12歲女孩給喜歡女性角色的電子游戲玩家謀福利

Audie Cornish （Host）： Today， some of the most popular video games in the world are made specifically for smartphones. The game Temple Run has been downloaded more than a billion times. Sixty percent of its players are women. Many of these mobile games are free to play， but if you want to play using a female character， you’re often asked to pay up， sometimes quite a bit. Steve Henn from our Planet Money team has the story of a sixth grade girl who figured this out and decided to do something about it.

Steve Henn （Byline）： Maddie Messer is 12. She loves science and hiking and biking and her dog， and she also loves a good video game. And one of her favorites is the classic Temple Run. In this game， you’re running along a path or a 1）swamp， 2）fleeing from a tribe of angry zombie 3）skull-faced monkeys. You have to run and jump and turn.

Maddie Messer： If there are roots sticking out， you can just move from side to side to 4）dodge those. And if—Oh， I didn’t see the rock.

Henn： For Maddie， this game is perfect， except for one thing. Her character—this digital version of Maddie—is a guy.

Maddie： Guy Dangerous.

Henn： If you want to play as a guy in most video games， it’s not a problem. If you want to play a female character， it’s not as easy. Often you have to pay. And for Maddie， this was annoying. She’d often have to go to her parents and ask for money to buy a girl.

Maddie： It’s not fair， because， like， you know， if I’m being forced to play as a boy， like， why？

Henn： So she told her dad，“l(fā)ook， these games are 5）rigged. They favor boys.” But honestly， at first he was kind of 6）skeptical. He said， “prove it.” So Maddie said， “OK， I will.” She 7）proposed a research project. She said，“l(fā)et me download the 50 most popular running games， games like Temple Run， and I will count up how many offer female characters and how much they cost.” Her dad agreed. So for weeks， Maddie would come home after school every day and download a video game. And then she’d play it and record her results on this giant paper chart. And what she found was kind of mind blowing. Out of the 50 games she looked at， 37 offered free male characters. The number offering free female characters？ Just five—5 out of 50.

Maddie： It was kind of a 8）letdown. Like， I was hoping that there were gonna be more girls， but there just weren’t. And I was kind of 9）bummed. Like， come on—it’s not that hard to do one girl.

Henn： In most of these games， you could unlock these characters by playing， but it takes hours. It’s faster and easier just to buy them. And the average price for a female character was $7.53. Disney had one game where there was only one female character—the only one—and it cost$30—$30…So Maddie decided to write an 10）op-ed.

Maddie： I was thinking， oh， maybe it’ll get published in like our local paper—maybe not—and that will be the end of it.

Henn： But The Washington Post published it. People saw it all over the world. The makers of Temple Run—they read it.

Natalia Luckyanova： It was embarrassing （laughter）. It was embarrassing to read that.

Henn： Natalia Luckyanova is one of the creators of Temple Run， and she was 11）mortified. When Natalia built Temple Run， she 12）deliberately added female characters to the game because she wanted to make it 13）appeal to as large an audience as possible. But because she was giving away the basic game for free in the app store， she and her partners decided to charge for these 14）bonus characters. And as a business decision that worked beautifully.

Luckyanova： There was a huge demand for a female character.

Henn： Sixty percent of Temple Run players are female. And even though female characters in the original game don’t have any special powers， they still bring in a lot of cash.

Luckyanova： For all of our good intentions and for all of my good intentions， it’s true that， you know， you start out with this male character—that the male， you know， the white male is always the 15）default—and then anything else， it’s like you have to work for it.

Henn： Natalia says Maddie was right.

Luckyanova： So I think she had a point.

Henn： The very same day Maddie’s op-ed ran in The Post， Natalia wrote to Maddie and said that her company would make one of their female characters free. Disney also backed down， too. That $30 girl character—its price is falling to zero.

奧迪·科尼什（主持人）：如今，一些世界上最受歡迎的電子游戲是專門為智能手機(jī)設(shè)計的。《神廟逃亡》這款游戲已經(jīng)被下載超過10億次，其中60%的玩家是女性。這些手機(jī)游戲很多都是免費(fèi)的，但是如果你想用女性角色來玩，你通常就會被索取費(fèi)用，有時候費(fèi)用會很高。我們“貨幣星球”（譯者注：這是一個關(guān)注全球經(jīng)濟(jì)的多媒體團(tuán)隊，通過博客、播客和推特等多媒體手段進(jìn)行研究和推廣）欄目組的史蒂夫·海恩帶來一篇有關(guān)一個六年級女孩的報道——她發(fā)現(xiàn)了游戲中女性角色需要付費(fèi)的事實，并決定為此做點什么。

