The 90s saw a spate of games targeted at girls but they leaned heavily on stereotypes. Now, women are making games that try to represent the breadth of their experiences. And they're on display at Melbourne International Games Week.
Amy is developing VR video game Ghost Cam where you take photographs of a ghost in a haunted bedroom and try not to get caughtGame developer Amy Louise Doherty remembers exploring a neighbour's home when she was a child, and walking into a room that was dominated by ribbons, trophies and a giant painting of a horse.
Using the camera in Ghost Cam, players look for highlighted objects and then capture them on instant film, which unlocks the next story moment.Doherty says playing games allowed her to explore new worlds and have experiences that wouldn't have otherwise been possible, something that was important for her to bring into her own game development.
"In the 1990s, there was this big movement called the 'girls games movement', which was when people realised how much money you could make by putting Barbie on CD-ROM — but now it's very, very different," Harkin says. Another game included in the exhibit is Sashiko: named after a style of Japanese needlecraft, it combines this traditionally feminine pastime with electronic play.
Jane Fiona Kennington is the developer of Incolatus, a self-styled, "girly pop" first-person shooter. It draws from Y2K aesthetics and pioneering games like DOOM, which started development when she was in high school. Incolatus remixes traditional first-person shooters with a pink and pastel aesthetic inspired by Y2K-era design with robot enemies exploding into pink hearts."I guess the pushback on that would be like, 'Oh, you're kind of making a mockery of femininity', I say we're inspired by girl games.'A foundational piece of culture'
Girls Games Game Developers Games Ghost Cam Amy Louise Doherty Melbourne International Games Week Stephanie Harkin Call Of Duty Sashiko Incolatus DOOM
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