Le blog de A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER

Female gamers and media

         Media coverage seems not to be concerned by the French female gamers scene, but a few countries consider electronic sport as a real sport. Indeed e-sport requires from players, discipline, concentration, rapidity, teamplay and being strict but also regulars and intensives trainings.
          Moreover some countries like the USA, Sweden or China show their cyber-athletes as celebrities. Those one are employed by sponsoring companies and we call them progamers or PGM (professional gamers). This method gets benefit from press focused on female gamers through websites, newspapers, real TV shows, events, advertisement and sometimes competitions can be televised. Nowadays it is the ground of an overexposure. How do media influence the female gamers community ?
        We will pick up three main themes : an international top Swedish female team called Les Seules, the miss video game election and a female team (the fragdolls) created and employed by Ubisoft (video games designer) in order to promote each new product range in the USA, in the UK and in France.

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER publié dans : Introduction
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EXCLUSIVE : INTERVIEW WITH STEPHANIE HARVEY

I made an interview with one of the best female gamers of the world named Stephanie Harvey. She recently won the world cup (ESWC) with an American female team called "SK-gaming" and today she tells us how they managed to do that with the help of many sponsors and how she feels about it. This cute and smart girl tells us many interesting details about her gaming career.
Moreover she explains the deal with her popularity and her point of view about female gaming and medias You can't miss it !
The interview is now available here

Here is a summary of the interview :
Stephanie is 21 years old and she was born in Quebec city, Canada. She's studying in a Master of architecture in France but she got her licence in Canada. She has been playing video game since she is 3 when she got the first mario !! Five years ago she figured out that Counter-strike competitions would allow her to win money and do tournaments over the world.
She started to play with a Canadian female team where she was supported undefined

by one of the best sponsors of the world. These girls went to Spain or France for ESWC 2005. Then she was recruited in an American team called "SK-Gaming" who won the ESWC in 2005, got 4th place in 2006 and won again in 2007 !! Her sponsors were adidas wear, Intel, ATI and many others... Since the beginning of the year, she is part of the "Emulate gaming" team, which is the strongest one in France and one of the best in the world. This team won the ESWC in 2006 and got 3rd place in 2007.
       She thinks that sponsors are essential for her gaming career because it costs a lot of money to travel. In fact it is important to play many events and gamers just get better because the game and the feeling is perfect on LAN (Local Area Network). The gamers have to pracctice during events (organized all over the world) because they learn what to do in these conditions to be ready for the world cup.
       She knows how to deal with the medias since they focused on her Canadian team. She was followed by cameras all days long, did press conferences, interviews, photos, video shows, newspaper articles, publicity magazines and more !!! She takes advantages of a growing popularity that she manages to control but it seems to be quite difficult sometimes. She got a lot of fans but it can be boring to answer every mails and questions especially those concerning her private life. As a superstar she is always polite and nice. Counter-Strike competitions allowed her to meet people from all over the world (Corea, China...) and she tells us that she would never had a chance to do that without gaming.
    She explains the big differences between the USA and France toward video game. It seems that French medias focus on the bad side of gaming, showing it as a thing for fat people wearing glasses that actually, it's NOT ! American people know Counter-Strike as a huge and interesting game ! She confesses not being a perfect student, friend, girlfriend or child because sometimes she prefers going to play than going out with friends or cleaning her room, but she's not inhuman at all !
     We discussed about "Les seules" (swedish female team who did a TV show about their gaming career) and Stephanie thinks that they were toys for the company that employed them with a 5-years contract but she admits that she could have done this considering the fun and not the fame.
     Miss Harvey doesn't agree about the "miss video game" election that she considers as a huge joke. She explains her angry toward this organization.
    To conclude, Stephanie thinks that medias want the female gamers because they sell. On the contrary the good female gamers don't even care about medias and don't need that attention that sometimes medium female gamers use to be on TV.

Stephanie Harvey likes to answer questions and shows what gaming is. Medias can sometimes show a bad side of gamers that's why she hopes that girls like her will continue to promote girl gaming like it really is.

