Yes but (hey somone is going to say it eventually i might as well take the heat) can we see yours?
jokes aside: it really is simple Sex Sell and no industry is safe.
Mirror universe ST, To'pol's Pon Far (how many horney men downloaded thost episode from youtube?) Slave Leia, Slave Leia, did i mention Slave Leia? Super girl, hell almost any super-chick (though to be fair i think the short pleated skirt she wear works well for a super hero, better then spandex, try doing a high kick in tight pants you going to rip the crotch seam more often then not) Name one industry without TNA, i can't
Superheroes balance it out with plenty of beefcake. Not that I look..or anything. *eyeshift*
An industry without T&A? Cold medicine. There's just no way to make runny noses and puffy eyes hot. :P
well, you know, maybe i'm a fat, ugly, hairy dude and that be my only chance to see some TNA (even if it is pixels)? I don't see anything wrong.
If a game sux, it can have hot dressed/naked girls/women everywhere, it will still suck but at least it has bewbies. However, if a game sux and has no bewbies at all, that's even worse.
But the cherry on the cake is when a game is really great, and in between it has some really nice drawn/modeled female characters (the witcher prostitutes for example, female characters from mass effect, etc). And if i get to choose the gender of my character and appearance, I choose staring at great female ass/bewbies all the time because i will probably never get my hands on such pwnage pron female (partly because i like playing video games too much perhaps).
Top pvp teams in Guild Wars consist mainly out of female toons, dressed in what generally is accepted to be the sexiest outfits. Those pvpers are all male except for a very few (in top guilds anyway).
I also have to admit that a fighting female warrior in GW is damn sexy So I probably wouldve done the same.
And the people who wont admit that they can find pixels sexy are a bunch of idiots. Your brain reacts to those familiar curves and doesnt really care how convincing the rest looks. Otherwise Playboy wouldnt be so popular. Its just paper after all and your are aware that you cant *cough* paper. Still you react to the image even with that knowlegde. We are not that evolved lol. Some people just pretend to be.This goes for both men and women btw.
While I agree that marketing will use female anatomy to sell products to the primary target demographic, there's also one other element that I think has resulted in a large amount of breastacles on the packaging.... it's also the fantasy genre... that sword and sorceress half-naked thing that a lot of fantasy games have going for it. This has translated into space (even in BSG, the toned-down version, there were breastacles, remember the three-breasted lady?) which is why there's one really hot Borg chick in Voyager.
And the truth is that while more and more women are playing games, they are not nescessarily playing MMOs. Female gamer numbers on the ESA survey includes console games such as the Wii, which is a big favorite. I do think more women are playing MMOs, but the primary audience of most MMOs is still the 18-34 year old male. And they enjoy breast imagery. And the entire purpose is simply to get the 18-34 year old male to stop, and pick up the magazine/box to get a closer look at the features/game/ad.
and the turtle lives between two large perfect breasts,
some blond hair hanging down with maybe a river of beer somewhere, and ....
[ahem] yep. bewbs! Gotta love em!! They influence all of my purchases: from cars to underarm deodorant to chewing gum to butter to of course... MMOs. The interesting part is not so much that it's done with games, (of course it will be used in games... which is sort of an interactive movie... and look what movies do?!). It's when boobs are used to sell really off the wall things that it really stands out. Watching advertisers figure out how to use sex to sell aspirin or car oil or whatever... If there is any way possible to use sex to sell x, it will be done. We really are just chimps (97% dna equivalence) with an extra layer of neurons on the brain...
Sanya, the video games are mostly for men not for women. They are made for men and the reason for this are not women's titties ... it's psychology. And please, don't tell me that characters magical boobies will increase propfits ... we do not play games because of the boobies, we are playing for fun, to compete with other people, to enjoy the unrealistc worlds and graphics!
Maybe I'm one of the two men who recoil at such images, and have to read the box and read reviews before i buy an mmo. I feel so insulted that marketers think they have to stoop to those levels.
It immediately tells me "this game sucks sooooooo bad we have to put tits on the box to get idiots, and only idiots will be playing this."
I don't like porn art in games. I don't make women characters. I'm not a woman. I have no desire to be a woman. And it's unrealistic to me that they would put a female in a totally non-female genre i.e. medieval setting where women were second class citizens, or medieval setting where females wouldn't even be able to put on the armor, let alone pick up the weapons.
