Preferences of Game and Real Characters

In-depth Interviews of Young Male Players

Abstract

Digital games have been criticized as its stereotyped expression of game characters, but the number of game studies about gender has been limited in Japan. Since digital games in Japan has unique features such as idol games, role playing games, we conducted semi-structured in-depth interviews regarding preferences and general impressions of male and female game characters, and preferences of males and females in the real world. The results shows that interviewees suggested both masculine and feminine features for female game characters preferences, but they mentioned more masculine aspects for male game characters.