Quote from: Ulairi;1030159Girls like aspirational things just as much as boys. Instead of aspiring to be He-Man or a member of GI Joes they aspire the mirror image but around "pretty" or "real life" one of the big things I've noticed about kids is that girls tend to play and recreate "real life" much more than boys. Which is why I don't think we will ever see parity of the sexes in role-playing games. I don't think women are even going to be as interested in elf games as playing real life. It starts when they are little and it's a big reason even with video games that girls start to drop off as they start to mature. They get much more interested in real life than boys do.

Empirically, this seems suspect. There isn't great data on tabletop RPGs, but in the U.S. video game market, girls and women have varied from 38% to 48% of players over the past dozen years. That's under 50%, but the year-to-year variation is larger than the difference. They also engage in fictional books and movies at similar rates or higher than boys. They engage at different rates for different genres, but they don't shy away from either fiction or games - even just restricting to current U.S. trends.

Quote from: Ulairi;1030159But, I do think, a Disney game targeted to what little kids like (not what hipsters like or think they would like as kids) would do well. One of my biggest issues with kid content today is that it's written for people that never developed past the age of 12. They are making "kids" content for people their ages because they haven't grown up.

It's possible, though I have doubts. It is very difficult to get out a tabletop RPG that is successful at all with either boys or girls. Forty years in, and D&D and offshoots still dominate the market. This is particularly true in a non-established genre. RPGs these days tend to sell to only established RPG players.

Quote from: jhkim;1030312Empirically, this seems suspect. There isn't great data on tabletop RPGs, but in the U.S. video game market, girls and women have varied from 38% to 48% of players over the past dozen years. That's under 50%, but the year-to-year variation is larger than the difference. ......

Are you sure it's a year-to-year difference, not a difference in methodology of the studies? I have heard of huge differences depending on if you're talking about games on the iPhone vs PC games or console games.

Quote from: Trond;1030320Are you sure it's a year-to-year difference, not a difference in methodology of the studies? I have heard of huge differences depending on if you're talking about games on the iPhone vs PC games or console games.

The specific graph I was thinking of is here:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/232383/gender-split-of-us-computer-and-video-gamers/

which implies a singular source, but I can't access the source currently. The results roughly match with other sources I've seen for given years, but I can't directly point this variation to a verifiable source. So I'd have to put this into the "maybe".

Here are some articles and studies which imply significantly changing trends in recent years:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/08/22/adult-women-gamers-outnumber-teenage-boys/?utm_term=.a46d45ea0d21

http://www.alistdaily.com/strategy/female-gamer-trends/

Quote from: Trond;1030320Are you sure it's a year-to-year difference, not a difference in methodology of the studies? I have heard of huge differences depending on if you're talking about games on the iPhone vs PC games or console games.

There are huge differences in the types and platforms. When we use generic "gamer" words it looks better until we start to narrow in on the types of games.

Quote from: jhkim;1030324The specific graph I was thinking of is here:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/232383/gender-split-of-us-computer-and-video-gamers/

which implies a singular source, but I can't access the source currently. The results roughly match with other sources I've seen for given years, but I can't directly point this variation to a verifiable source. So I'd have to put this into the "maybe".

Here are some articles and studies which imply significantly changing trends in recent years:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/08/22/adult-women-gamers-outnumber-teenage-boys/?utm_term=.a46d45ea0d21

http://www.alistdaily.com/strategy/female-gamer-trends/

Your second link kind of supports the types of games women play are quite different than men. Women and girls play games but as women age the types of games aren't the same as boys. It's like all kids play Mario when they are younger but by high school girls are playing mobile games while the boys still play on consoles

Judgeing from my 9 year old myself I would never got really interested ttrpgs by a game like that. I was more sold the on idea of a medival life-simulator about knights, samurai and battling orcs. That and metal-as-hell artwork before I knew was metal was. But I am not a girl and all kids are not the same. Noted.

I generally don't believe in the notion of trying getting either girls or women into ttrpgs by just making games based on certain popcultural IP's that appeals to girls and women. Since the appeal of ttrpg medium itself falls on the male side in general. There is always outliers. And that is OK. Making ttrpgs based on IP's like Twilight, Frozen etc will not change that and will ultimately end up in obscurity.

