As a girl gamer I find that there are few games that can meet my romantic and adventurous side. I love a good game, regardless of gender but its’ frustrating always playing the male hero saving some ditzy princess. Just once I would like to be the heroine who saves the day.

The Nintendo DS has a ton of games geared towards girls but most of them consist of Cooking Momma, Imagine Cheerleader and other titles that are meant for someone in their teens or younger.  Those games are entertaining but for us hard core girl gamers we want a female Solid Snake or Link.

There have been some gems over the years that have been geared towards the female audience: Final Fantasy X-2, Perfect Dark Zero, Tombraider, Draken: The Ancient Gates, Princess Debut and Rhapsody: A musical Adventure. Other games like Mass Effect and Fable 2 let you choose male or female.

There is a lot more freedom when it comes to the PC. Games like Neverwinter Nights and any MMO allow you to create your character. In an MMO there isn’t much difference between male or female, except in how you look. While in a PC game like Neverwinter Nights, you may be able to start up a romance with one of your henchmen. There are also a ton of NWN player created mods that have romantic storylines that can be for male or female.

Thank goodness for the Sims, which I refer to as modern Barbie. In the Sims you can play the rich snobby daughter, or the powerhouse woman who wants to climb the career ladder. Even though the Sims is a simulation game it gives us girls a chance to do all that girly stuff we love so much. In the Sims2 your girl sim can get pregnant and have a child. She’ll go through morning sickness, and you watch her belly grow. If your sim was a fancy business woman, she’ll be forced to go on maternity leave. Once the child is born its’ your responsibility to feed, cuddle, change its diapers and give it a bath. Soon it will grow into a toddler, which adds in a whole new world of stuff. You can teach your kid to walk, talk and go on the potty. I turned out to be a terrible mother in the Sims2. I went to work and didn’t have a babysitter. By the time I got home, social services had taken away my kid.

So what does the future hold for us girls? Well there are some titles that will be releasing in 2009 that spark my feminine interest: My World, My Way a story about a spoiled princess that becomes an adventurer, Steal Princess a strategy based game, and Onehanbara: Bikini Zombie Slayers (although I think this is more geared towards boys). I haven’t lost faith in the gaming industry and I feel that every year we get closer and closer to having a wider range of girl games. For now we’ll have to stick to our Cooking Mama’s and Sims, and wait for another Lara Croft character to emerge.

Eliza Nintendo DS, Uncategorized, Vigster, gaming bad games, cooking mama, games, girl, good girl games, Nintendo DS, pc