You had mentioned to me yesterday that I never answered your question about girls and games, so I thought it was only fair to give you a complete answer, so here goes:
Girls and Gaming
Video games, at their first inception, was built upon testosterone induced premises. Though many believe that "Pong" was the first game, they are actually wrong, the first videogame was a war sim. Though the graphics were poor, it still had the premise of manliness behind it. In the early days of games they appealed to a wider crowd. Games like "Asteroids", "Centipede", "Space Invaders", and "Dig Dug" helped video games reach great heights, and helped games get to a wide audience. However, it wasn't until the game "Pacman" came out that video games were really excepted into the mainstream. Men and women alike were drawn to this game, as well as it's many sequels ... including "Ms Pacman", which was the best of the series.
As video games started to come into homes, with the Atari 2600 which "Everyone and their brother" owned, games had hit it big. The thing with games coming home though was the fact that, though games like "Pacman" and "Dig Dug" were great to play if you had a quarter or two on hand, people found that they just didn't hold up too well with homeplay. You can play "Pacman" for so long before it gets boring. Thus enters the "Platformer".
As games started to get more "adventure" based, it was found the market was being flooded by many copycat trash games. With many "adult" games, that helped to feed into the "manliness" of gaming, as well as games such as "Halloween", which was pulled off the shelves for being "too violent", it was becoming obvious that gaming was a "guy thing". While many guys used to like to sit around and trade baseball cards, or go out hiking, they had started turning to videogames. Many girls didn't except games, maybe it was because the "pastimes" that girls enjoyed had never phased out. Little girls were still into their dolls, which maybe has to do with their internal motherliness, as older girls enjoyed shopping, or keeping up on fashion.
During the early to mid eighties, the image of a "gamer" was more or less a "geek", or an "outcast", and image not many girls would want to be associated with. In 1985, when Nintendo came on the scene, gaming grew, but so also did the level of "manliness" in games. Many games started to focus more on blowing things up, saving the girl, or sports. During this time the majority of "girl gamers" were either drawn into gaming by older brothers, were social outcasts (which is why you see so many female Goths that enjoy gaming), or tomboys.
As gaming entered the nineties, many lost interest. Gamers were looked down upon again. Then in 1995 Sony released the "Playstation", all at once it became "hip" to play games. As game still do continue to nurture to the men, with games that focus on blowing things up, saving the girl, or sports (only with better graphics now), there are also games coming that appeal to a wider audience, games that girls have grown to love. The "Puzzle" type games have always been a favorite of girls, but now you also have the "Music" games, like "Parappa The Rapper", and "Um Jammer Lammy". As girls are starting to see that it's "socially expectable" to be a gamer, more girls are embracing it. With the image of the social outcast being removed from the "gamer's image", and now being replaced by "hipness", people are becoming more open to video games. If many girls tried and played some "Bust a Groove", I bet many would enjoy it.
So, you say, why don't girls like games... I think it's because they haven't given what's to offer in today's' gaming world a fair shot. Sure, a girl doesn't want to play a round of "Metal Gear Solid" (a videogame that plays out like a mega action movie), but that doesn't mean that they wouldn't like "Space Channel 5"(a dancing/rhythm game).
~This Is A Man's World, But It's Nothing Without a Woman