The responses ran the gamut from, "Yep, guilty as charged," to those of a few of the women, who seemed just a little indignant to think that they couldn't come up with the idea of playing MMOs on their own. Some of them were quite pleased to let me know that they were the ones who introduced their husband to the games. There were 15 who had come up with the idea on their own and eight who had introduced their husband or boyfriend to playing massively multiplayer online role-playing games. Breccia had this to say: "I was the one who brought the game home. I had heard of MMORPGs and wished to join one. I really like role-playing and have been doing tabletop since I was 12 or so. So I tested out all of the (then) decent looking MMORPGs and decided on which I would buy. When I had played a little while, and figured out the game was as good as I had thought, I told my husband, "I think you'd like this," and he started a character on my account. That scenario didn't last long, and we bought a second account, transferred his character over, and haven't looked back. I tend to be the one to try out all the new games as they come out, and tell him, "This is fun. This one sucks. This is really bizarre...I had fun in this one, but you won't like it...etc." So it's always been me who does the picking. We both like RPGs and primarily play those, although the occasional FPS catches our attention. We're both waiting for Doom 3, for example." The survey showed that a hefty number of 15 players decided on their own to play their first MMOG, while another eight made a joint decision with their husband/boyfriend.
One participant, Jellica, was encouraged by her teacher to play an MMO: "I got into EQ through my English teacher whom I saw looking at Everlore [a spoiler site for EQ] one day. I was interested, he told me [about the game], and I've been hooked. I've since gotten my cousin Lindsay hooked as well." All in all, five of the women were inspired by co-workers to play MMOGs. One woman, Dreleen, was inspired by her boss: "Actually my boss got me started. He saw my drawings and told me I'd probably enjoy the game [EQ] so I tried it and I did." Eight of the women were introduced to MMOGs by some other person (friend, family member, etc.), then introduced their husband/boyfriend/significant other to the game.
However, despite some of the mildly indignant responses, the statistics proved that, indeed, the largest percentage of the 110 women participants had been inspired to play their first MMOG by their partner. This percentage represents 35 of the answers, as shown in the bar chart below. Many of these participants stated the reason they agreed to play the MMOGs was to have more time with their partner. In many of these cases, the women went on to become hooked (read: addicted) by the game, where in some cases their partner got bored and dropped out. Artameus gave a representative answer in first part of the latter category: "Yes I did get into playing because of my husband. He was playing a lot and I wanted to spend more time with him. He was happy I started playing (I know a lot of men find it an invasion of their space)." And Zeta went a step further and was one of the participants who outlasted her significant other in the game. "I played computer games before my, then boyfriend, now husband told me about a game called Everquest. We started it together; he has since quit but I still play." BAR
CHART SHOWING THE PERCENTAGE RELATIONSHIP
The answers from the 110 participants were divided into 10 categories as follows:
In the long run, it would appear that women
were introduced to the game at least by a male, and the largest
percentage of them were introduced by a significant other. However,
I would also say, from the tone of indignation when the ladies
talked about it, that they didn't like to think of themselves
as meekly following the male lead, or taking the back seat in
choosing games or choosing to play the games. Many of the women
who joined their husbands in playing MMOGs did so in order to
understand them better or to spend some enjoyable time with them.
Others did so "because it looked fun." I venture to
say if the survey were to be done over again in another couple
of years, the percentages would be much different. Links: - Additional interesting quotes from female players regarding how they became involved in playing MMORPGs can be found here. - Study methodology is outlined here (along with a linked list of the participating forums). - A list of the participating girl gamers is here. - A short bio of Raya is here. - Link to Article 1 - Introduction and the Games Girl Gamers Play Next week, article 3 in this
series, exclusive to Silky Venom, will deal with the third question:
MMORPGs
- FROM THE FEMALE PERSPECTIVE © 2004-2005 by Raya |
Society has
been prone to depicting the female in a lesser role when it comes
to male-dominated sports and entertainment. Up until the last
few years, that probably has been true, especially in the hugely
male-dominated domain of online gaming. The question above was
posed to all 
Zariel
was one of the women in this category: "I began gaming
at 15 at an invitation from my (female) best friend, but I'd been
longing to try it since childhood. My first gaming experience
was a tabletop D&D game. By the time I was 20, I was running
games myself. In 1999, I read in InQuest magazine about a Massively
Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game called EverQuest and was
instantly fascinated. I bought a new computer with the capacity
to run EverQuest, bought the game, and slowly began to figure
it out. Soon enough, my then-boyfriend began watching, and before
I knew it, he was using my computer more than I was! Soon enough,
he got his own computer to play EQ; we made secondary characters
to play together."