Axelle MARIE Crédit photo : Yves Malenfer

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER publié dans : Articles Axelle
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Les Seules

This video available here is concerning the famous team of females video gamers : Les seules.

   Swedish champions of the most popular online game untitled "Counter strike", which one is played by more than 100 millions people worldwide.
   Also Electronic Sport World Cup's first team, "Les Seules" created their real TV show about professionnals gamers. This last introduce the group, that is to say, a team made up of five girls between 20 and 27 years old, in ten parts realities series, untitled "play US". First-ever documentary series on this subject, it is focused on their dailylife of pro-gamers rather than the game they play.

     We learned that "Les Seules" did their introduction in the United States, with their first stop in New York City.
     As we know, the team wanted to do a world tour, in order to cross continents and visit internationals cities. Indeed, ten citites were selected, which are : New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, London, Paris, Berlin, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Shenzhen and Tokyo.

    For those girls, a world tour seems to be necessary, because they have to promote their show. Also, we can notice, through the video, their "star status"... five girls, cutes, quite good-looking, who need to see their fans. These fans consider "Les Seules" as rockstars and idols of the video game.
    "Les Seules" are interviewed at the TV and on the radio because of their popularity. They're going everywhere by means of limousine.
    Moreover, they are doing shootings, advertisements, and pictures as if they were top models. Their physical aspect seems to be more important than their abilities. Maybe that's why they have got a stylist and costumes designer to dress them for the events but also in their dailylife.
    However, managers seems to put pressure on them and it's bring about tensions in the team. We can feel that Sophie is uncomfortable in the group. Is that the consequence of this media coverage?
   In an other side, Cazzidy is saying that she's able "to give up family and friends just to get to the top"! Gaming is really the first goal, or her publicity stunt comes before?

     They have to be the best not only for the game and the competition but also for their fans. But maybe this real TV show is just a trend phenomenon. We'll see the success of the season two...

(You can go to see as well on the website: http://www.playus.tv/series/)

                                                                                                                            Marion Depoisier

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER publié dans : Articles Marion
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Meet the Frag Dolls!

The Frag Dolls a female team created and employed by Ubisoft

Let's see the video!

    The Frag Dolls team is relevant to a new phenomena into the community of hard gamers in the world: the increase of the female gamers community.
In fact, since 2000 we can notice more and more girls who are interested in video games and that represent the new marketing target.
Whereas Playstation and Nintendo targeted female gamers with pink material and pretty games like breeding a pet, Ubisoft creates in 2004 the famous female gamers team: the Frag Dolls.
They also play with their mediatization to promote a « two step » communication, as a matter of fact the Frag Dolls target girls and boys, all over the world.

   Frag Dolls break the stereotype which considers gamers as a spotty teenager who speaks every time about his « second life » with his fellows. They appear like beautiful women who are intelligent (they come from University of California for instance, they are graduated) and whose passion is video games. Thus they annihilate the culpability feeling which may have female gamers who can now assume their passion.
Their accessibility and popularity has attracted boys and girls, it is the proof that video games are not a synonym of « geek » or « no life ».

   It is the proof that Ubisoft knows how to profit on the feminization of the community of gamers too. In fact Frag Dolls were a real media blow.
They increase the number of female gamers by proving that a girl can play at Counter Strike or Unreal Tournament for instance and not just at Desperate Housewives role play or Nintendogs.
Then they are used as an advert for Ubisoft as if they were sexy girls behind a nice car, what urges boys to go to show games just to see them.

   To conclude, Frag Dolls present Ubisoft games, they are awesome players who seduce male and female gamers in the world. But all their actions are overexposed, as if they were precisely a character of a role play game. We can wonder if it is a pervert effect of their mediatization or if it is in fact the marketing strategy of Ubisoft to mix virtual and reality?

(For further informations and videos about the Frag Dolls , clic here)

Frédérique Roussel

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER publié dans : Articles Frédérique
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Miss Video Game 2007

Here is a press release as concerns "Miss Video Game" election from PRWEB.

In fact, there is a website where they were looking for a person to be Miss Video Game 2007. The girl can be a gamer or not, the idea is to bring more women into the scene and prove what they are capable of.

