James Scalpello, the wireless marketing director for THQ, a leading video game company, has said in a recent interview that girls won't download games to play on their phones, but that they will play games that are already on their phones.
He also said that there is no point in making games for girls because they aren't successful. Does he even know about Cooking Mama?!
I would agree that girls don't need to be patronized by games that are festooned in pin and ribbons. Most of the games made specifically for girls and women are ludicrous examples of game design that simply serve as object lessons in how not to design a quality game.
However, I find it difficult to understand why this marketing exec is willing to write off the desire of girls and women to download games as some sort of gender thing. Mobile games are not that good yet. To say that, "not in a million years would most girls connect to a mobile portal to download a game," is incredible insulting. The iPhone is a great step towards better games that are worth paying for, and women are a substantial part of the iPhone market.
Cooking Mama was created with women and girls in mind and it has been a wildly successful game for the Nintendo DS portable system. It also has been successful with men and boys. The key is to make good games with girls in mind, not crap that is in a pink package and expect girls to flock to it.
It seems that the video game industry just has it out for girls as game players and I think that Mr. Scalpello is just saying what others are thinking. They have the boys, who needs the girls? With 50% of the market just waiting to be tapped, I would say THQ does.