This past weekend, ESL.eu hosted a female-only SC2 tournament that we promoted on our brand-spanking new Twitter account. The tournament itself was successful and congratulations go out to 1st place winner Pikachu and all the other women that played. In some ways, though, the the bulk of the action took place outside of the tourney itself in the debates that arose on several gaming forums. Some troll-ololols thought it’d be cute to mock the women organizing it, saying the typical “girls don’t play games” schtick, while others were supportive and the rest were ambivalent about the issue.
I personally believe that e-sports can potentially be a universal playing field for both men and women. Both sexes can equally pick up a controller, keyboard or mouse and start playing a game (and well, at that). However, this is not to say gaming is inherently gender-neutral. Games tend to be marketed towards men, and played more by them. I think as the years go by this will balance out, but right now the standing is that more men play video games than women, and advertising continues to reflect that trend.
This is where you, the reader, comes in. What are your thoughts on segregating tournaments for women only? Does this help attract female gamers, or potentially undermine them? Does it matter? Continue the debate here and register for our forums, where you can get to the heart of the matter in this post!
