Why Female Gamers Love the Nintendo Switch
Girls and women who play video games have classically been mocked and harassed by bigoted, cave-dwelling idiots. But that might be coming to an end with the Nintendo Switch.
Some male gamers feel the sentiment that women don’t have the brain power or reflexes to play at the same level as their male counterparts. They’ll continuously claim female players will never beat them or can play with them as equals. Women receive more explicit messages online than men and suffer frequent harassment from both viewers and other players.
Yet, the Nintendo Switch system has 50% female players.
How is this possible, you may ask? The Switch has marketed itself as an inclusive gaming platform, with games for everyone. Not only for teenage boys, but for both genders and for all ages. They’ve realized there’s a huge market they’re not tapping. If teenage boys can get so insanely addicted to videogames, what’s stopping another 50% from getting on board? Further, increasing the age span will create even more widespread purchases.
Let’s first examine what keeps women out of gaming, in order to understand how the Switch is breaking this barrier.
Right now, online, there are tons of videos of women getting called slurs when they enter a chat lobby for popular online shooting games on PlayStation and Xbox. They’ll get forcibly removed (getting shot by their own teammates) or will get deserted (everyone else leaves the lobby to avoid playing with women). This only happens because she’s a woman, and they can’t fathom she could be any good as a teammate.
This rhetoric, along with the mockery of women’s interests in general, has kept many women out of gaming. On the popular app Tik Tok, many female gamers post videos of them entering online games and the abuse that follows. They will then destroy the male players at whichever game they’re playing. But, why do men who would never say this to a woman in real life, feel like they can say it behind closed doors?
It could be these men feel ownership over these online games, and feel like they’re comfortable enough to do and say as they please. They don’t want women interrupting their man cave. This only goes to show these men don’t see women as equals and people they can be friends with. They are women first, human second.
So, why are so many women getting into the Nintendo Switch? It could be the growing prevalence of non-first-person shooter games. Shooting games appear to be a sore spot for female entry. The most popular Switch games are solo adventures and friendly competition, not first-person shooter. The top five games are Mario Kart, Animal Crossing, Super Smash Bros, Zelda, and Pokémon. These are all either played by yourself or with friends on the couch. There are options for online play, but they’re not the main pull.
Since many popular Switch games could be considered a safe space for entry, they have breached the gender gap in gaming. A friend sitting beside you playing a game isn’t going to complain to your face about playing with a girl. But, if you were playing online, they may feel they can say these sexist remarks behind a screen with few consequences.
“Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.” - Oscar Wilde
Games with low barriers for entry are then attracting a greater audience. These are games women can feel confident playing, knowing they won’t be berated. Feeling like an outsider playing a game is never fun, and games are supposed to be enjoyable.
One of the best parts of online games is the camaraderie you feel with your team, win or lose. You’re talking online with either friends or strangers, but everyone has the same goal in mind. Now, imagine you just want to feel that same level of camaraderie, but you’re a young girl. Strangers, and even male friends, will tease you for trying to get involved. They’ll claim it’s a boy thing, and that’s where it begins. From then on, boys continue practicing videogames since they’re ten years old, and girls are distanced from this experience.
However, with perseverance, girls can still play these games with their friends. They can either convince their male friends to play with them or get a group of girls who will be interested in playing. The issue is, most boys own these consoles and will be playing it themselves (every single evening). You’d have to be a pretty wealthy family to justify getting two PlayStations for two different children. They could claim the children could take turns, but if the console is given to the boy at Christmas, it’ll be difficult to argue they should get equal playing time. Especially if the boy’s friends are playing all the time. This creates barriers for entry from the very beginning.
The Switch, however, is inciting more girls to play from a young age. Equal opportunity to contribute to the bottom line, am I right? With less online games, but still ones that require skill, girls can hone their techniques without getting harassed. They can practice and get addicted to videogames the same way many boys are. This way, when they decide to play online games on other consoles, they’ll still unfortunately get harassed, but at least it won’t be over their “skill level.” (It never was, it’s just sexism.) Then, eventually, as more boys see girls playing the game and doing well, their sexist comments may lessen and lessen.
