We recognize that The Sims appeals to a broad audience, but according to Electronic Arts’ own internal data, 60 percent of Sims players are female, and from casual conversations we’ve had with EA producers and executives, teen girls make up a sizable chunk of that audience. For Davis to take The Sims–the videogame equivalent of a soap opera or a telenovela–and turn it into yet another teen male high adventure story not only stereotypes videogames as being the province of boys alone, it also represents a missed opportunity to illustrate how this videogame in particular has illuminated the inner lives of girls, women and men alike.

At the time of reading yesterday’s article on details for the upcoming ‘The Sims Movie’, I wasn’t thinking about this.  But after checking out N’Gai Croal’s article, he has a valid point.  I didn’t match the fact that The Sims is made up of a huge market of female players – and I’ve even reported a few stories on it.  However, so far the producer for the movie would like to turn it into a ‘male’ teen movie.  Hope they don’t miss out on their core audience and include some female actors.  But then again, it is Hollywood we’re talking about here.  Probably going to be full of cursewords (in Simlish) and fartjokes for the majority of the movie…

The Big Idea: Should a Game Whose Core Audience Is Teen Girls Become a Movie Aimed at Teen Boys?