The history of video games is male-dominated. Not because only boys play or because games for girls aren’t important, but because we don’t give games that aren’t clearly aimed at a male audience the recognition they deserve. Aside from a few honorable exceptions, with Tetris leading the way, video games have always been a heavily male-dominated medium. And not because it only attracts men, but because it’s always been treated as if only they played video games.
This isn’t true. Men and women play in equal numbers. Preferences between games usually aren’t very different, that’s true. But it’s also true that there are games with more female players and games with more male players, even if there are also games without those biases. And while the latter are treated as neutral, as games for everyone, the former are treated exclusively as feminine. That’s why you’ll hear about GTA6 everywhere. Because it’s the big release of the year. And yet, you might not even know that Barbie: Rewind is coming out. Even though it’s a release that might not sell as much, it’s important to the history of the medium.
A collection of great games
Barbie: Rewind is a compilation made by Digital Eclipse of 16 Barbie games published between 1991 and 2007. With games spanning from the NES to the Game Boy Advance, there are some legendary games of the world’s favorite doll here, ranging from Barbie Super Model to Barbie: Pet Rescue and, of course, the Detective Barbie games. Something that won’t mean anything to many people, but will bring enormous nostalgia to the female audience.
In fact, the selection of games is thoughtfully curated. Though not every game that ought to be here is, every game that is here ought to be. And though the quality isn’t always consistent, some of the games being better than others, they all tell us about the different approaches people were taking with Barbie at the time. Rather than limiting itself to “girl things,” what’s interesting is seeing how there were games of every kind starring the character.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t some major absences. Barbie Explorer, considered one of the character’s great games and often compared to Tomb Raider, is absent from the collection. As is Barbie and the Three Musketeers, perhaps the character’s best game to date. Though considering it came out on Nintendo DS in 2009, it’s understandable that it falls outside the scope of this collection.
Putting Care Into the Content
Though the game’s most notable aspect isn’t just the collection of games or its selection, but the care they’ve taken with it. With Barbie’s DreamHouse acting as a game-like main interface, we’ll play as the doll herself and be able to decorate it however we like with up to 250 furniture and decor items. This is also how we’ll access the games, but the way to unlock items for the house will be to achieve certain goals Barbie herself sets for us. This gives the game a life of its own.
But that’s not all. Digital Eclipse has also brought back a game that was never released as part of this collection: Barbie: Vacation Adventure. Planned for Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis, it was supposed to come out in 1994, but never saw the light of day. This game takes us on a journey across the whole of the US with Barbie, having to play various minigames where she’ll have to make the most of her vacation.
While the game isn’t particularly novel or brilliant, what’s interesting about it is that until now it was considered a lost game. Since this is its first official release, this collection isn’t just preserving Barbie games and making them accessible to a whole new generation, but also recovering titles that were previously inaccessible. That’s also important work and that shouldn’t go unnoticed.
That’s what makes Barbie: Rewind so interesting. A collection aimed at a very specific audience, but one that shouldn’t go unnoticed for that reason. Because girls, particularly young girls, also need games made for them. Video games are not exclusively for the male gender, and it shouldn’t be only what can be judged through the lens of a specific gender or age that is taken into consideration in order to be preserved, studied, and taken into account. That’s why Barbie: Rewind is worth celebrating: for the same reason we celebrate all collections of retro games.