So I go with option nr 4. This kind of things probably mostly attract old creepy dudes that also collect manga  series about japanese school girls and My Little Pony merchandise. The other main potential demografic would of course be gamer-dads who want to introduce their kids to the hobby. But those generally don't need it since they rather just run some version of D&D adapted in what ways appropriate.

Quote from: jhkim;1030312Empirically, this seems suspect. There isn't great data on tabletop RPGs, but in the U.S. video game market, girls and women have varied from 38% to 48% of players over the past dozen years. .

Are those the SAME video games, though? Because I've got the feeling that a lot more guys are playing Call of Duty, and a lot more girls are playing Candy Crush.

Mind you, I don't play Call of Duty and I'm a world champion at Candy Crush, so I'm not saying that there's a total divide.

Quote from: RPGPundit;1030701Are those the SAME video games, though? Because I've got the feeling that a lot more guys are playing Call of Duty, and a lot more girls are playing Candy Crush.

Mind you, I don't play Call of Duty and I'm a world champion at Candy Crush, so I'm not saying that there's a total divide.

To add to that - even if women are 38-48% of the market, that doesn't necessarily mean that they spend 38-48% of the $.  (I have no idea if they do - I'm just pointing out a potential gap in that stat.)

Quote from:  UlairiI don't think women are ever going to be as interested in elf games as playing real life. It starts when they are little and it's a big reason even with video games that girls start to drop off as they start to mature. They get much more interested in real life than boys do.

Quote from: jhkimEmpirically, this seems suspect. There isn't great data on tabletop RPGs, but in the U.S. video game market, girls and women have varied from 38% to 48% of players over the past dozen years.

Quote from: RPGPundit;1030701Are those the SAME video games, though? Because I've got the feeling that a lot more guys are playing Call of Duty, and a lot more girls are playing Candy Crush.

Mind you, I don't play Call of Duty and I'm a world champion at Candy Crush, so I'm not saying that there's a total divide.

No, they don't play the same video games at the same rates. But are you claiming that Candy Crush is "real life"?!???

To recap - Ulairi's claim is that girls are inherently more interested in real life than boys are, thus they will never be significantly interested in tabletop RPGs. I'm arguing back against that. As far as I can see, girls and women engage in games and fiction to roughly the same degree - though not always the same games and fiction. Which, to the topic of the thread, means that it could be worth a shot to try tabletop RPGs like a Disney RPG that appeals more to girls.

I'm sure that if there comes a time when women are 48% of tabletop RPG players, then it will also be true that they don't play all the same games at the same rates, but there will be plenty of overlap.

Quote from: jhkim;1030785No, they don't play the same video games at the same rates. But are you claiming that Candy Crush is "real life"?!???

To recap - Ulairi's claim is that girls are inherently more interested in real life than boys are, thus they will never be significantly interested in tabletop RPGs. I'm arguing back against that. As far as I can see, girls and women engage in games and fiction to roughly the same degree - though not always the same games and fiction. Which, to the topic of the thread, means that it could be worth a shot to try tabletop RPGs like a Disney RPG that appeals more to girls.

I'm sure that if there comes a time when women are 48% of tabletop RPG players, then it will also be true that they don't play all the same games at the same rates, but there will be plenty of overlap.

The types of games that women, on average, tend to enjoy, are bite sized games that can easily be put away. There is evidence that boys and girls tend to enjoy the same sorts of games as they are younger and as girls mature and hit puberty they stop playing those sorts of games.

Here is a chart about what sort of video games women enjoy:
http://quanticfoundry.com/2017/01/19/female-gamers-by-genre/

It's hard to compare video games to table top games. But, RPGs, unlike board games, require much more of a time investment to learn, play, and continue.

If we can collect a few thousand dollars we can purchase this:

https://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/bfrmw9/global_board

women enjoy games. Just not the same games that men enjoy at the same rates. Since we tend to be a RPG focused forum (and more specifically a D&D and OSR forum) I don't think we will ever see women close to parity in D&D type games. But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Quote from: Charon's Little Helper;1030738To add to that - even if women are 38-48% of the market, that doesn't necessarily mean that they spend 38-48% of the $.  (I have no idea if they do - I'm just pointing out a potential gap in that stat.)

