[kennon]

I don't think this is news to anyone who's familiar with the rising popularity of social games. During the facebook gaming boom, "pink" games far outpaced "blue" ones in popularity and profit. I worked at a zynga competitor around 2008-10 and it was very clear that female audiences were less demanding, less prone to cheating, and more willing to regularly spend money (in the aggregate) than their male counterparts. In other words: lower maintenance, easier profits. We would release the exact same feature in two games-- one pink and one blue-- and the pink game's revenues would spike while the blue's flatlined. Definitely not a scientific approach, but one that repeated itself on multiple occasions.

All of this transitioned nicely into mobile social games, where we are today. There is some risky gender stereotyping that can arise in tandem with these kinds of discussions, but from my experience the revenues make it pretty clear which audience to target.

[bitwize]

There is some risky gender stereotyping that can arise in tandem with these kinds of discussions

Damn straight, and you've already internalized the lingo. "Pink" and "blue" are the new "AAA" and "hardcore": game industry terms that piss me right off.

Many of the best games are profoundly gender-neutral. Your Marios, Zeldas, Sonics, and Katamari Damacys being the obvious examples. Then again you mentioned working for a Zynga competitor; I'm not so certain that delivering great games was in their mission statement.

[ultramundane8]

I never thought I'd actually make a HN username. But Mario and Zelda are both games where a man saves a princess by killing everything in his way.

[derefr]

Theoretically. In practice, Mario and Zelda are games where a rather blobby avatar is guided through platforms, labyrinths and puzzles, where some of said puzzles consist of autonomous moving blobs that try to touch you, and which you can defuse by touching them with your active end (the front--mid-sword-swing--for Link, the bottom--mid-jump--for Mario.)

Saying that the games are about princesses and mass-murder is a statement on about the same level as saying that chess is a game about military tactics: it might look decorated that way, but it's not what you spend your time thinking about when you're playing, and it's not what draws people to the games.

[wtracy]

Can you explain what's wrong with the terms "AAA" and "hardcore"?

[bitwize]

They're terminological shell games. It's difficult to tell whether "AAA game" means a popular game, a quality game, or merely a game with a very large budget. It depends on who's using the term and, often, there's a hidden implication that a game which has one of these traits must necessarily have the other two.

It's similarly difficult to tell whether "hardcore" means "challenging", "played online competitively", or "has adult themes like sex and violence". The best working definition I could find based on actual usage is if a game is an FPS, RTS, or MMORPG[0] it's "hardcore", otherwise not; but why not just say FPS, RTS, or MMORPG and not have this hidden value judgement that games which are not in these genres are "softcore"?

[0] Other game categories, like MOBAs and some third-person shooters may now qualify.

[slurgfest]

I don't know whether what he said is true, but accurate analysis of the market doesn't depend on what pisses you off or not.

The topic was how to make money, not how to make games which you personally think to be great or politically correct or whatever.

[coderdude]

It's a fact of life. Some things are made for guys and some things are made for girls.

[roguecoder]

The only thing that is actually true of is underwear, and even there my girlfriend steals my boxers. Many products are targeted at women or men, but most often their consumption by one gender or another is more self-fulfilling marketing prophecy than real differences.

Limiting your audience to half the population seems stupid to me. Especially when it doesn't seem all that hard to crossover; mostly it involves not making those self-fulfilling marketing prophecies.

[coderdude]

If many products are targeted at men or women then it certainly isn't true that the line is drawn at underwear. Catering to a specific subset of all people is not stupid even if it halves your potential audience. If that were so then the countless brands wouldn't set out to appeal to the tastes of each gender. If the numbers showed that most people like unisex things then that's what they'd all be pushing.

You seem to regard the distinct tastes between the genders as some kind of marketing brain washing. Masculinity and femininity weren't concocted in the board room.

[slurgfest]

It's not symmetric; you are less likely to steal your girlfriend's bras. And if you do, it probably means something different from when your girlfriend steals your boxers.

Men and women do differ even from an early age, but you are of course right that these differences do not necessarily track with cultural stereotypes. (And when they do it may be because those stereotypes are being conformed to in a strongly biologically underdetermined way)