{"id":8088,"date":"2017-12-15T18:38:00","date_gmt":"2017-12-15T18:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamasutra.com\/view\/news\/311821"},"modified":"2017-12-15T18:38:00","modified_gmt":"2017-12-15T18:38:00","slug":"q-a-designing-flutter-vr-a-game-unapolegetically-made-for-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2017\/12\/15\/q-a-designing-flutter-vr-a-game-unapolegetically-made-for-women\/","title":{"rendered":"Q& A: Designing Flutter VR, a game unapolegetically made for women"},"content":{"rendered":"

Flutter VR<\/em><\/a>, the latest offering from Dunedin, NZ-based\u00a0Runaway Play<\/a>, is a virtual reality game for Google\u2019s Daydream platform that promises to be \u201cunapologetically made for women.\u201d<\/p>\n

The game sees players\u00a0peacefully exploring\u00a0the Amazon rainforest as a researcher, and making friends with Barbara the Capybara (missed opportunity to call her Capybarbara). Runaway Play is also run by women and has nearly achieved gender parity on its staff.<\/p>\n

I sat down with managing director Zoe Hobson, and creative director Emma Johansson, to chat with them about what making a game for women means these days; in short, it means focusing less on gender stereotypes and more on making a game for the busy lives led by young and middle-aged women.<\/p>\n

We also discussed the New Zealand gaming scene and how a recent political sea change there might affect the fortunes of NZ game dev.<\/p>\n

Cross:<\/strong>\u00a0Emma, in your press release you say that “Flutter VR<\/em> is unapologetically a game made for women.” Despite the gloominess of our age and the nastiness of some sectors of the tech community, I think it’s safe to say we’re living in a renaissance of games about\/by\/for women. In that context, what does “unapologetically” mean now; what separates Flutter VR<\/em> from other games–even just in the VR space?<\/p>\n

Hobson:<\/strong> We agree that it\u2019s so positive to see the narrative changing around games for women. However we also think it\u2019s still important to recognize that we have not yet come far enough. Even in the launch of this game we have received a small number of complaints about the fact that it\u2019s been made for women.<\/p>\n

And so we must reiterate that we are not apologizing for creating something for an audience demographic that is both growing globally, but is also a huge part of our mobile gaming community (80 players\u00a0of our other three mobile games’ players are women).<\/p>\n

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Johansson:<\/strong> In terms of \u201cunapologetic\u201d we also mean that this game has been created very deliberately for women, right from every design decision. It hasn\u2019t just had a female character slapped into a game at the last minute.<\/p>\n

We designed the gameplay sessions to be 20 minutes long, perfect for our busy female demographic at the end of a day. We designed the story narrative based around the value of creating time for yourself – something we know many women struggle with, and countless blog articles rave about. We designed the game experience to be relaxing, calming and peaceful – something we know from our other games that our audience really cherishes in a gaming experience. It’s unapologetic because we are proud to be doing this.<\/p>\n

What separates Flutter VR<\/em> from other games is the way that we approached it.<\/p>\n

Cross:<\/strong> In the same press release Emma said, “It\u2019s all too easy for us as developers to design for the world we are accustomed to living in, in the way we are used to experiencing it.” That’s a design philosophy that should be embroidered on the tea towels at every gaming studio! But what does that look like in Flutter VR<\/em>? As we all know, gender is not the only place a “comfort zone” might exist in the world of design.<\/p>\n

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“It is our belief that great game products can be created and grown while maintaining good work life balance, and that overtime should be very rare.”<\/span><\/h6>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Flutter VR<\/em>‘s setting and conceit–exploration of the Amazon–keys into some rather old, and some might say troubling, colonial narratives about European exploration (the safari, etc.) Clearly you’re going in a different direction; this is a game about a scientist who is peacefully interacting with and studying nature, not exploiting it. But were there other things you did to decenter\u00a0what you knew, or what you thought you knew about places like the Amazon rainforest?<\/p>\n

In short, how do you pay attention to issues of race\/nationality as well as gender?<\/p>\n

Johansson:<\/strong> In terms of our design philosophy, we have done our best to decenter\u00a0ourselves in our approach to the game. \u00a0For inspiration we sought input on the Amazon from a number of diverse sources including children’s literature, documentaries, blogs, brochures, conservation and commercial websites, books, historic accounts, local and indigenous stories, as well as current research.<\/p>\n

One particular source that we loved was a recent Conservation International video called Under the Canopy<\/a>, which presents the Amazon visually in 360 degree video and is narrated by an indigenous guide. This may seem extensive, but we\u2019re convinced that each source was valuable in helping us step beyond our established gaming perspective.<\/p>\n

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When choosing mechanics during prototyping, we were user testing constantly to see not only what WE thought worked and would make an enjoyable experience, but what our potential players thought worked. Quite often we found that our \u201cgreat ideas\u201d didn\u2019t work how we had imagined in practice, and other ideas came from our players\u2019 reactions to mechanics. We also tested with people of multiple ethnicities, gamers\/non gamers and in an age range of 18 to 65, to try and see our game from multiple viewpoints.<\/p>\n

In the beginning of the project when we defined the target audience we started with 25-40 year old women, passive \u201cnon-gamers\u201d, first-time VR users. We also added targets of creating the game for:<\/p>\n