Chapter 8: Your Audience
1. The Seven Kisses of Death of Children’s Interactive Media
The process of creating interactive projects for children is riddled with possible pitfalls. Some of
these pitfalls are particularly sly and seductive, and over the years I have given them a name: The
Seven Kisses of Death. They are dangerous because they seem to make so much sense, but they
are based on faulty assumptions. I first encountered these kisses as a writer of children’s
television programs, and encountered them once again, hardly unchanged, when I moved into
interactive media. Thus, I speak from personal experience when I say that they can invade
projects for young people with great ease. The good news is that these blights can be overcome
by various strategies, and I’ll be reviewing them after describing the Death Kisses.
The Seven Kisses of Death are:
Death Kiss # 1: Kids love anything sweet
Yes, it is true that children love all kinds of sugary things—candy, ice cream, sugar frosted
breakfast cereals. But this doesn’t mean they also like their entertainment to be sweet, except
with they are very young. For some reason, however, when adults design projects for kids, they
often tend to heap on the sugar. In truth, sweetness is an adult concept of what kids should enjoy.
Many adults feel a compulsion to make all their characters kind, gentle, and loving, and to
portray the world as a sunny, happy place without a smidgen of discontent. But real children
above toddler age appreciate something with an edge, something that has some reality or bite to
it, even in a fantasy game.
Death Kiss #2: Give them what’s good for them
This death kiss is usually committed by adults who are sure they know what’s best for children,
and they are determined to give it to them whether the kids like it or not; it is the “medicinal”
approach.
Educational works are often plagued with this type of thinking. All too often, people approach
such products with a great earnestness and a zeal to make something that will be really good for
children. Unfortunately, they overdo it, and the resulting product is lifeless and dull. That doesn’t
mean, of course, that interactive works for children can’t have solid educational content. But the
educational material needs to be skillfully integrated with entertainment, or otherwise, the kids
will tune it out.
Death Kiss #3: You’ve just got to amuse them
This could be called the “junk food approach.” It is based on the assumption that it is far easier
and cheaper to make products for children than products for adults, because children are less
discriminating—a fatal assumption right there. Children are actually quite discriminating—
though in different ways than adults. And while kids love to be entertained, they are also hungry
for content. If a product is fun, but has no substance, you might not have any trouble getting kids
to play it, but they’ll get bored with it quickly and move on to other things.
Death Kiss #4: Always play it safe!
In the desire to avoid violence, sex, and controversy, it is all too easy to go to the other extreme
and produce something so safe that it is boring. In actuality, avoiding objectionable material does
not mean forgoing excitement or drama. It just means find other ways to keep the adrenaline
pumping.
Death Kiss #5: All kids are created equal
This particular Death Kiss is committed when we are trying to make a product that will appeal to
an extremely broad demographic, without taking into account how different children are at
different ages. But, as we saw earlier in this chapter, children go through distinct stages of
development, each with characteristic interests and play patterns. Thus, projects for children
must be designed with a clear target age group in mind.
Death Kiss #6: Explain everything
In our desire to make things perfectly clear, we often overdo it, and drown them with words. It is
hard for us to realize that kids are really clever at figuring things out, and aren’t nearly as averse
to the trial and error process as we grownups are. Children have little patience for lengthy
instructions or explanations, and particularly dislike being lectured at by a single talking head.
We’re being lazy when we do this, because we aren’t doing the tough creative job of devising
better ways to convey information.
Death Kiss #7: Be sure your characters are wholesome!
This death kiss is particularly slippery because it seems so laudable. Of course we want our
characters to be positive role models. Unfortunately, characters that are totally good are dull are
also totally boring. You have to move beyond wholesome if you want to have truly interesting
characters for children. And if you don’t have interesting characters, you’re missing one of the
key ingredients of a successful product, as we emphasized earlier in this chapter.
Countering the death kisses
Now that we’ve isolated the Seven Kisses of Death, we can review some strategies for
combating them. Essentially, we have ten effective ones available to us:
1. Build your project on a compelling mission
This tactic counters the “play it safe” Kiss of Death, and also the junk food approach. In fact, it is
powerful against all the death kisses. The idea is to hook your young users with an absorbing and
meaningful challenge or purpose. We can give the child a mystery to solve, or a quest to go on,
or a secret to discover. Or, if this is a creativity tool, we can give them something enormously
desirable to make. If it’s a simulation, we can give them the ability to control a fascinating
miniature world or enterprise. The hook should be clear-cut and readily identifiable; it won’t
serve its purpose if the players don’t know what it is. This is not the place for subtlety.
2. Inject an ample dose of tension
Tension is an extremely useful storytelling technique for keeping users engaged in an interactive
work. If anything, it is even more effective with children than it is with adults, because children
have a shorter attention span. It is also an excellent antidote to Death Kiss 4, “Always play it
safe.” It’s a dynamic way to add excitement without falling back on violence. Tension can be
ramped up by creating a powerful antagonist or by building in substantial challenges to
overcome, techniques that work particularly well in games or story-based projects. Of course,
you don’t want to use any forms of tension that might be disturbing to your target age-group.
When works have to gaming or narrative elements, you can create tension by harnessing the
child’s own curiosity. After all, curiosity is an intense anxiety to find something out, or to see
how something is resolved. Even a creativity tool can draw on the force of the child’s curiosity,
especially if it is leading toward a big finale or reward once the project is all put together.
3. Offer genuine substance
By integrating meaningful content into your project, you will be countering Death Kiss #1, “Kids
love anything sweet,” and Death Kiss #3, “You’ve just got to amuse them.” Children are like
sponges; they are eager for information about what the world is really like, and how to live in it.