史蒂夫·海恩（撰稿人）：瑪?shù)稀っ啡麪柦衲?2歲。她熱愛科學(xué)、徒步旅行、騎單車和她的狗狗，她也喜歡玩電子游戲。她最喜愛的其中一款游戲就是經(jīng)典的《神廟逃亡》。在這個游戲里，你要跑過一條小路或者一片濕地，被一群憤怒的僵尸骷髏頭猴子追趕。你必須又跑又跳又轉(zhuǎn)彎。

瑪?shù)稀っ啡麪枺喝绻袠渲Τ霈F(xiàn)，你只需從一邊跑到另一邊去躲避那些東西。如果……哦，我沒看到那塊石頭。

海恩：在瑪?shù)峡磥恚@款游戲除了一個地方，其他都是完美的——她在游戲里的角色——電子版的瑪?shù)鲜且粋€男的。瑪?shù)希阂粋€叫Dangerous的男人。海恩：如果你想用男性角色去玩大部分的電子游戲，沒有問題；如果你想用女性角色來玩，那就沒那么簡單了。你通常需要付費(fèi)。而對于瑪?shù)蟻碚f，這很讓人苦惱。她經(jīng)常需要向她父母要錢去買一個女性角色。

瑪?shù)希哼@不公平，因為，你懂的，如果我被迫去玩一個男性角色，那么理由是什么？

海恩：所以她跟爸爸說：“聽著，這些游戲是不合理的，他們偏愛男生。”但事實上，起初她的爸爸對此有點懷疑，他說：“證明給我看。”于是瑪?shù)险f：“好吧，我會證明給你看的。”她想出了一個研究計劃。她說：“讓我下載50款像《神廟逃亡》那樣最受歡迎的跑酷游戲，我會統(tǒng)計里面有多少游戲提供女性角色，她們的收費(fèi)是多少。”她的爸爸同意了。所以幾周以來，瑪?shù)厦刻旆艑W(xué)后都會回家下載一款游戲。然后她會玩一下那款游戲，把結(jié)果記錄在一個大的紙質(zhì)表格上。而她發(fā)現(xiàn)的事實讓她激動不已。她研究的50款游戲中，有37款游戲提供免費(fèi)的男性角色。那么提供免費(fèi)女性角色的游戲數(shù)量呢？只有5款——50款里只有5款。

瑪?shù)希哼@很讓人失望。就像，我曾經(jīng)希望會發(fā)現(xiàn)更多的免費(fèi)女性角色，但卻事與愿違。我很沮喪。就像，不會吧，提供一個免費(fèi)的女性角色不難啊。

海恩：在大部分的這些游戲中，你可以通過闖關(guān)來得到這些角色，但這需要時間。購買這些角色更加方便快捷。然而一個女性角色的平均價格是7.53美元。迪士尼公司有一款電子游戲里只有一個女性角色，她的價錢是30美元——30美元……所以瑪?shù)蠜Q定寫一篇專欄文章。

瑪?shù)希何耶?dāng)時在想，噢，也許它會發(fā)表在像是我們當(dāng)?shù)氐膱蠹埳希苍S不會——那么這件事就到此為止。

海恩：但是《華盛頓郵報》發(fā)表了這篇專欄文章。全世界的人都看到了，《神廟逃亡》的創(chuàng)造者也看到了。

娜塔莉亞·盧克亞諾娃：這很讓人尷尬（笑）。讀到這篇文章很讓我尷尬。

海恩：娜塔莉亞·盧克亞諾娃是《神廟逃亡》的創(chuàng)始人之一，她很難堪。當(dāng)娜塔莉亞創(chuàng)造《神廟逃亡》時，她故意給這款游戲加入了女性角色，因為她希望游戲盡可能受到更多玩家的歡迎。但是因為她在應(yīng)用商城已經(jīng)提供了免費(fèi)的基本游戲，她和她的合伙人決定對額外的角色收費(fèi)。而這個商業(yè)決策收益甚好。

盧克亞諾娃：女性角色的需求量很大。

海恩：《神廟逃亡》60%的玩家是女性。盡管女性角色在原版游戲中沒有任何特殊的能力，她們?nèi)匀晃鸩簧佟?/p>

盧克亞諾娃：就拿我們所有好的意圖來說，就拿我所有好的意圖來說，你懂的，我們確實是要先考慮男性角色——男性，你了解的，白人男性總是我們默認(rèn)的選項。然后才是其他的東西。就像你必須要這么做。海恩：娜塔莉亞說瑪?shù)鲜菍Φ摹?/p>

盧克亞諾娃：所以我覺得她有道理。

海恩：就在瑪麗的專欄文章發(fā)表于《華盛頓郵報》的同一天，娜塔莉亞寫信給瑪?shù)希f她的公司會讓他們其中一個女性角色免費(fèi)。迪士尼公司也作出了讓步，那個價值30美元的女性角色變成了免費(fèi)。