my ballet classes and make up. Perhaps a lack in games to suit these interests were the reason that girls of my age lost interest in playing games? Men, on the other hand, tend to be brought up to enjoy sports and video games, therefore maintaining their interest in playing video games. Also, as generations change, I think that more people, both male and female, will play video games, as a wider range of games are being developed to suit different audiences. Ten years ago, not as many consoles were around; however today, there is a wide range to choose from, such as Playstation, Xbox, Nintendo DS and Nintendo Wii. It has been suggested that the Nintendo DS and Nintendo Wii are aimed at a female audience, as females have been used to advertise these consoles, and also because the design of them is more sleek.

Girls Aloud appeared in an advertisement for the Nintendo DS Lite. Here it is shown that the DS is also available in a wide range of colours including red, pink and blue which means that it can be tailored to meet the preferences of a wide audience.

This is a promotional picture for the Nintendo Wii. A girl's hands are used to model the small and sleek Wii remote.

On this PS3 advert, however, a male's body is shown to advertise the console, suggesting that it is aimed at a male audience.

There are also a lot more games on the market to choose from, such as cooking and makeover games that are more suited to stereotypical girls' interests (when I was younger, I found I was quite limited to platform/ arcade style games), and football and shooting games for boys. With the availability of video games to suit an extensive range of preferences becoming more saturated, the percentage of women who play video games may gradually rise to match the percentage of men in a few year's time.

Characters and the way they are portrayed in a game may play a part in influencing who plays the game. I will use Tomb Raider as an example. This game may be seen from some perspectives as glorifying females; it is not often that females are given the role of the heroic figure in games. This may attract girls to the game as it would make them feel powerful. However, an article written by a female gamer suggests that one of the reasons that girls don't play games is because they are put off by the sexualization of the female characters. One girl writes about "Lara Croft Sydrome":

I couldn’t wait to load and play Tomb Raider when it first came out, but when I saw Lara, I just couldn’t take the game seriously. The giant twin pyramids mounted onto her chest look like something she could use to impale her enemies. In many ways her kick-butt presence is a triumph, but the designers’ decision to sexualize her to the point of deformity angered me. I couldn’t get past her proportions, so I put the game away.