I even recoiled at White Wolf's use of using the female pronoun in ALL of their literature. I mean "make sure she spends a blood point before she activates the power". I was so annoyed. Clearly 90% of the buyers of the product are men, yet they continually used female pronouns. It's as if they weren't even talking to me.
Her article was great and recognized the true companies who didn't need to stoop to booby marketing. They knew they had a solid product and the artwork showed.
I just don't get booby marketing. Wouldn't it be 10 times better to show a really powerful "epic" male figure that the viewer would envy, than some weak women with her breasts hanging out? I would venture to say the booby marketing backfires in an MMO, because as soon as the player sees no continuous boobage, they stop paying monthly fees. However, had the player come in thinking they would ultimately be some epic beast of a man, they would stay there to kingdom come, trying.
I bet booby marketing and the tremendous amounts of failures in the MMO industry are directly equal. Boobies = your game sucks and you are fail.
Funnily enough the Star Trek Online PC Gamer covers were censored on the STO website... And then removed entirely except for the ship cover! http://www.startrekonline.com/node/350
There were four covers, the one of the ship, and three of various hot alien women (a Klingon, a Vulcan, and Andorian IIRC.)
Now, if any franchise can be said to have almost as many female fans as male fans, it has to be Star Trek. So why are they marketing this game toward 13 year old boys? Personally, I think it's sexist and disgusting.
Some folks are pretty sensative about using female anatomy. One poster here seems to be ...lets see... what would be the best way to describe? Heterophobic? Believe it or not, boys and girls can play together and often do. In my limited experiance, I have met both sexes during play and have had equal fun. Boys, their not aliens coming to steal your dogs.
Keep in mind marketing is targeting an average demographic and not a specific one. Some hetero girls hate the sexist art. Some hetero girls love the female form and don't care one way or the other how its used as long as its appealing, just like guys.
I love this thread. I'm not sure why the author of this article is debating with the men and women here. One reason why I don't like articales like this is because there is no involvment in your opinion. It's point blank stated and known that sex sells past games and goes way back. Women may talk junk about that, yet their magazines are filled with sexy women and weight loss tips, how to get a better orgasm, anti-aging creams, how to find a man, big buff guys in their underwear....oh wait. DAMN, I been playing male hero characters for years and all of them were mainly buff studs and Duke Nukem, come on, that's like the ladies man right there.
This is why I think there is no reason to make an article like this. It's stating the obvious and your obviously going to get flamed for it. Gaming attracts boys and girls. My friend would love to get nailed by a real life Chris Redfield and she loves buff studs in gaming. I like sexy women in gaming. This whole world is about appeal.
As a female gamer, I like the non-blatant female characters on the boxes because I think....."ooh pretty, I could make my character look like that" but when it flashes excessive cleavage, I do think the game is not for me. Interesting read Sanya, really enjoyed it!
Funny, I never noticed those Evony ads and now I am staring at one as I type this message, and those would be one of the times I would say the game is not for me, yikes!
of course it works, we all want to be with our dearest futuristic, magic user and common sense Female that understand our imaginary world & feelings of our dreams, we dont like real females, OF COURSE NO DOUBT.
That's why. If RL women were like that this world would be a better place, OF COURSE IT WOULD.
A study by Nielsen Entertainment in 2006 shows that 56% of 117 million American gamers play online games and that a staggering 64% of them are women.
Most women I game with don't mind seeing some major boobage. Sexy women sell, no matter what your gender and if a box cover offends you; then maybe you should consider getting some help with your insecurities.
I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. - Galileo Galilei
A study by Nielsen Entertainment in 2006 shows that 56% of 117 million American gamers play online games and that a staggering 64% of them are women.
Most women I game with don't mind seeing some major boobage. Sexy women sell, no matter what your gender and if a box cover offends you; then maybe you should consider getting some help with your insecurities.
Well, this is my first post although I've been a member for a few years now and lurk. But I thought this was worth posting since I love reading Sanya's articles (ever since she was working for Mythic).
