Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this column are those of the participants and the moderator, and do not necessarily reflect those of the GIA. There is coarse language and potentially offensive material afoot. If it helps to set the mood, imagine me writing this column while in a last, desperate dogfight high above the surface of Mars. Don't say we didn't warn you.

In case you haven't seen it yet, I suggest you click here, so you'll have some idea of what I'm talking about in intro.

Yep, I'm out of here before too long. The reasons for my retirement are about what you'd expect, the paramount being that I've simply been here long enough, and it's time to move on. I still enjoy writing this column very much, and I'm starting to actively miss it already when I think about not writing it anymore, but it's getting harder and harder to say things I haven't said two or three times before. Of course, it's the nature of gaming letters columns to hash out the same old questions and debates over and over again, but I think it's about time for someone else to step in who'll be able to address those debates with a fresh perspective and some new enthusiasm.

That someone could be you; I strongly encourage anyone and everyone to give the application a try if you're even vaguely interested in the job. Don't get me wrong, the application process will be damned tough, but I'd never been more than an occasional writer to the column, and I made the cut. I'd love to see someone with some really fresh insights get the position: a really articulate DQ fan, or a woman with the same kind of passion that we saw in Andrea and Tami's recent stint. Of course, what we're really after is the best possible columnist we can get, but we'll never know if that's you or not unless you apply, so get to it.

As for me, I'll be hanging around until the final decision's been reached, and migrating soon after to the gentler climes of writing vaults and reviews, where all good DAs get to go when they die. I'd say more here about how great it's been to have this job, and what an honor it's been to work with the staff and the readers, but I'm not quite gone yet, and in the meantime I'd just as soon enjoy myself while I'm still around.

Speaking of which, I haven't forgotten the Final Fantasy Movie contest, but I will need a little longer to do all the counting and get things in order: expect a winner announced tomorrow. As for now, let's see what we can do with today's topic, eh?

Onward.

True story: last night I was on the GIA staff channel, and Nich pointed out that the topic he was about to send my way might result in relatively few letters. I agreed, saying that the only two female console developers I could think of off the top of my head were the composers for Grandia and Dewprism.

The composers for Grandia and Dewprism aren't women.

So, you see, the difficulty of the topic was even higher than I'd thought. It's not impossible, as the letters below reveal, but it is pretty damn difficult. And why is that? Here's one theory...

Ok, it's not a great theory, but at least it's something.

Seriously, it shouldn't be that surprising; look at the general states of the arts in the US, for example. It's not that there are no respected female movie directors, writers, composers, etc., but they're certainly well-behind their male counterparts. The reasons for this are way to complicated to get into here, but a surface explanation is that it's likely a chicken-and-egg thing. The people most likely to produce the next generation of an art form are the people obsessed with the current generation, which is mostly men for video games. This site's readership is about 90% guys; some of those same guys may go on to produce video games of their own, which will attract mostly guys into playing them, who will go on and produce games of their own, etc.

Of course, the kneejerk reaction is to say "We've got to get more women into gaming!" And the kneejerk reaction to that kneejerk reaction is to say "Why is it important to have women in gaming in the first place?" Again, these are pretty hairy questions to answer, but I'd suggest that differing perspectives could be exactly what's needed for those gamers who complain that there's no innovation in gaming these days. For someone who's only ever seen sf-influenced Quake clones, a dating sim with the ambience of, say, Maison Ikkoku could be a complete revelation.

Then again, you can argue that women need to be more visible in gaming just to improve the gender's general reputation; sad to say, I got 1 Stevie Case letter and 0 Roberta Williams letters, and that's not fair. It's not even the case that you need more superstars in gaming to cancel out the Stevie Cases of the world, it's just that there should probably be more recognition of the rank and file game developers who put out solid, respectable entries into gaming. But even then, Amy Henning, director of Soul Reaver 2's the only one I can think of, and that's largely because she was the one answering the questions about why the original Soul Reaver got cut in 2.

Admit it: you only looked up that Uncharted Waters 2 trivia so you could rave about Yoko, didn't you?

Ah, what do I care. Yes, Ms. Kanno most very much definitely rocks... or swings, or whatever you want to classify her music as. Much as it does take a Roberta Williams to cancel out a Stevie Case, Ms. Kanno has made it possible once more to associate the phrase "kick-ass music" with the name "Yoko". Of course, she had some help...

Indeed, Yoko Shimommura's work on LoM was great; it's a near thing, trying to figure out if LoM's hand-painted graphics are prettier than the music that accompanies it. However, the rest of her stuff isn't quite so great: she composed the Parasite Eve soundtrack, some of which was great (and some of which made my head hurt: yeah, synthesized opera, I'm looking at you) as well as Live a Live, and some tracks on both Front Mission and the Super Mario RPG. We'll get a chance to see what else she's capable of when Kingdom Hearts comes out, since she's scoring that one too.

And yeah, the character designer for Symphony of the Night and Circle of the Moon was a woman: Ayami Kojima. Don't know if she's related to the Kojima, tho.

See, this is what we need: more fanboys for female game producers! How could any woman resist a career in which an army of pasty, out of shape geeks feebly wave their controllers in the air in celebration of her name?

Er, never mind. But yeah, Phantasy Star rocks, and so does Skies of Arcadia, which she also had a hand in. And thus I second: Whooo!

Closing Comments:

Wow, managed to milk that topic for more than I thought I might. As for tomorrow's topic, since I won't be around for this coming holiday season, let's hear your early predictions: by 1/1/2002, what console and game will have had the best past three or four months, respectively? What are you looking forward to getting, and what do you think's gonna flop like a brick? Let me know, and I'll be back tomorrow. Adios.

-Chris Jones, going, going... but not gone just yet