What video games are appealing to women?

I was recently at my friend’s house for a BBQ. My girlfriend who hosted the soiree is a project manager at EA Games. Once my friend found this out his eyes lit up. Being a huge fan of the game Madden, an animated conversation was started about the game’s history. I was at a loss keeping up and my friend joked – “It’s a guy’s game”. Which made me question, "What are 'girls' games?'"

Personally, there not a lot of video games I like. I had a PlayStation for a few years and had a few games. But the only time I would play them was if a friend visiting wanted to play. I often found the game choices for women were really limited and I was often offended how violence and gross stereotypes of women were main focuses in most video games. I find myself now playing Yahtzee or Sudoku on my phone more than anything as its perfect while waiting for the bus or between appointments. Is this only specific to me or is this definitive of the female gamer?

Doing a little research, the stereotype of the female gamer portrays women as only being interested in casual games and only playing on the computer or online. They are unlikely to buy a game or console as they are not a committed gamer. Therefore, consoles and games are marketed heavily to men because that is the core demographic. However, a recent study counters this argument. Entertainment Software Association reported 40 percent of video gamers in North America are women. Women over 18 represent a third of the gamers, outnumbering the stereotypical teenage boy gamers, which only represent a fifth of the pie. Women also account for half of those buying games. Online and wireless, women gamers make up 44% of the gaming population. The top selling games of 2009 and early 2010 show the influence women gamers have on buying trends – 13 out of the 20 bestselling video game titles of 2009 were rated E for everyone and 11 were made for Nintendo Wii or DS.

It seems too that women are drawn to games that relate to their lives; whether it is something they can play with their kids to bond or connect to their life, values and schedules. Robyn Tippins, a community manager at Yahoo, commented in the article, "Where are the Video Games Women Really Want?": "Games that hook into real life more will broaden the market tremendously. Games like Wii Fit explore the connection between 'time wasted' playing a game and 'time used productively' playing a game. A game that lets me feel like I've accomplished something worth doing, rather than just another cool sword dropped in (as in World of Warcraft), appeals a lot more to me. And I need games that don't involve quite the time sink that so many traditional games do." I tend to agree with Miss Tippins, if I were to buy another console it would be a Nintendo DS which I could tuck into my purse in order to play Brain Age when a free moment arose. I guess that’s my “girl's game.”

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The only two fail-safe ways I found to treat my symptoms of ADD and focus clearly have been exercise and drinking Yerba Mate tea.

Coming up at NightLife, Guayaki will be hosting a tasting of their Yerba Mate tea. Yerba Mate (Ilex paraguariensis) is a small evergreen tree of the holly family found in the forests of Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina. Yerba mate is packed with nutrition – 24 vitamins and minerals, 15 amino acids, and antioxidants as well as caffeine. Its function as a stimulant paired with its balancing nutrition makes it a great substitute for coffee. There are six commonly used stimulants globally: Yerba mate, coffee, kola nut, cocoa and guarana. I have loved seeing this product become more readily available in San Francisco as Yerba mate has been one of my staples for years. It was recommended by my doctor to wean myself off of Ritalin.

I was diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder at sixteen and was put on Ritalin for treatment. ADD is one of the only recognized neurological mapped learning disorders. Research links ADD with a strong neurobiological basis affecting the frontal lobe as well as dopamine transporters. Heredity is the leading cause for ADD and is the reason I have it. My brother was diagnosed with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) just before me. The disorder is also seen on both sides of my family. Smoking and drinking alcohol during pregnancy can also lead to ADD in offspring. Symptoms of ADD can be seen as inattention, hyperactivity, and distractibility. Research theories believe those with ADD show high restlessness and hyperactivity because it helps them increase dopamine levels in order to sustain mental functioning. Stimulant medications like Ritalin are successful for treating the symptoms of ADD because they provide the boost needed to focus. Stimulants act as a focusing and calming panacea for the symptoms.

I took Ritalin for five years. It got me through high school and my first year of college and I came to hate it. With Ritalin, I knew when it was in my system and when it was not and the transition was jarring. If I took it too late at night, I would be up all night. As a stimulant, Ritalin is also an appetite suppressant and after years of sleepless nights and very little appetite, I wanted another way to treat my ADD.

I tried various vitamins and combinations of food. The only two fail-safe ways I found to treat symptoms and focus clearly have been exercise and drinking Yerba Mate tea. Both give the same effect of clearing my mind enough to be lucid and focused for a few hours. I often walk everywhere and drink Yerba Mate tea several times a day. ADD isn't limited to the childhood years as most people believe but if you do have the disorder you learn to work with it and find ways to compensate. From my experience from many trials and errors, a walk or a cuppa usually provide enough of a boost in order to concentrate.

If you are interested in learning more about Attention Deficit Disorder, my bible growing up was CHADD (Children & Adults with Attention Deficit/ Hyperactivity Disorder) newsletters. They now can be found online.

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I'm the third from left to right.

Every year, during the decade or so that I was a Girl Guide in Costa Rica, my fellow guides and I would trek up the steep hill, usually carrying our own sleeping bags and supplies. Once we got to the top, we chopped up wood with machetes and cooked over open fires. We woke up at the crack of dawn and showered in icy-cold water. During the rainy season, we got very wet. During the dry season, we got sunburned.

Camping took precedence over almost everything else. The day I graduated from high school I was in the middle of an international camping trip with girl guides from around the world. My parents drove up the hill, put some ointment on my sunburned ears and whizzed me over to the theater to pick up my diploma. Then they drove me back up the hill to finish the event.

My childhood home in Costa Rica, with the
campground ridge in the backgroundOur trips were always full of that sense of adventure you can only experience as a kid when you're out in nature and away from your parents. We ran up and down the mountains, crawled in muddy pits, climbed trees and cut ourselves with our machetes. By the end of our trips we were always completely worn out. Once, I sat on my bed and fell asleep with my backpack still on my back.

But all this happiness came to a crashing halt. On Aug. 20, 1988, when I was 16, a young couple my age was murdered in a coffee field on the road to the campground. My sister and I were supposed to go camping a few days later. But my parents wouldn't hear of it, no matter how much we begged. And who could blame them? The way he had killed his 14 victims was so cruel that it was impossible to incorporate his methods into his moniker, à la The Boston Strangler. So the press simply called him el psicópata, The Psychopath. Fear of el psicópata marked my adolescence and early adult life.

What was near-miraculous was that in time I was allowed to go camping again at Campo Escuela Iztarú. This photo of me is proof, I guess, although it doesn't make any sense, because my parents were so fearful of everything when it came to their daughters. Perhaps they let me go because they both had good memories of the time they spent outdoors, my mother as a little girl camping all summer long in New England and my father as a teenager pedaling up and down Costa Rica's mountains to make it to the Pacific coast by sundown. I'm so grateful to them for overcoming their fears (or not – I'm sure they had many sleepless nights). Those fleeting moments of freedom and that sense that anything is possible that I felt when I was camping are so much a part of me that I can't even really consider them memories. So thank you, Mummy and Daddy, for letting go and letting us go up the mountain.

Watch the "Nature Deficit Disorder" TV Story online, as well as find additional links and resources. Also, please share your own photos of childhood nature experiences in our Flickr Photo Pool.

Gabriela Quirós is a Segment Producer for KQED-TV, and is the producer for this story.

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