As for the boob thing, despite being mid-20's and male, the advertisements have no effect on me because I am gay. I don't mind it though, and (thus far) I play games based solely on their PvP merit. What's interesting though is that in the few ads I've seen with shirtless male warriors and whatnot, I am equally unattracted. I think it's because the MMO type of man isn't really attractive to me. I dunno. But if they made a really hot character and put him in an MMO, I am guessing I would probably at least check it out. :P
Just a Short reply. I, as a male would have no problem if my avatar could look better/(hotter for the ladies). My problem with MMO ads are truth in advertising, not once in any MMO that I have played have I seen an avatar that looked like the box images.
What would it hurt to have better looking Characters?
There were just too many replies to read all, I am just going to add my 2 cents. If it was previously posted I apologize.
While I agree with the article, I must disagree with the idea that one of the reasons women don't pick up the games and play is because of the image of the scantly clad lady on the cover. I mean, have you ever seen every cosmopolitan? Or hell the entire magazine rack in a check out line? All of them marketing to women. I know of no men that buy (but know of a few who have been known to look twice including yours truly).
And on another note, thanks for ruining my perception of Angelina Jolie in Tomb Raider. Falsies? My fantasies have been shattered.
The article was an interesting read... no doubt and at the same time it was obvious, but to an extent that many people who read it haven't really bothered to reply.
One thing I really wish, was if MMO boxes were sold in my country and I don't have to google up the box art *sigh*
Sex sells and well women are always going to be eye candy and just today at the train station i realised everybody, men and women of all ages, were checking out this scantily clad hot young thing walk by. Quite a coincidence of reading this article about breasts and watching it in reality.
LOL I think i've gone a bit off topic, anyways kudos to Sanya
RE: So please, understand that while not all men will buy a game just because there are breasts on the cover, the fact is that enough men do make their purchasing decisions in just that way.
Ken: Hrm, this game looks good. Artwork is a 38DD!
Friend: Dude, she's just pixels.
Ken: Yeah, and damn nice onces too!
www.ActionMMORPG.com One man, a small pile of money, and the screwball idea of a DIY Indie MMORPG? Yep, that's him. ~sigh~
lets not forget that well over 78% of female toons are actually guys lol, you know, because they want something good to look at while they are grinding xp lol
Comments
It's all very fascinating, but I've always been very sceptical about advertising in general.
Maybe there are just masses of extremely gullible people out there, and I can understand
using imagery to grab attention... but to actually make a purchase or subscription to a game
because it has a pair of almost-but-not-quite naked breasts on the cover? With the amount
of free porn available on the Internet it would be very odd if men were purchasing these
games for the chance of a little bit of cleavage.
The Duke approves of this fine reporting!
Superheroes balance it out with plenty of beefcake. Not that I look..or anything. *eyeshift*
An industry without T&A? Cold medicine. There's just no way to make runny noses and puffy eyes hot. :P
I dunno Lucy Lawles might could pull it off ;p
well, you know, maybe i'm a fat, ugly, hairy dude and that be my only chance to see some TNA (even if it is pixels)? I don't see anything wrong.
If a game sux, it can have hot dressed/naked girls/women everywhere, it will still suck but at least it has bewbies. However, if a game sux and has no bewbies at all, that's even worse.
But the cherry on the cake is when a game is really great, and in between it has some really nice drawn/modeled female characters (the witcher prostitutes for example, female characters from mass effect, etc). And if i get to choose the gender of my character and appearance, I choose staring at great female ass/bewbies all the time because i will probably never get my hands on such pwnage pron female (partly because i like playing video games too much perhaps).
my2c.
/flameshield on
Top pvp teams in Guild Wars consist mainly out of female toons, dressed in what generally is accepted to be the sexiest outfits. Those pvpers are all male except for a very few (in top guilds anyway).
I also have to admit that a fighting female warrior in GW is damn sexy
So I probably wouldve done the same.
And the people who wont admit that they can find pixels sexy are a bunch of idiots. Your brain reacts to those familiar curves
and doesnt really care how convincing the rest looks. Otherwise Playboy wouldnt be so popular. Its just paper after all and your are aware that you cant *cough* paper. Still you react to the image even with that knowlegde. We are not that evolved lol. Some people just pretend to be.This goes for both men and women btw.
"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
.jpg)
Loved this! Truly.
While I agree that marketing will use female anatomy to sell products to the primary target demographic, there's also one other element that I think has resulted in a large amount of breastacles on the packaging.... it's also the fantasy genre... that sword and sorceress half-naked thing that a lot of fantasy games have going for it. This has translated into space (even in BSG, the toned-down version, there were breastacles, remember the three-breasted lady?) which is why there's one really hot Borg chick in Voyager.
