From the New York Times (registration required, bugmenot is cranky), it seems that the XBox 360 is trying to market heavily towards women. Unfortunately, their planned path is not by actually making games for women.

Microsoft hopes to win a bigger share of the market from the PlayStation 2, the top-selling console made by Sony, by promoting a more family-friendly image for the new Xbox, which will be in stores starting Nov. 22…

Brochures going out to major retailers like Best Buy prominently describe the 360’s ability to double as a DVD player, play music from an MP3 player through a television’s speakers and even display digital photos on a TV. Its game functions, while impressive, are now only part of the message…he brochure even says, “Here are some things you might want to tell your wife this thing does.”

The article does mention “Kameo, an action adventure game for young teenagers, including girls” as a game that might broaden the gameplay scope. Still, the 360 is a console aimed at the hardcore gamers, especially their launch line-up. So the question is, will convincing mom that your machine runs DVDs do any good?

History says no. Everyone in America already has a DVD player, and most of them have PCs that are much better suited for music downloads and sorting through your digital photos. Even if XBox turns out to be better at any of these things, mom’s not likely to buy that as an argument to plunk down $400 dollars for an xbox and wireless controllers.

The HD-DVD situation only serves to make matters worse. Current rumors are that the platform will eventually ship with HD-DVD, but the launch versions will not. Which kind of underscores the whole HD-bluray debate – no one wants to buy the next gen discs until they know which of the two are going to win, so even if the functionality were there, it probably wouldn’t be a purchasing decision that mom would appreciate.

For what it’s worth, I think the XBox 360 would sell a lot more machines to Mom if there was a good Dr. Mario type game for the platform at launch.