And even very young children must contend with certain things that can be upsetting, such as a
fear of the unfamiliar, sibling rivalry, and anxieties about being abandoned. Older kids have
different concerns, of course, including peer pressure, conflicts with parents, and the yearning to
be accepted. If you address some of these issues in your work, you will be sure to capture the
attention of your audience. Of course, they must be presented from a child’s point of view, well
integrated into the overall frame of the work, and age appropriate.
4. Create multifaceted, dynamic characters
Good characters are powerful ammunition against all seven Death Kisses, but most particularly
against Death Kiss #7, “Be sure your characters are wholesome.” They add interest and
excitement to your product and bring it to life. When designing your characters, don’t forget to
pay attention to the opponents, if antagonists are appropriate for your project. They can be even
more fun to design than your heroes, and the more multidimensional and unusual they are, the
more energy they will give to the work.
5. Offer satisfying challenges and rewards
Rewards are a powerful motivator. A key strategy for grabbing the attention of children is to
break the content into a series of small, exciting challenges, and to offer rewards each time a
challenge is met. Challenges should increase in difficulty as the child’s mastery increases, thus
keeping the work interesting.
Rewards provide positive reinforcement, and also serve as a measuring stick for how well the
child is doing. The trick is to emphasize success and to play down failure. If the player makes a
mistake, soften the sting with a little humor, and with words of encouragement from one of the
non-player characters. You want to keep them involved and eager to do more, rather than
become discouraged and quit.
6. Make the product easy to use and understand
This guideline will help you deal with Death Kiss #6, “Explain everything.” When it comes to
guiding a child through your product, good interface design is the best way to reduce the need for
lengthy explanations. The more intuitive the interface, the less the need to give instructions about
how to navigate through it.
If your product calls for text, make sure it is as readable as possible. Your font should be
attractive and large enough for children to read easily, and the words shouldn’t be crowded
closely together. Remember, it is daunting even for adults to wade through a big chunk of text on
a screen. Think what it must be like for new readers. You can learn a great deal about design, and
the interplay between visuals and text, from studying fine picture books for children. Whenever
possible, use visual images and action rather than spoken or written words to get your message
across.
7. Make the product adjustable to the child’s abilities
When it comes to age appropriateness, interactive works have a great advantage over linear
works: They can be built with different degrees of difficulty. That means less accomplished users
will not be frustrated and more skillful users will continue to be challenged. Many products let
the child or parent set the difficulty level, and in some cases, the difficulty level even invisibly
adjusts to the user’s ability. By offering activities or games with different degrees of difficulty,
you are also giving your project greater repeatability. Children will come back to it again and
again, because they will find new challenges every time they play. Levels of difficulty can help
disarm Death Kiss #5, “All kids are created equal.”
8. Supply liberal doses of humor
Humor is the perfect antidote to sweetness and blandness. It adds life and color. Almost any
product you make for children has room for humor, so put some quality time into thinking up
ways to inject it.
9. Build in meaningful interactivity
The interactivity in your product should be well integrated into the overall content. The players’
role in the work – their agency – should make sense, and make a difference, just as with a work
designed for adults. Your young users should not have to sit through long stretches of passive
material before finally reaching the parts where they can actually do something. They should be
able to be active participants throughout.
10. Be respectful of your audience
Here is a strategy, or actually a philosophy, that is a powerful defense against every single one of
the Death Kisses. Being respectful, first of all, means not talking down to the young users or
patronizing them. Being respectful also means creating a product for them that is age-appropriate
and truly engaging. Finally, being respectful shows you care enough about your young audience
to make something that challenges them, but not beyond their abilities, and that is entertaining,
but isn’t “dumbed down.” Overall, it means offering them plenty to do and lots of fun, but
meaningful content, too.
2. Branded Versus Original Properties in Children’s Digital Media
Many interactive products for children are based on branded properties. A branded property is
one that is widely known and that has such a distinct identity that it stands out from other
products in the same category. Such products are much easier to market than unknown ones, no
matter how many attractive qualities the unknown product has. For example, it becomes much
easier to sell Harry Potter video games and toys once the novels and movies have become a big
hit; Harry Potter is a branded property.
Branded products are increasingly dominating the children’s entertainment marketplace, to the
degree that original products are having an uphill battle achieving success. Yet we can find
ample significant evidence that original products can and do make a place for themselves, though
such products must struggle hard for recognition. But the little mouse Mia, a tiny underdog (or
under-rodent) if there ever was one, is certainly proof that an original line of games can become
a true success story. And every character in the classic Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?
series of games is an original, too.
To create a successful original product, however, generally requires more of everything than a
branded product does: more effort, more creativity, more attention to content, more testing, and
more investment in marketing. Plus a little something that is beyond anyone’s control: luck.
Adapting from another media
Taking a branded character or story from one medium and adapting it for another can definitely
give it a leg up on the road to success. But adaptation also comes with a set of inherent problems.
It is not possible to simply port over a property from one medium to another and expect it to
flourish in its new venue, especially if the original medium was linear and its new home will be
an interactive venue. For this to work well, you must give serious thought to what it is about the
linear work lends itself to interactivity, and what opportunities you can build into the interactive
version that allow the user to participate in it.
