COMPUTER FATHER KNOWS BEST?

Byline: Joseph Coleman Associated Press 

She's your little princess. You name her, wring your hands when she's sick, fret over her schooling. Like any caring dad, you keep steady watch over her hobbies, clothes and manners.

But if after all your lavish attention, she becomes a bar hostess strutting around in fishnet stockings or a club-swinging street tough - no problem. Just reboot your computer and start again.

The game is part of a hit series of Japanese software called ``Princess Maker,'' which gives the player control over the activities, hobbies and clothing of a female character he ``raises'' from childhood.

Even priced at a hefty $140 per release, the series has sold a combined 200,000 copies, according to its creator, making it a best seller by the standards of Japan's still-emerging home computer market.

Software maker Gainax Co. Ltd. came out with the first version in 1991. ``Princess Maker 2'' followed in 1993, and a third one is now in the works. The game is exported to South Korea and Taiwan, and creator Takami Akai hopes to finish an English-language version this year for export to the United States.

But the game might raise some eyebrows in the West.

In Japan, provocative images of young girls are a staple of male entertainment, and ``Princess Maker'' is no exception. The girl character is depicted in sexy, wide-eyed, comic-book style, and can be programmed to dress in lingerie or sunbathe naked.

``I find it very discomfiting,'' said Etsuko Yamashita, a women's studies professor at Japan Women's University in Tokyo. ``It's like incest.''

Still, by the standards of Japanese late-night TV or widely read adult comics, ``Princess Maker'' is tame. Although the character can be dressed seductively, there are no sexual encounters.

For Akai, the game's ``air of sexiness'' is just good fun.

``It's unnatural to suppress it,'' he said. Akai believes the game's appeal lies not in titillation, but in giving Japanese males a chance to fantasize about making a conquest in the one place where they don't call the shots - the home.

Japanese women traditionally control the household budget and make most important child-rearing choices, while men are absorbed in their jobs and obligatory after-hours drinking with colleagues. As dads, they get little respect.

``To play this game means to do something you want to but can't,'' Akai said. ``It's impossible in reality for fathers to interfere with their daughters, because the daughters would complain.''

The game, however fanciful, could tie into a trend toward Japanese men getting more involved in family life as job insecurity frays traditional loyalty to companies. Magazines give men parenting advice, and a TV show features a single father who struggles to balance the demands of job and parenthood.

College senior Fumiya Yamada, who said he had played the game more than 200 times, likes it in part because he doesn't have a child. But he also said some of the appeal lay in the fact that the main character is a girl.

``Princess Maker 2'' takes place in a medieval fantasy world, where the player is presented with an adoptive ``daughter,'' age 10. He names her, picks her birthday, even chooses her blood type, which some in Japan believe determines character traits.

The player picks the girl's classes and jobs, and the two can have short ``conversations'' about how she's doing or how she feels about her studies. The girl - who blossoms physically as the years pass - is constantly monitored in about two dozen categories, including sexiness, strength and smarts, which help determine the game's outcome.

Even with the player making all the decisions, the girl character sometimes rebels. She can make unsuitable friends, run away from home, even get arrested. If she doesn't get a big enough allowance, she snaps at the player: ``Cheap!''

But in the end, the ``father's'' programming has the last word. A successful outcome means a future as a queen, a warrior, or a government official. If the player doesn't score well, the ``daughter'' might face a future as a bar hostess, who giggles as she holds up a slinky dress.

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Photo

Photo: Takami Akai, creator of ``Princess Maker,'' is shown with illustrations from his fatherhood simulation game.

Associated Press