GDC 13: Why female protagonists in games are rare

March 28th, 2013, 23:39 Posted By: wraggster

Industry needs to be spurred on by financial gain to adopt changes, says BioWare writer

The game industry needs better financial motivation to encourage more developers to use female protagonists in games, the lead writer of Dragon Age III has said.
Speaking to Rock Paper Shotgun, BioWare’s David Gaider said that developers and publishers as a whole largely relied on generally accepted industry wisdom that certain genres or ideas were not as popular and could not be as successful as others.

Citing EverQuest as an example, Gaider explained that when the MMO reached 800,000 subscribers at is height, it was generally accepted by the industry that the 800,000 was essentially the market cap for the genre that was already being catered for.
That was until World of Warcraft came along as a game-changer and proved the accepted industry wisdom was wrong.
He said that for more games to star female protagonists, more examples needed to be given that these titles could be as successful as those starring male characters in the lead role. Although accepting this was a jump in logic, he said it didn’t stop the industry trying to justify it.

http://www.develop-online.net/news/4...games-are-rare

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