For example, when Warner Brothers created The Official Harry Potter Website some years ago,
they came up with some extremely clever ways to find interactive adaptations of elements that
were already well-known and loved in the Harry Potter books and films. Children who visited
this site could actually become “students” at Hogwarts, the school of wizardry that Harry
attended. First, however, they had to “enroll” in the school, just as Harry and his classmates had
to do, by going go through a special initiation process conducted by the school’s famous Sorting
Hat. Once enrolled, they could play the school’s unique sport, Quidditch, an aerial form of field
hockey; pick out a custom-fitted wand at the wand shop; and explore buildings along Dragon
Alley, a street catering to the specialized needs of wizards. They could even attend the same
classes as Harry did, and try out some of the same experiments, such as transplanting a
mandrake, which resembles a baby with leaves growing out of its head. Users who were
successfully able to pull the mandrake out of the pot, not an easy thing to do, were rewarded with
a blood curdling scream.
Each time a new Potter film was released, Warner Brothers added new games and activities to
the site, making this magical world ever richer (though the older features a bit more difficult to
find). The interactivity offered on the website was completely in keeping with the books and
movies, but in addition, it gave young users an active way to participate in Harry’s world, quite
different from the passive experience of reading the novels or watching the films.
In a very different type of adaptation, Her Interactive turns the Nancy Drew novels into
interactive games. Their first challenge in the adaptation process is to choose a book from the
approximately 300 novels in the series that will lend itself to an interactive approach. They look
for a story that has strong characters, interesting locations, and opportunities for puzzles. The
adaptation process usually calls for some nips and tucks in the story, though they are careful not
to remove anything that a devoted reader of the book might miss. And in terms of what may need
to be added, the major task is to figure out ways to intimately involve the user in solving the
mystery, throwing up enough obstacles, twists, puzzles, and surprises to keep things interesting.
Original properties
But what if you are developing an original property instead of working with an already
established one? Where do you begin? As with all projects, one of the earliest steps is the
development of protagonist. In a project for young users, you must work out what will make this
character appealing to them, and what the relationship will be between the users and this
character.
For the Kutoka team, which developed the Mia edutainment titles, creating Mia’s personality
was something of a trial and error process. Richard Vincent, the company’s CEO, told me he was
planning to use four primary characters in his first game and one of them was going to be a
cowardly little mouse. But as work on the project developed, the three other characters were
dropped and the character of the little mouse changed dramatically. All that remained of the
original concept of her was her small size and the fact that she needed help. “She ended up being
strong, having chutzpah,” Vincent said. “Her personality was molded by the needs of the game.”
To be the major mover and shaker of an adventure game, Mia had to become courageous where
once she was timid. She had to be able to fearlessly slide down furniture, scale walls, and hurl
herself into the unknown, something she does in Mia: Just in Time, where she plunges into a
dark, seemingly bottomless mole hole. Mia evolved into something of a role model for kids, with
a spunky, helpful, positive personality. But because of her diminutive size, just 3 1/2 inches tall,
kids could understand why Mia needed their assistance.
While Mia, the prima donna of the series, gets the lion’s share of attention, serious time is also
spent on other characters, including the chief villain of the Mia titles, a greedy, ugly rat by the
name of Romaine. “We wanted a character who could immediately be recognized as a bad guy,”
Vincent said. They concentrated first on communicating his nastiness through his looks, then
worked out details of his character and personality. “Romaine would sell his own mom for
sparklies (valuable gem-like objects),” Vincent said. “Sometimes he slips and does something
good, but he quickly catches himself.”
The time Kutoka has spent in developing strong titles has been well worth it, in terms of the
success of the Mia titles. The series was launched in 1998 and not only has it picked up dozens
of awards, but it is still going strong. “It shows that if you put the quality in, you can keep the
product around a long while,” Vincent recently told me.
3. Applying the Science of Child Development to Children’s’ Interactive Media
The study of child development is a fairly new science. Until sometime in the seventeenth
century, children were regarded as small adults who, in almost every regard, were just miniature
versions of their elders. In the eighteenth century, however, Jean-Jacques Rousseau proposed a
radical idea for his time: that children started out as immature creatures, but went through
distinct stages of development as they grew up. Each stage, he proposed, had its characteristic
thought patterns and interests, and each built upon the earlier stages.
Other intellectuals came to agree with Rousseau and endorsed his theories, but none more
articulately than Jean Piaget. Although other psychologists have weighed in since with
amplifications or alternate theories, Piaget’s work remains the touchstone study of the stages of
childhood. Almost everyone who develops products for children and who is concerned with age
appropriateness uses Piaget’s work as a guide.
4. Why Do People Produce Children’s Interactive Digital Media?
Producing digital works for young audiences comes with a host of challenges and potential
pitfalls. Yet these issues and concerns may cause us to lose sight of one extremely important
thing: that the reason most people design projects for kids in the first place is because it’s fun!
And not only that: It is an opportunity to give pleasure to children and enrich their lives, and a
chance to contribute something worthwhile to the next generation.
5. Content for Children: A Vast Landscape
Interactive entertainment for children covers a vast landscape of different products deployed
across a great variety of media. Some of these product types can be further broken down into
genres—categories of programming that contain characteristic elements. If you are making a
product that is to fit within a specific genre, you will want to make sure it reflects the basic
characteristics that define the genre. Otherwise, you risk disappointing the children who will be
using it and the parents who have purchased it.
A brief look at genre
Let’s look at some of the major types of computer and game console software products for
children. They include:

