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Game Design > Hole in the fricking market!

#11080 - RSP - Thu Sep 25, 2003 5:56 pm

I would like to start a discussion here. i recently had a conversation with my teacher game-design. He told me certain B-titles pave the way for publishers to release their AAA titles. as an example he stated "Who wants to be a millionaire?" of Eidos. Obviously an half assed game made by designers in their spare time. However, the game was released and it flew off the shelves.... why? target audience!! what you say? i hear you think.

well boys, there has been an target audience who have been abandonned almoast fully for the last twenty years of console gaming. GIRLS. another example. some guy thought it would be funny making a game about some people in a house. you would be able to buy furniture and all. everybody lauched... but that same game now counts 8 (!!!!) expansion packs and the highest selling rate in the last decade.

So. my question to you... how to make a game (on the gameboy) that would appeal to Girls (in general, taking ages 12 to 18) to the max?
spit it out ... give it to me and maybe, we'll cook up some idea ;)

#11081 - SimonB - Thu Sep 25, 2003 6:10 pm

heres a few ideas;
* make up/fashion
* dating
* licence "Friends" from NBC ;)

#11082 - RSP - Thu Sep 25, 2003 6:23 pm

Maybe, i think we should take another look at the sims. what does appeal to the target audience? the fact that the user is able to manipulate the sim in every way or is it something else.

Making a friends game with some "How you doin'" jokes would probably sell millions even it were to be a puzzle game.

#11088 - Daikath - Thu Sep 25, 2003 9:13 pm

LOl! like with Duke Nukem? :D

But the thing is, you have to have a GBA to buy those games, so unless he or she has someone who has a GBA and see him or her playing the game they won't buy it. Unless you find an old sock wih enough money for a marketing campaign.
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#11124 - Foz - Fri Sep 26, 2003 6:11 pm

I'm not sure if this is technically a game but I heard Mary Kate and Ashley Day Planner for the GBA, did very well. They're just cute as buttons.

#11125 - Foz - Fri Sep 26, 2003 6:22 pm

AS for the Sims, it is social interaction. Even before it went online players would have these social interactions with the digital characters themselves. This is very important to human beings. For the most part we need to be socially active in some way. Even if it's digital.

There are people who are addicted to forums; putting in the same amount of hours as they would an intense video game. Then there's the people in the chat rooms. In the end it all boils down to our need for social interaction, and the digital age's ability to create new forms of interaction and in turn change the meaning of interaction itself. Anyway, that's my 2 cents.

#11142 - FluBBa - Sat Sep 27, 2003 10:23 am

Just remembered Little Computer People from the C64, that could be a really nice remake on the GBA.
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#11144 - RSP - Sat Sep 27, 2003 12:26 pm

[Images not permitted - Click here to view it]
Little Computer People

These kind of games are the pathway for the sims and all kinds of toys like tamagochi (i knew you owned at least one) the key to making a game appeal to this specific target audience is clearly not making the game too "sweet" no 15 year old is waiting to put barby in her 4wheel drive to have a cup of tea over at Ken's place. no i think they want to feel an affiliation with someone they know and this is where the big difference is with the male audience. offcourse you can't put all the 12 to 18 year old females in the same corner but in general i think a game where the player would be able to choose for the character in a way that resembles real life (yes on GBA) would definitly be a hit... the difficult part is to not make it look like the sims too much :)

#11489 - poslundc - Wed Oct 08, 2003 2:53 pm

As far as I can recall, simulator games have always been in a class by themselves.

Unfortunately, when Maxis realized the potential there they went and exploited a whole bunch of those avenues, including SimEarth, SimLife, SimTower and SimAnt. (Probably a bunch of others I am unaware of as well.) Since then we've had a Heaven/Hell simulator, a potted plant simulator, roller coaster simulators, and amusement park simulators, not to mention The Sims, Tamagotchi and the like.

Games like those are a lot like Lego. They give you a vast array of tools with which to construct something that will either turn out to be what you want, or something else.

While I don't necessarily think games like that have been done to death as such, it would probably take more than a rehash of the same old thing or a new "thing" to simulate in order to be a real success. None of the different Lego "kits" will ever be as successful as plain, old Lego.

If you want to build a simulator, it would be a good start to find some kind of a fresh take on the whole idea. The Sims was enormously successful by bringing the simulation to a level that no one had previously done. Tamagotchi was a hit by simplifying everything about the simulator to just "take care of me". To my knowledge, games that just take the classic simulator and put it in a new environment are, in recent times, only ever modestly successful. (How many of your friends own a copy of Roller Coaster Tycoon?)

Dan.