Quote from: J Arcane;318168Frankly, I think roleplaying already has lots of traits that would make it plenty appealing to girls.  They are, after all, just fairy stories played out with friends.

Agreed.  I hang out with a ton of gamers and easily half of them are females, my fiance included.  And I'm not just talking about the people who only play because their husbands and boyfriends do.  These chicks lurve their gaming!  By extension I think this has and will rub off on anyone in their families who cotton to such things.

Earlier this year I played in a game run by a 9 year old girl*.  Her father helped her out using minis from board games and such plus a few rules here and there.  But make no mistake, she was running the show.  Killer GM, too!

She called it Game in a Jar.  Cuz everything needed to run it came in the jars she handed out to all the players.  I still have mine. And yes, the four players had a blast.  


*She may have been a different age but she was certainly a pre-teen.

My oldest, who's 11, is into Harry Potter (reading Deathly Hallows), fairies, Star Wars, and the Ranger's Apprentice series.  Anime is nary a blip on her radar.

If she wanted to play an RPG (the jury is still out on that one) I used to joke that she'd want a fairies intensive GURPS campaign.  However, since she's gotten into the Ranger's Apprentice series, I think I'd have just as much luck getting her to play a basic style D&D campaign.

Quote from: GeekEclectic;317987I remember a little game named Heartquest, but it wasn't exactly as good an implementation of the FUDGE system that it could have been(and the artwork wasn't good enough, honestly).

I actually own that book, purchased recently from a discount sale at the FLGS like I did with Sailor Moon RPG too a few years earlier, and it's true that some of the illustrations admittedly give it the appearance of a fan project rather than that of a professional publication. But still, it was an interesting effort.

My co-worker has three children, two 12 year old fraternal twins, and a 14 year old daughter.  She wanted to get them going on roleplaying so she was asking around for suggestions.  A lot of the suggestions she got were D&D 4E.  Now, I knew that her 14 year old was into fantasy/sci-fi fiction and was currently engrossed in the Twilight series (I know...), while her other daughter is a very "girly" girl (she loves BellaSera) and her son is a typical 12 year old boy.  I suggested Buffy to them.  I know the game is out of print so that might be a limiting factor, but it hit marks with all three children and the system was just enough in all respects to keep them interested without being overwhelming.

Something based in pop culture to grab attention with enough variety in the encounters to keep things interesting would seem to be the best way to keep young kids interested.  

But everything is subjective.  A lot of the previous posts blow this one out of the water. =/

Quote from: JCrichton;318292Earlier this year I played in a game run by a 9 year old girl*.  Her father helped her out using minis from board games and such plus a few rules here and there.  But make no mistake, she was running the show.  Killer GM, too!

She called it Game in a Jar.  Cuz everything needed to run it came in the jars she handed out to all the players.  I still have mine. And yes, the four players had a blast.  


*She may have been a different age but she was certainly a pre-teen.

This kid is awesome.  Pure awesome.

Quote from: Kinetic;318459This kid is awesome.  Pure awesome.

Troof.  I believe she's run it three times, maybe more by now.