Interactive storybooks: animated, interactive versions of picture books, which the user
advances page by page. They usually contain clickables, games, activities, and songs.

Edutainment products like drill and kill games: games that drill children in particular skills.

Creativity tools: programs that let the child create artwork, cards, doll clothes, and so on.

Reference tools: encyclopedias and other organized works, often with audio and sound, and
sometimes with “host” figures to guide the young user around.

Informational works: factual information about subjects children find particularly interesting,
such as animals, sports, and outer space.

Activity centers: entertainments that contain a number of games and activities often based on
a favorite movie or character.
Games for children largely mirror video games made for older players, which are described in
chapter 15. They include the following genres:

Platform games: fast-paced games that require quick reflexes and manual dexterity. You
must make your character jump, run, climb, dodge objects, and move through various
levels.

Adventure games: story-based games with a clear-cut mission and that invite the
exploration of various environments. They generally involve a quest and call for the
solving of riddles or puzzles.

Mystery or mystery/adventure games: games in which you must solve a mystery, with
some of the same elements as an adventure game.

Role-playing games: games in which you play a character that you yourself have defined
by appearance and attributes such as species, occupation, physical abilities, and the skills
you possess.

Simulations: junior versions of sim games in which you have god-like powers over a
world or an enterprise and must make critical decisions regarding the sphere you control.

Sports games and racing games: games in which you compete as a solo player or control
a team.

