Modern video games role in gender socialization Karen E. Dill and Kaythern P. Thill stated “Both the content of video games and the role of video games in popular culture have changed profoundly since the first games appeared on the market in the 1970s.” and everyday this is proven more and more true. To clarify games from the 1970s to present day is considered modern, games generally before then were text based or demonstration of technological ability (examples: 1962 Spacewar, 1966 Periscope, 1961 BBC, 1950 Bertie the Brain). These games helped pave the way to create modern video games however it wasn’t until 1980s release of PacMan and 1982s release of Ms PacMan that we truly saw our first real gender divide in video games. Although since
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Hyper masculinity is common males are; fighters, chasing a damsel, athletic, racers or geniuses. These stereotypes are overused and could be pretty repetitive 1991-present Duke Nukem series is an example of the trop of a manly men. Developers seem to have noticed this and moved away from this, 2010s heavy rain (a father willing to do anything to save his son) is an example of real relatable men that are in touch with their emotions. The more we move away from these stereotypes we can make the character relatable which makes the story more impactful. A video game that has guns and explosions whilst keeping the main character dealing with a real relatable issue 2012s spec ops: the line (a story of a special operator that deals with lost loved ones, schizophrenia and PTSD). A major road block for developers is “emotioneering” which is the ability to physically show emotions which is very difficult. Women have to deal with hyperfeminization unfortunately as well, from characters being reduced to love interest, damsel in distress, or sexualized protagonist 1996-present tomb raider for example. Even though there are examples of strong female non-sexualized characters such as shamus from the 1986-2010 meteoroid series or even faith from the 2008-present mirrors edge series. If developers continue to stray away from these gender norms the industry would grow even more than it already …show more content…
That is almost twice the amount the US government spends on education(59.9 billion dollars). With that type of revenue also comes a lot of power, with that power they have created a massive video game culture. Video games culture has created memorabilia, TV stations (G4 for example), peripherals, conferences/conventions, Esports, MLG and so much more! With this kind of influence economically one would think they market to as many people as possiable. Statista stated the game industry is 60% men and 40% women however the games that are created are geared toward specific genders instead of making more gender neutral games. Games such as mobile games target the female audience, while strategy and RPG targets men. Gender is often considered a spectrum however demographics only focus on the male/female gender lines. The LGBT community is another demographic that would be tapped if games where created more gender neutral. All in all the industry is a large industry but could be even bigger if developers would move away from these gender stereotype and focused on creating entertainment everyone can
Hyper masculinity is common males are; fighters, chasing a damsel, athletic, racers or geniuses. These stereotypes are overused and could be pretty repetitive 1991-present Duke Nukem series is an example of the trop of a manly men. Developers seem to have noticed this and moved away from this, 2010s heavy rain (a father willing to do anything to save his son) is an example of real relatable men that are in touch with their emotions. The more we move away from these stereotypes we can make the character relatable which makes the story more impactful. A video game that has guns and explosions whilst keeping the main character dealing with a real relatable issue 2012s spec ops: the line (a story of a special operator that deals with lost loved ones, schizophrenia and PTSD). A major road block for developers is “emotioneering” which is the ability to physically show emotions which is very difficult. Women have to deal with hyperfeminization unfortunately as well, from characters being reduced to love interest, damsel in distress, or sexualized protagonist 1996-present tomb raider for example. Even though there are examples of strong female non-sexualized characters such as shamus from the 1986-2010 meteoroid series or even faith from the 2008-present mirrors edge series. If developers continue to stray away from these gender norms the industry would grow even more than it already …show more content…
That is almost twice the amount the US government spends on education(59.9 billion dollars). With that type of revenue also comes a lot of power, with that power they have created a massive video game culture. Video games culture has created memorabilia, TV stations (G4 for example), peripherals, conferences/conventions, Esports, MLG and so much more! With this kind of influence economically one would think they market to as many people as possiable. Statista stated the game industry is 60% men and 40% women however the games that are created are geared toward specific genders instead of making more gender neutral games. Games such as mobile games target the female audience, while strategy and RPG targets men. Gender is often considered a spectrum however demographics only focus on the male/female gender lines. The LGBT community is another demographic that would be tapped if games where created more gender neutral. All in all the industry is a large industry but could be even bigger if developers would move away from these gender stereotype and focused on creating entertainment everyone can