3 - The Free-to-play Time of Women in Brazil: Localized Mobile and Casual Games
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 November 2020
Summary
Abstract
This chapter looks at the rising popularity of casual mobile games in the global South with a spotlight on Brazil. Initially costless, ‘free-to-play’ games are appealing to increasingly gender-diverse players. Structurally, the addictive features of design are looked at carefully, especially in relation to temporality and pacing, drawing from past feminist studies of how women incorporate entertainment media like television into their daily routines. I question whether players are empowered, or whether they are exploited by such sticky casual game mechanics. The intersectional analysis in this chapter takes both gender, and the geographic location of developers and players into account. This chapter also discusses localization strategies that Northern developers are implementing for marketing casual mobile games in the global South.
Keywords: Feminist media analysis, intersectionality, mobile games, casual games, game addiction, localization
In the previous chapter I presented examples of digital play in the face of formidable infrastructural and economic obstacles. I also observed a tendency for play spaces in the global South like game cafés to become marked as predominantly boy's leisure time territory. One hopeful consequence of easy-to-pick-up and shorter to complete, non-violent ‘casual’ games seems to be the large scale assimilation of women and girls, as well as other once uncommon digital gamer profiles such as elderly and LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer) players into the ranks of global game players. In this chapter I question whether this expanding, apparently more egalitarian, shift in game consumption is really such a positive, empowering improvement of players’ lives. Players in the global South, especially those located in so-called ‘BRICI’ nations with large, strong emerging economies like Brazil and India, are finally appearing on the radar of global game marketers. Do initially free-to-play Facebook and MMORPG games like Farmville and CityVille exploit game addiction among those in relatively poorer nations who can ill-afford to pay later for power-ups, inventory items, and other game add-ons once they are addicted to a game? Who benefits from the global upsurge in mobile and social network gaming among casual players? Are glocalized games like the quiz-game SongPop with nineteen musical Brazilian music genres tailored to the knowledge of Brazilians, helping to spur local Brazilian game industries?
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- Transnational PlayPiracy, Urban Art, and Mobile Games, pp. 65 - 78Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2020