And the truth is that while more and more women are playing games, they are not nescessarily playing MMOs. Female gamer numbers on the ESA survey includes console games such as the Wii, which is a big favorite. I do think more women are playing MMOs, but the primary audience of most MMOs is still the 18-34 year old male. And they enjoy breast imagery. And the entire purpose is simply to get the 18-34 year old male to stop, and pick up the magazine/box to get a closer look at the features/game/ad.
LrK
The earth rests on the back of a giant turtle,
and the turtle lives between two large perfect breasts,
some blond hair hanging down with maybe a river of beer somewhere, and ....
[ahem] yep. bewbs! Gotta love em!! They influence all of my purchases: from cars to underarm deodorant to chewing gum to butter to of course... MMOs. The interesting part is not so much that it's done with games, (of course it will be used in games... which is sort of an interactive movie... and look what movies do?!). It's when boobs are used to sell really off the wall things that it really stands out. Watching advertisers figure out how to use sex to sell aspirin or car oil or whatever... If there is any way possible to use sex to sell x, it will be done. We really are just chimps (97% dna equivalence) with an extra layer of neurons on the brain...
Sanya, the video games are mostly for men not for women. They are made for men and the reason for this are not women's titties ... it's psychology. And please, don't tell me that characters magical boobies will increase propfits ... we do not play games because of the boobies, we are playing for fun, to compete with other people, to enjoy the unrealistc worlds and graphics!
The technology of Tau makes us strong!
Maybe I'm one of the two men who recoil at such images, and have to read the box and read reviews before i buy an mmo. I feel so insulted that marketers think they have to stoop to those levels.
It immediately tells me "this game sucks sooooooo bad we have to put tits on the box to get idiots, and only idiots will be playing this."
I don't like porn art in games. I don't make women characters. I'm not a woman. I have no desire to be a woman. And it's unrealistic to me that they would put a female in a totally non-female genre i.e. medieval setting where women were second class citizens, or medieval setting where females wouldn't even be able to put on the armor, let alone pick up the weapons.
I even recoiled at White Wolf's use of using the female pronoun in ALL of their literature. I mean "make sure she spends a blood point before she activates the power". I was so annoyed. Clearly 90% of the buyers of the product are men, yet they continually used female pronouns. It's as if they weren't even talking to me.
Her article was great and recognized the true companies who didn't need to stoop to booby marketing. They knew they had a solid product and the artwork showed.
I just don't get booby marketing. Wouldn't it be 10 times better to show a really powerful "epic" male figure that the viewer would envy, than some weak women with her breasts hanging out? I would venture to say the booby marketing backfires in an MMO, because as soon as the player sees no continuous boobage, they stop paying monthly fees. However, had the player come in thinking they would ultimately be some epic beast of a man, they would stay there to kingdom come, trying.
I bet booby marketing and the tremendous amounts of failures in the MMO industry are directly equal. Boobies = your game sucks and you are fail.
Funnily enough the Star Trek Online PC Gamer covers were censored on the STO website... And then removed entirely except for the ship cover! http://www.startrekonline.com/node/350
There were four covers, the one of the ship, and three of various hot alien women (a Klingon, a Vulcan, and Andorian IIRC.)
Now, if any franchise can be said to have almost as many female fans as male fans, it has to be Star Trek. So why are they marketing this game toward 13 year old boys? Personally, I think it's sexist and disgusting.
Wow,
Some folks are pretty sensative about using female anatomy. One poster here seems to be ...lets see... what would be the best way to describe? Heterophobic? Believe it or not, boys and girls can play together and often do. In my limited experiance, I have met both sexes during play and have had equal fun. Boys, their not aliens coming to steal your dogs.
Keep in mind marketing is targeting an average demographic and not a specific one. Some hetero girls hate the sexist art. Some hetero girls love the female form and don't care one way or the other how its used as long as its appealing, just like guys.
I love this thread. I'm not sure why the author of this article is debating with the men and women here. One reason why I don't like articales like this is because there is no involvment in your opinion. It's point blank stated and known that sex sells past games and goes way back. Women may talk junk about that, yet their magazines are filled with sexy women and weight loss tips, how to get a better orgasm, anti-aging creams, how to find a man, big buff guys in their underwear....oh wait. DAMN, I been playing male hero characters for years and all of them were mainly buff studs and Duke Nukem, come on, that's like the ladies man right there.