We can read the reason for doing such an event on their official website :

To assist in the proliferation of females in gaming genres of all types and to help raise awareness of the female gaming audience among game publishers and advertisers. To make the gaming industry take women gamers seriously and to treat them with respect as equals.

We can also notice the following goals :

- to showcase female gaming talent and the amazing variety among female gamers

- to create a positive role model for young girls who enjoy playing video games

- to break the stereotype that gaming is a male dominated industry

- to have a good time in a fair and friendly environment

To register the judges want to know your nickname, name, age, country, the hours you usually play per week, the languages you speak and then you are supposed to write a bit longer on these three questions :

- what is your favorite game ?

- what are your future goals ?

- how do you want to change the perception of female gamers ?

and add 4 pictures of yourself.

This is a photo of the winner named Lauren.

source : www.missvideogame.com

I think this could be a great experience because we can find the spirit of competition between all the applyers. Moreover, a trip to Canada and Mexico is something really amazing.

But we must consider the negative points of such an event. This promotes a bad aspect of girl gaming and discredits it. As miss Harvey said, the best female gamers of the world are fighting against this gap between male and female and try to be considered as gamers and not only "girl gamers". Those type of election shows people that popular girl gamers are recognized for their beauty and not for their skills.

The gap between male and female gamers has become more important for the last 2 years because of money : the female get some sponsors more easily than the male because they promote a better aspect of gaming (beauty, smile, social life...) which makes a kind of "jealousy" from the boys. The best female players are not interested in giving smiles to medias but showing great results in competitions ! These different aspects from female gaming are separating the gamers into two parts : those who are recognized for their skills and competitiveness and those who are popular because of their beauty.

From my point of view, this MissVideoGame election is really disappointing because that doesn't show who the real female gamers are.

Axelle MARIE

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER publié dans : Articles Axelle
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Key words

Here is a list of key words extracted from the whole blog.

video gamers media coverage female gamers scene Counter-Strike electronic sport sponsors progamers gaming career tournaments/competition ESWC team reality show to win/to loose fans star status	virtual/reality hard gamers community gamers stereotype geek/no life team/guild/clan media blow marketing strategy games promotion contracts job/wages advert consumption

We hope that you had fun while reading this blog !

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER
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The hidden side of the Frag Dolls

        After studying the Ubisoft team and after wondering if its over exposure was a real strategy or a pervert effect, I wanted to inquire about this Frag Dolls' wave. Instead of choosing a common press release I decided to search on the Net to find concrete and unusual informations which deal with the media coverage of the Frag Dolls. I found an interesting article with two testimonies (don't forget the second page).

    Firstly we can notice that some paradoxes distort the aim of the Frag Dolls' phenomena. Their missions are in dissension with the reality. Instead of proving that girls are able to play with a lot of different games and that they are more and more into the virtual world, the Frag Dolls are only paid for promoting the Ubisoft video games. In fact, the Frag Dolls don't have the right to play with another competitor product. A fact which is not astonishing because a Frag Doll signs a contract with Ubisoft.

    Then it is precisely because they sign this contract that the Frag Dolls are not a real team. There is any clan, any true group of players. Personally, I enjoy playing MMORPG which are online games where people meet them because of a role play behaviour, and we finally found a guild because we were friends. It is totally opposed to the Frag Dolls who are girls into a team but paid for an individual job, not for pleasure. The proof is that they are paid according to their capacity and success in playing Ubisoft games but finally they don't really know each other and they play for themselves and for their wages.

    Finally it seems obvious that Ubisoft has built a solid marketing strategy which rest on a virtual creditable reason: the fact that girls need to be recognise into this world full of male gamers. But the truth is that the media coverage of pretty female gamers who are playing Ubisoft games is profitable. Indeed we learn with these two testimonies that girls are chosen according to their talent for playing but especially according to their sex appeal and a kind of stereotype of the casual fashion woman, which is defined by a stable life of a young woman who has a job.