Seeing girls and women as equals from a young age is extremely important in changing the way gamer girls are viewed. Even how video games portray female characters, like Zelda, has changed over time. Zelda evolves from a less dominant to more dominant role since the game’s invention. This can subtly influence the way little boys view women. For this reason, it’s not only important that the Switch is getting more girls involved just so they can enjoy videogames, but for feminism in general.
People aren’t born sexist, racist, or homophobic. These qualities manifest over time. If equality is learned from the beginning, it can have greater impacts on society in general. If it’s not, as it wasn’t taught in gaming, it can have dangerous consequences.
Some women who play online end up fearing for their lives after playing with sexist individuals. The harassment can get so bad, that some trolls have been known to find out where the women live and threaten their safety.
Women must be careful not to say their age, weight, and living situation online. They often must use the “less is more” tactic and keep a low profile to stay safe.
Since the gaming culture is built off the idea that you can be anyone you want behind the screen, there isn’t a lot of accountability that goes into it. This can cause serious problems when gamers feel they can threaten and harass women and get away with it. They may not feel the same level of accountability as they would in person. Therefore, getting men to stop being sexist against women can start at the very first stages of gaming, with the Switch.
Nintendo creates games that target all interests, rather than strictly stereotypical male ones. Since women will often be made fun of for interest in these areas, such as sports and shooting games, they will automatically gravitate away from such mockery. They will feel more accepted playing games such as Animal Farm, Zelda, Super Smash Bros, Mario Kart, Super Mario Odyssey, and Pokémon. Promoting and marketing games towards both genders then helps close the gaming gap. While obviously both genders can play whatever games they like, it’s difficult to fight societal pressure and gender norms. Especially if you’re not already a gamer and want to start playing from scratch.
Being a woman and a gamer are often seen as dichotomous. Why would a woman be interested in gaming when it’s such a male dominated sector? They’re surely only playing to impress the guys. They just want male validation and to seem like “one of the guys.” This is internalized misogyny at work. Claiming women would only want to play video games to impress men stems from the fact that women aren’t allowed to have interests without being mocked. People with internalized misogyny will find any way to explain why a woman would have an interest, rather than just that they’re a human who enjoys activities.
If they like something that’s within their stereotypical gender role, such as Barbies or horses, they’re basic or a crazy horse girl. If they like something outside of their stereotypical gender role, they’re trying to be one of the boys and don’t actually enjoy it. They can’t possibly be good at a video game and will bring down the gaming experience for all the other boys.
This enigma limits young girls and essentially puts them in a box. They aren’t allowed to explore different activities as much as the boys because their socialization is harsher.
Therefore, if we start girls and boys on the same activities young, they may continue to feel equal in adulthood. If both have an equal opportunity to play video games on a Nintendo Switch, what can’t they do? Wars, famine, inequality, all vanished in an instant. Just kidding, but seriously. Children need to learn equality young (or to be more accurate, not learn sexism). If children (of all genders) play videogames together when they’re young, there’s less of a chance they’ll grow up to hate on female gamers. They’ll think it’s completely normal and expect women to be competent players in their team.
This is why it’s beneficial for both women, and Nintendo as a brand, to promote the Switch to women as well as men. They’ve found double the market and are running with it, all while bringing anti-sexist change to the gaming community. The inclusive games they’re promoting aren’t just online, first-person shooter and sports-related (which are heavily marketed to boys) but solo adventure and friendly couch competition. With these good-natured games, girls will get their foot in the door, and then will feel confident enough to play whatever games they want. Girls who never would have played Call of Duty (a first-person online shooting game) will realize they have a passion for it. This is less likely to happen if they aren’t first allowed into the gaming community without harassment or mockery.
As a woman who games, I see this gateway as a positive movement towards an equal online gaming world. One where you can talk in a lobby without being told to go to the kitchen. This day will come, and it starts at the very beginning. With a child’s first console. Hopefully it’s a Nintendo Switch.
