Raph Koster is blogging furiously these days, and he's just posted a round-up of the Korea Games Conference that ended this week.
In sum, he says, the KGC was buzzing with:
- Everyone wants to know about how to break into markets in other countries
- Everyone is worried about training the next generation of developers, wondering about what the right curriculum is
- There s cultural and social concerns about games everywhere: distracting from school, RMT, addiction, etc.
- Everyone wants more diversity among the game development community
- Everyone wants games that appeal to women
- Everyone thinks the games are getting too expensive to make
I'm going to jump on point 5, because it's a pity that this meme that games don't appeal to women is being perpetuated so; data shows time and time again that almost half of all gamers (41-48% depending on age, platform and location) are already female, despite minimal to non-existent target marketing.
I reckon this is courage-drumming. Everyone knows the games industry must appeal to more than just blokes, but few are quite ready to announce significant experiments yet. You can almost hear the foot-shuffling and whispers of "you go first, mate", "no YOU first".
But how hard can it be? Make more games that break a mould! Build on past successes. Invest some money in less nichecore marketing: EA have (finally!) got the right idea with these fab ads for The Sims 2. Oh, and hire more ladies, dear industry, you'll find a ton in the new media software, television and film development industries, which aren't a million miles away from games. No more talking now, just do it.
















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