When one looks at who the consumers of video games are, it is not surprising to discover that the vast majority of them are male. Why is this, and why are some games more liked by males than females (and even vice versa)? I will attempt to explore the world of gamers and figure out why this is so, and why the few gamer chicks in the world cannot seem to understand this.I do not hide the fact that I am a gamer chick. I myself bought and own a Sega Genesis and a Playstation One (and many games for both systems). The Nintendo, which my brother and I shared, was equally "owned" by both of us. After the Nintendo era ended, my brother more or less stopped playing video games, while I continued to (poorly) play.

When I try to explain that I like video games, most guys are stunned. When people walked into my dorm room last year and see my roommate and I playing Tekken Tag on her PS2, they were quite surprised. Girls, playing a fighting game? How odd. But we never considered it odd at all. Sure, games are marketed to boys, but why should that stop us from playing too?

Then there is the SIMS, the "create your own family in their surroundings and watch what they do" game. I read something in the newspaper that I found amazing and should have realized before then: the vast majority of my friends who are addicted to this game are girls!

I am unsure whether or not this game is marketed to them, or by chance females tend to purchase and play this game more often than males. The only game that I can think of that's specifically marketed to girls contain the word "Barbie" in the title. Will this spurn a whole new generation of gamer chicks?

I think the only other game genre that is slowly gaining more women players are RPGs (role-playing games). Epics such as the "Final Fantasy" series and "Chrono Cross" are becoming more appealing to girls. However, they are still overwhelmingly played by males. Shooting and sports games, obviously, have a large male majority. Why?

Perhaps it is because women have better things to do with their time than sit in front of a television for hours trying to beat Bowsers until the princess is no longer in another damn castle. Perhaps we can't sit still that long, only focusing our attention on one thing. Perhaps we prefer to shop or chat on the phone. I really don't know. I hypothesize that much of it has to do with a coolness factor -- while it's perfectly normal for boys to play video games, it's weird and geeky for girls to do it. I personally feel that women should take pride in their love for video games, and show the guys what true gamers are made of. Kupo!.

-- Shelby Bleiweis