    To conclude the principal mission of the Frag Dolls which is to increase the recognition of female gamers seems to be a great illusion. The Frag Dolls are only a human and a virtual (because of their blogs, their avatars...let's see my first article) advert for Ubisoft which manage to link two poles of consumption : video games and sex appeal. And that is how we can assimilate the Frag Dolls as... the car dolls.

Frédérique Roussel

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER publié dans : Articles Frédérique
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Interview : Nathalie Ek

    After having studied the presentation of the reality show made by Les Seules (Play US), I was interesting by one of the player from this team : Nathalie Ek, more known as Nato.
    So, I picked up an interview (here) from fragbite which is a swedish website. This last is focused on the game community. The interview has been done in 2006 after the Electronic Sport World Cup (ESWC). Les Seules lost the grand final against BTB (france) to take the second place.

    Here, Nato is talking about herself and her team as well. She's 19 and she's a swedish girl who speaks fluently English. This point is important for her and the team because they need to communicate each other. Indeed, they're five with two norvegians, two swedish and one dane.
    Accordind to her, the relationship is different between them and as we notice they've got problems of communication. She can have fun with Miss Hyper for instance but she considers Cazzidy as the ingame leader. Maybe Cazzidy feels superior compare to the others and that's why there are some tensions in the team, as we saw in the video (first article).
    Apparently, there is no real friendship between the players...it's like a hard work where there is a hierarchy and where you need to be the best to win money and to be recognized.

    However, the interest for the team is increasing and according to her it's because of being active in the ESWC 2006, whereas they were not in 2005. But that's not the only reason. They attend as many events, like that, they can meet their fans as well. But also the reality show is important for the public image of the team.

    Everything is like an advertisement. Indeed, when she says to the journalist "You'll be able to catch us on several events.", does it mean "every fan and journalist could see them everywhere"? She feels like a role model as she means and the support of fans is very important. According to her, one of the reason why they lost the ESWC is the absence of fans but also the personnal commitment of the commentator.

    The media coverage is increasing and their planning is over booked...But this media coverage could ruin the team. Some players wanted to leave Les Seules to turn into a "normal" life (Queen).

     Also, play in high level has some consequences on the studies. Indeed, Nato stopped it for the game and because of her ambition to win and to be the best, she needs to train 3 to 5 hours a day! So the game comes before the studies. She thinks that she can built herself thanks to a game. However, as we know a professionnal gamer can't play after 27 because of reflexes which are no more the same.

     Her first goal is to win and nothing else seems to come before. Moreover she would like an equality between men and women gamers. According to her there is a kind of wall and she seems to say that women are not picked for their skills. Indeed, to be picked, girls have to get a "sexual image" as well.
But is that really important when you're playing a video game on a computer?

                                                                                                                      Marion Depoisier

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER publié dans : Articles Marion
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Conclusion

       To conclude, we saw different aspects from girl gaming : the professional side and the media one. In fact our written articles are trying to debate about differences between real gamers and marketing gamers.

       Actually, teams like "les Seules" or "The Fragdolls" were created by sponsoring companies in order to promote their brand and products that's why those girl gamers are chosen attractive and pretty.
       On the other side professional and competitive female gamers like MissHarvey fight against those "dolls products" who bring discredit on the whole gamers scene and community.

       The problem is that the gap has become more important between female and male gamers despite the fact that most of girls are aiming for being considered as real progamers. After reading those articles can we find how do media influence the female gamers community ?

       We saw that media takes part of this debate by showing female gamers through TV shows and sexy shots for example. We also know that sponsoring companies invest hugh amount of money to promote their brand with the help of the girls. So the answer seems to be clear : money is the key of success...!

       Some countries consider electronic sport as a real sport but France do not. Is it te fact of a bad French media exposure toward gaming ? Yes, probably.

par A.MARIE ; F.ROUSSEL ; M.DEPOISIER
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Female gamers and media

EXCLUSIVE : INTERVIEW WITH STEPHANIE HARVEY

Les Seules

Meet the Frag Dolls!

Miss Video Game 2007

Key words

The hidden side of the Frag Dolls

Interview : Nathalie Ek

Conclusion

Présentation

Recherche

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