Gershkovitch is certainly no gaming noob. Her adventures in the industry date back to 2005 when she was entrusted with all the business aspects of EA breakaway Deep Fried Entertainment, which created games for Sega and Take Two Interactive. Meanwhile, Forbes was also working on her gaming mogul cred as an Executive Producer at Radical Entertainment. In 2010, the two of them joined forces to conquer an emerging and often misunderstood market: the casual female gamer. After extensive market analysis and careful trend research, the newly-formed Silicon Sisters Interactive decided to focus its knowledge, technology, and craft on quality titles that apply traditional gaming mechanics to social networking features, and create products with real-life relevance for casual female gamers.
Their debut title, School 26, is an iOS mobile game designed for the iPhone, iPad and Android, and geared towards teens and tweens. Players are required to navigate the treacherous waters of high school cliques in order to establish meaningful friendships. You play Kate, a girl whose new age-y nomadic parents have moved her from 25 different schools. Tired of change, Kate must make enough friends in School 26 so that she won’t be forced to relocate yet again. Your weapons of choice: empathy, effective communication, and social problem-solving skills.
The game places you in different scenarios in which classmates ask for your advice regarding various social conundrums. In order to establish yourself as a worthy friend, it is important that the player listen carefully to the other character’s problems, follow their emotional queues, and react accordingly. Your compassion and finesse at handling the tricky scenarios and the he said/she said situations will be the key to your success. The game is sprinkled with tarot card games and puzzles to ease the awkwardness of your new-found friendships. Completing the games successfully will help nurture the budding seeds of alliance. And, true, while assault rifles and blazing plasma launchers may seem cooler and more to the point, the fragile intricacies of teenage social engineering are an elusive skill that only an enlightened few will ever master. In other words, it wouldn’t kill you to try.
So we asked Gershkovitch to answer our shy and awkward questions about the birds and the bees in gaming, the challenges and opportunities that a lucrative female market represents to the industry, its truths, its myths, its future… and more importantly, do girls really want to date gamers?
Game Rant: What initially drew you to this industry?
GR: When did it dawn on you that you wanted to start this company, take on this mission of gender equality in the gaming marketplace, and corner the female market?
GR: Can the female gamer market be, in fact, cornered?
GR: Do you have plans to engage the “core” audience at some point?
GR: In your opinion, what draws females to gaming?
GR: Is gaming feminism’s newest frontier?
At casual connect last summer, there was a panel of women who were consumers of casual and social games and they spoke about how games fit into their lives. They used them as stress relief, and as escapes. Some women and girls game to be social. I really noticed this in Japan. Girls in coffee shops will all cluster together to play a multiplayer game on their DS. Even though they could play it in separate locations, they all wanted to be together playing. I thought that was really interesting, and I’m pretty sure the guys were not doing the same thing.
We did an interview with a teen blog called “myYearbook.com” and the number of girls who said they got into gaming to meet guys blew me away. I hadn’t even thought of that. These are 14 or 15 year-old girls who know that if they kick some multiplayer ass in Brotherhood they are going to impress the hottie in their socials class. Pretty funny. I can’t criticize though — I remember working on cars with my dad and learning the ropes in order to impress a car guy I worked with. Teenage-hood is all about social currency.
GR: What qualities constitute a “female game” versus one designed for a male?
GR: Did anything in particular surprise you during your research regarding gender distinctions in the gaming consumption arena?
GR: What are the other gaming studios overlooking?
GR: What is your opinion on current video game trends regarding the portrayal of females? Any female characters interest you or stand out?
GR: Tell us about School 26.
GR: Is this social problem-solving game the kind of title Silicon Sisters Interactive will focus on?
GR: Do you consider violence and competition as qualities that appeal strictly to male gamers?
GR: Will you continue to design strictly for a female audience or eventually create more “gender-neutral” content?
GR: Do you think your studio’s success will be so definitive that we will begin to see any female character in a video game that has regular-sized breasts?
The foregoing interview was conducted by our contributor @LaNerdista. You can follow Brenda Bailey Gershkovitch and Kirsten Forbe’s exploits at @SiliconSisters.
School 26 is currently available for iPhone, iPad and Android.