This is why I think there is no reason to make an article like this. It's stating the obvious and your obviously going to get flamed for it. Gaming attracts boys and girls. My friend would love to get nailed by a real life Chris Redfield and she loves buff studs in gaming. I like sexy women in gaming. This whole world is about appeal.
-In memory of Laura "Taera" Genender. Passed away on Aug/13/08-
|
RISING DRAGOON ~AION US ONLINE LEGION for Elyos
Yay Boobs! (and guns) id buy it
As a female gamer, I like the non-blatant female characters on the boxes because I think....."ooh pretty, I could make my character look like that" but when it flashes excessive cleavage, I do think the game is not for me. Interesting read Sanya, really enjoyed it!
Funny, I never noticed those Evony ads and now I am staring at one as I type this message, and those would be one of the times I would say the game is not for me, yikes!
of course it works, we all want to be with our dearest futuristic, magic user and common sense Female that understand our imaginary world & feelings of our dreams, we dont like real females, OF COURSE NO DOUBT.
That's why. If RL women were like that this world would be a better place, OF COURSE IT WOULD.
/end of sarcasm.
There is no knowledge that is no power.
A study by Nielsen Entertainment in 2006 shows that 56% of 117 million American gamers play online games and that a staggering 64% of them are women.
Most women I game with don't mind seeing some major boobage. Sexy women sell, no matter what your gender and if a box cover offends you; then maybe you should consider getting some help with your insecurities.
I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. - Galileo Galilei
An example of, I pull stats out my ass.
Well, this is my first post although I've been a member for a few years now and lurk. But I thought this was worth posting since I love reading Sanya's articles (ever since she was working for Mythic).
As for the boob thing, despite being mid-20's and male, the advertisements have no effect on me because I am gay. I don't mind it though, and (thus far) I play games based solely on their PvP merit. What's interesting though is that in the few ads I've seen with shirtless male warriors and whatnot, I am equally unattracted. I think it's because the MMO type of man isn't really attractive to me. I dunno. But if they made a really hot character and put him in an MMO, I am guessing I would probably at least check it out. :P
Just a Short reply. I, as a male would have no problem if my avatar could look better/(hotter for the ladies). My problem with MMO ads are truth in advertising, not once in any MMO that I have played have I seen an avatar that looked like the box images.
What would it hurt to have better looking Characters?
There were just too many replies to read all, I am just going to add my 2 cents. If it was previously posted I apologize.
While I agree with the article, I must disagree with the idea that one of the reasons women don't pick up the games and play is because of the image of the scantly clad lady on the cover. I mean, have you ever seen every cosmopolitan? Or hell the entire magazine rack in a check out line? All of them marketing to women. I know of no men that buy (but know of a few who have been known to look twice including yours truly).
And on another note, thanks for ruining my perception of Angelina Jolie in Tomb Raider. Falsies? My fantasies have been shattered.
http://www.southparkstudios.com/episodes/103974/
the impact of tatas
"Good people are good because they've come to wisdom through failure. We get very little wisdom from success, you know." William Saroyan
The article was an interesting read... no doubt and at the same time it was obvious, but to an extent that many people who read it haven't really bothered to reply.
One thing I really wish, was if MMO boxes were sold in my country and I don't have to google up the box art
*sigh*
Sex sells and well women are always going to be eye candy and just today at the train station i realised everybody, men and women of all ages, were checking out this scantily clad hot young thing walk by. Quite a coincidence of reading this article about breasts and watching it in reality.
LOL I think i've gone a bit off topic, anyways kudos to Sanya
RE: So please, understand that while not all men will buy a game just because there are breasts on the cover, the fact is that enough men do make their purchasing decisions in just that way.
Ken: Hrm, this game looks good. Artwork is a 38DD!
Friend: Dude, she's just pixels.
Ken: Yeah, and damn nice onces too!
www.ActionMMORPG.com
One man, a small pile of money, and the screwball idea of a DIY Indie MMORPG? Yep, that's him. ~sigh~
ohhhhhh,
lets not forget that well over 78% of female toons are actually guys lol, you know, because they want something good to look at while they are grinding xp lol