Women Say Video Games Aren’t ‘Just For Boys’ Anymore

By Carol Cavazos

NORTH TEXAS (CBSDFW.COM) – Maybe at some point video games were thought of as ‘just for boys’ – but not anymore. Studies show girls are just as interested in playing video games as boys.

Despite statistics, video game marketing is still ‘all boy’. Game developers say they aren’t even sure what females want – but there are some North Texas women,  already in the business, who can tell them.

Grace Blessey, 28, has a law degree and now wants to become a video game designer through the video game education program, or the Guildhall at Southern Methodist University.

“I always liked video games,” said Blessey. “But at some point, I realized I really just wanted to do something more creative, like truly artistic.”

From Blessey’s perspective, what women want from a video game is the mental challenge. “Ultimately what it is, it’s like the hand-eye coordination challenge that people like. It’s like pointing, can I get it while it’s moving fast and shoot it?”

That type of challenge is one of the things Elizabeth Stringer likes about video games. “You look at who plays games and why they play those games. You stop looking at gender at all,” said Stringer, who is one of Blessey’s professors. “You don’t need to draw those lines. You don’t need to draw that division.”

Read the full story or watch the report.

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