Top Ten Games For Girls

There’s a common misconception, not only in gaming but in culture generally and it is this, all women are the same and all girls are the same. Sadly for all those happy statisticians out there this is just NOT the case and this is not the case with gaming either. So how can we possibly come up with a top ten girl games list? Well other sites have, with so much ease it must be simple, just pop a few no brainer puzzle titles in, not to mention a title or two with bright colours or pretty graphics and you’re set… or are you?

We’re taking a different approach, this is a top ten, but it’s actually two top tens. The top ten list of games likely to appeal to the non initiated female gamer (ie the girlfriend or friend who looks at you like you're a jerk when you start going on about how cool the Master Chief is) and the top ten list of games likely to appeal to the veteran female gamer (ie the frag tossing, smack talking, I payed off my entire mortgage in Animal Crossing, joypad loving grrl), because they’re different.

Top Ten Non Initiated Female Gamers:
Firstly lets add that we don’t think all girls who haven’t delved into gaming are the same either, some have a clear non interest, just as some of their male counterparts also have no interest (it’s hard to believe but it is true, some guys aren’t interested in gaming!! Shock horror!!), some might be interested if it wasn’t a ‘guy thing’ to do and some fall into the wifey category in that they probably would take an interest if they weren’t cut down everytime their boyfriend beat them at pro evo 4. So with all of that in mind and for ease and the sake of this article we're generalising throughout, ah yes bane of the academic world and yet done so freely, the key to good research is generalisation mixed with a smattering of assumption that we're all inherently the same as already mentioned, but not so the same that we only need one Top Ten.

For the non initiated girl gamer a lot of variables come into account when trying to choose a top ten and taste is the main one, we can’t possibly account for ALL non female gaming tastes, some may love bloodshed and some may love mayhem but for the point of this article and due to our dear aforementioned friend 'Mr Generalisation' we’re going to go for those games that may get the non initiated and usually non interested female gamer to glance up from her OK magazine and say “what is that you’re playing?.. it looks ok.. maybe I’ll give that a try?”.

1. Animal Crossing
2. The Sims
3. Tomb Raider
4. Harvest Moon
5. Playstation EyeToy
6. Dance Dance Revolution (or any derivative of)
7. Super Monkey Ball
8. Feel the Magic (Project Rub)
9. Pikmin
10. Tetris

Well well well, what have we here, lots of bright chirpy or interactive titles, which goes along ever so nicely with the preconceived notion that us girl gamers like a good cutesy title, if it's all camo and no roses you can keep it bucko because I'm just not interested! *cough* Ok so 'maybe' and only 'maybe' that could be the case for the innocent girl gamer who has never felt the joy of fragging an opposing team mate from a darkened alcove at the gates of hell in Mars City, BUT let's not get all giggly and silly and start believing that is going to work for every girl... no siree bob. What we have here is what Dr Simpson and Dr Paris have coined 'the Duping Aesthetic', otherwise known by its non Latin scientific name as the 'your girlfriend has spotted you chatting to Tom Nook in Animal Crossing and gone gaga and let her anti gaming guard down aphasia'.

You have opened the gates of domestic gaming bliss, just don't start to complain when she's kicking your ass at Halo 2... in front of your friends... on Xbox Live ok.

The Top Ten List for the Veteran Girl Gamer:
For the top ten list of games veteran girl gamers play it’s actually more difficult because these girls have opened their minds to the multitude of gaming genres and are not held back by a first sight aesthetic that may or may not woo them into giving something a try. These girls are like their male counterparts without the joy of knowing they will be able to play a female character in game all the time, so, they suck it up and play stuff they like just because they can and hope that one day, all games will come with the choice to play male OR female characters!

1. Beyond Good and Evil
2. Halo 2
3. Animal Crossing
4. SSX Tricky
5. Tomb Raider
6. Ghost Recon
7. World of Warcraft (or Everquest)
8. Fable
9. Burnout 3
10. Resident Evil (any of the series)

As you can see there are no Barbie titles, no Olsen Twins games, for these our dear friends are the scourge of the gaming world and the fallout from these under 8 girl gaming titles spreads evil anti girl gaming radiation to all the girls over that age and well beyond! Is it good to woo these pre-teen girls with titles such as these, is it worth the rest of us older female gamers donning radiation suits and smiling sweetly in the knowledge that "at least they're playing games?". No, we should stand firm and aid our younger inexperienced sisters in the joys of the frag and let them know that Samus Aran is a girl and they can be a gun toting freedom fighter too, afterall what have the Olsen Twins brought to the world but weight issues and teen videos.

Disclaimer...
We covered the generalisation problem and we tried to cover our backsides by doing not one but two Top Ten Girl Gamers lists, but this still isn't the whole story because you can't possibly compensate and take into consideration every little variable in a womans taste, you couldn't do so with a guy either, some guys love Fable, some think it was a weak and unfinished attempt at what should have been a masterpiece, but most (ie over 50%) like Halo 2, so it makes it into the top ten and that's what we've tried to do here, we've looked at what girl gamers are saying, we've checked a lot of sources and that is how we put together the Top Ten Girl Gamer Friendly Games and the Veteran Girl Gamer Games to try and bring you a comprehensive listing that wasn't written by guys for girls because that my friends is what we in the experiemental phase call a confounding factor.

So what you have here is essentially a good attempt at an impossible task, to label and afix specific likes and dislikes to a huge sampling group via way of a random sample, which can work at times but in general is about as useful as a microwave on a deserted island. That said we do hope you've enjoyed this little tip toe through the mine field that is gender specific abitrary categorization in gaming aka 'pidgeonholing'.

Written with jest by:
Angela & Eden