Fantasy games: games that you play with a favorite storybook character, popular doll, or
cartoon figure or movie character, or actually become that character.
Whether you are making a project for a well-established area or a newly emerging one, you will
need to familiarize yourself with as many of its products as possible. Take note of its
characteristic features and try to discern what makes the popular titles particularly attractive to its
target audience.
Children’s websites
The Internet is an extremely robust arena for children, with a dizzying array of attractions. While
some focus on special topics, like science or sports, others contain a mix of approaches and types
of content. A single site may contain cartoons, games, music, a creativity center, homework help,
and special areas for perennial favorites like sports, animals, and style. A number of websites for
children offer ways for them to participate in polls and contests, and many sites also give them a
chance share their artwork and express their opinions.
Internet destinations for children also include robust entertainment sites; MMOGs specifically
designed for children; and children’s networking sites – junior versions of Second Life.
Some are closely related to MMOGs, in that users create their own avatars and interact with
other users in a virtual world. But social networking sites are primarily about personal
interactions (though some for children also offer games), while MMOGs are primarily about
gaming (though they also facilitate personal interactions). Club Penguin is one of the most
popular of these MMOG-like social networking sites for children, attracting millions of visitors a
month. Here, children create their own penguin avatars, decorate their own igloos, and waddle
around in an ice-covered wonderland.
As with video games, websites for young people are often geared for specific age groups, from
preschoolers through teens. The Internet has contains a number of sites for girls, mostly offering
fashion activities, shopping, decorating, and chat features. These sites include Cartoon Doll
Emporium and Stardoll.com, both of which let users dress up virtual paper dolls.
6. What Focus Group Testing Can Reveal in Children’s Products
How testing is done and what is tested varies from company to company and sometimes
from project to project. Almost without fail, however, software companies bring in experts to
conduct their focus group sessions. These professionals know how to keep the sessions on track
and how to gain the most from them.
Particular attention is paid to whether or not the content seems too young or too old for
the test group. Producer Diana Pray told me that boys in particular may have a hostile reaction if
they feel the storyline is too young, which may happen, for example, if the title has animals as
the main characters. Though small children are extremely fond of animal characters, she noted
that this changes after second grade, when kids want to move on to human characters or to
fantasy creatures like robots. Older kids also want the material to be a little edgier.
When Kutoka Interactive was developing its first Mia title, the company put a great deal
of effort into establishing the character design for Mia that would most appeal to their target
audience. They tested 19 different versions of her, ranging in style from extremely realistic to
extremely cartoony. The children were asked questions like “Which characters would you most
like to color?” and “Which of these characters would you like to be your friend?” After this
testing work, they then built one level of the game and tested that, paying special attention to
whether or not the children had difficulty with the navigation. A third round of tests focused
specifically on the educational content. Based on the various rounds of testing, the creative team
realized it needed to make a number of changes. The company’s president, Richard Vincent,
made a critical observation about the testing experience, saying: “Our assumptions about what
kids understand is very different from what they do understand.”
Testing often turns up unexpected but fixable problems and can lead to significant
improvements in a product. For instance, at Her Interactive, in the early days of making the
Nancy Drew titles, they tested one of the interactive mysteries on girls who had never played
games before. They discovered that the girls hated it when something they did triggered the
dreaded “game over” point. It meant that they would have to start all over again, even if they had
already invested ten hours in the game. Unlike experienced boy gamers, the girls had not
anticipated such a setback. Because of their reaction, the company added a popular option called
“Second Chance,” which allows players the opportunity to pick up where they left off. Now the
players sometimes deliberately put Nancy in jeopardy just for the fun of watching the
consequences, which are often depicted in an amusing way. (At Her Interactive, they avoid
graphic violence and look for other, more clever methods to dramatize the consequences of a
major mistake.) After one of these detours, the players know they will be able to resume the