This is an interesting thing regarding consumption pattern between men and women and tabletop rpgs. I have been gaming for 2/3 of my life, been playing on local gaming clubs, went to cons for many years, worked some time in a FLGS and a good friend of me owns one.

Amongst all women I have met in the hobby I could probably only remember three women ever buying rpg books. One of the was a game designer and the only one having anywhere near comparable rpg consumtion of a general male rpg hobbyist. One had exactly two core books in her own collection and have no interest ever buying a new game or supplement. Third one would be my long-time girlfriend who I introduced to tabletop rpgs and bought exactly two games on her own but never had any interest in running.

It is not that there is never any women in gaming groups at cons, local gaming clubs etc. Most  I've met played Pathfinder, 5e and Vampire (though mainly LARPers) , some rare  speciment who's into CoC and a couple into story-game impro-theater. But thing is they don't buy books. Only fancy dice sets.

Of course this is all anecdote, IMHO etc etc. It would be very interesting seeing some serious numbers on this.

I remember the World of Darkness stuff seemingly to be big with the ladies in the 90's. From people at my high school, gencon, gaming stores, clubs, etc. I don't know if they moved on to different games when the fad ended or left the hobby all together. I do think LARPing is a hobby that probably has a much larger share of women compared to traditional pen and paper RPGs but I don't really consider RPGs and LARPs to be the same hobby.

Quote from: jhkimTo recap - Ulairi's claim is that girls are inherently more interested in real life than boys are, thus they will never be significantly interested in tabletop RPGs. I'm arguing back against that. As far as I can see, girls and women engage in games and fiction to roughly the same degree - though not always the same games and fiction. Which, to the topic of the thread, means that it could be worth a shot to try tabletop RPGs like a Disney RPG that appeals more to girls.

Quote from: Ulairi;1030799The types of games that women, on average, tend to enjoy, are bite sized games that can easily be put away. There is evidence that boys and girls tend to enjoy the same sorts of games as they are younger and as girls mature and hit puberty they stop playing those sorts of games.

Here is a chart about what sort of video games women enjoy:
http://quanticfoundry.com/2017/01/19/female-gamers-by-genre/

It's hard to compare video games to table top games. But, RPGs, unlike board games, require much more of a time investment to learn, play, and continue.

Well, that's different than what you said earlier - which was that girls are more connected to real life. But OK, that sounds more plausible to me. General comments:

1) It is informative, but I would be wary of extrapolating too much of absolutes from details of video game data. The percentage of women playing video games has changed significantly from decade to decade. It shows one way that things can go, but some of the state has to do with current state of the video game design, and less to do with absolutes about how women are inherently different than men.

2) I agree that tabletop RPGs tend to be high investment, with big 200+ page rulebooks and long multi-hour sessions. It's possible that some lower-investment variations might be a better fit - particularly for younger players like a Disney RPG.

3) On the other hand, larps are often higher investment - with detailed rules as well as costumes and organizing and more. Despite this, larps often have a higher ratio of women involved than in tabletop. So it might not be high investment so much as the type of investment.

Quote from: Ulairi;1030799women enjoy games. Just not the same games that men enjoy at the same rates. Since we tend to be a RPG focused forum (and more specifically a D&D and OSR forum) I don't think we will ever see women close to parity in D&D type games. But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

I think it's hard to picture change of any sort.  Forty years after the birth of role-playing, the dominant game is still D&D and variants - with other genres being a distant second. The closest thing to a real change was World of Darkness, which never overtook D&D. Still, that shouldn't keep us from wondering about a successful Disney RPG and what it might look like. It's pretty remote that there will be a significant change, I think, but still possible.

Quote from: jhkim;1030842The closest thing to a real change was World of Darkness, which never overtook D&D.

Wasn't it beating D&D for awhile in the 90's?  Though that was partially because D&D was having TSR business drama dragging it down.

Quote from: Charon's Little Helper;1030843Wasn't it beating D&D for awhile in the 90's?  Though that was partially because D&D was having TSR business drama dragging it down.

As always, I'm not sure if we know the actual number, but the prevailing wisdom I had heard was that Pathfinder beeting 4e was the first time D&D wasn't in the #1 slot, although I guess I don't know if that would be in comparison to World of Darkness or to each WoD game individually.