game.
7. Appealing Across the Gender Line in Children’s Products
Although many products for children are designed specifically for boys or specifically for
girls, some successfully manage to appeal to both genders. One line of games that has avoided
being pigeonholed in terms of gender is the Nancy Drew series. These games are played not only
by girls but also by boys, as documented by the numbers of boys among the registered users. Not
only that, but many of the players aren’t even children; they are full-scale adults, some as old as
80.
How is it that this series has managed to cross gender and age lines? Megan Gaiser, who
at the time of our interview was president of Her Interactive, has several theories about this. She
feels it is partially because Nancy Drew herself is such an iconic figure, already beloved by
generations of readers long before she ever turned up in video games. Gaiser also feels the games
appeal to players because of the sense of satisfaction they get by stepping into the shoes of a
spirited, independent character like Nancy Drew and solving a seemingly baffling mystery. In
addition, she believes the activities players engage in along the way are a big draw—solving
puzzles, investigating suspects, and escaping danger—along with the various rewards players
receive.
“You get to be a detective and find out firsthand what it is like to be brilliant,” she said.
“Around every corner you’ve got another mystery to solve. It is a cumulative ‘aha’ experience.”
In terms of cross gender appeal, Gaiser says they do keep female preferences in mind as
they make the games, avoiding violent scenes and not portraying female characters as victims.
However, Gaiser points out, that doesn’t make the games “girlie.” Boys like to play them, she
feels, because the mysteries are a true challenge, requiring brainpower and resourcefulness to
solve. Gaiser stressed that at Her Interactive they did not consider gender labels in designing
their games, “making it this way for males, that way for females.” Instead, she said, they
approached the making of their games like the making of a film, which, above all else, must have
a good story and other strong content elements.
8. The Three Traps of Character Design in Children’s Interactive Media
Adults tend to fall into three major traps when they design characters for children’s products:
1. The white bread approach. With the “white bread” approach, all the characters will be
nice, white, middle-class people who are pretty much like the people making the product.
Even when the characters aren’t all white and middle class and nice, they still look as if
they were all stamped out by the same cookie-cutter—whether they are human
characters, or little bears, or space aliens. They lack individuality and shadings of
personality.
2. The lifesaver approach. The “lifesaver” approach is often utilized as a direct counter to
the white bread approach. Here, instead of each character resembling all the others, every
character is a different color of the rainbow. Each represents a different race or ethnic
group—just like the colors in a roll of lifesavers. You’ve got one African-American, one
Asian, one Native American, one Caucasian, and so on. But instead of having life-like
characters, you end up with a dull pint-sized version of a United Nations General
Assembly meeting. The characters don’t have any distinct qualities except for the color of
their skin.
3. The “off-the-shelf” approach. This approach to character design relies heavily on
familiar stereotypes. You’ve got your beefy kid with the bad teeth; he’s the bully. You’ve
got the little kid with glasses; he’s the smart one. You’ve got your red-haired girl with
freckles; she’s the feisty tomboy. And then you’ve got your two blue-eyed blondes. The
boy blond is your hero and the girl blonde is your heroine. Using these tired clichés is a
bad habit that we tend to slip into when we are rushed and are unwilling to invest the
energy in designing original characters. You won’t fool the kids, though; even the small
ones will recognize them for the stereotypes they are.
9. Targeting Specific Age Groups
Several years ago, I was working with a group of subcontractors for one of the largest toy
companies in the United States. We were creating a cutting-edge interactive toy system for girls
ages 6 to 10. In the middle of the project, the toy company suddenly decided to change the
demographics on us, now targeting it for girls 8 to 12. They didn’t seem to realize how vastly
different children in these two age ranges were, or that we would have to rethink almost
everything about the project. Under the guidance of the excellent child psychologist who was our
consultant, we informed ourselves about the girls in our new target demographic, learning about
their favorite activities, how they related to their friends and family members, how they felt
about boys, and how they felt about themselves. Armed with this new information, we
extensively redesigned the product. But the moral here is that you can’t just make something for
a homogeneous group called “children”; you have to know and understand your target
demographic.