90% of the time I play as a man. I tend to play a very specific type of character (a kind of sneaky, ranged altruist). I have exactly one female character at the moment: a half-Breton half-Nord battlemage.

Call me weird, but I find it way more immersion-breaking when someone says "Hey lady" than "Greetings, Dunmer!" And it's hard for me to roleplay; I'm almost always myself (I may have grey-blue skin and red eyes, but it's me) -- an altruistic guy who prefers to mitigate damage by killing you before you know I'm there. Okay, so that last part might not be me, but you take my meaning

In a game that doesn't constantly remind me I'm a female, I might pick one for a couple of playthroughs, but otherwise it's just too jarring.

What's funny is that is EXACTLY how most females feel in that exact situation. Talk about immersion.

I'm about half and half. I have an imagination. :shrug:

1st character is a male. 2nd time around female.

Whether I play male or female is the majority of the time dependent upon what my character archetype is.

For heavily armored warriors? Guy.

For mages, or lightly armored spellswords? Woman.

Of course sometimes I break from my usual preferences and make a male mage, or a female barbarian. Spellswords actually have the highest chance of breaking my preferences, but mostly because I like battlemages of all kinds and both genders usually look good in light armor.

I find it interesting that so many people say it's "weird" or "hard" to roleplay as a girl. A mighty fantasy warrior who probably isn't human, with magical powers, totally parallels their life however.

Well, to be fair, the other "races" in most, if not all, fantasy/sci-fi settings are driven by human motivations. Be they ridding the world of "evil", personal gain, love, revenge, honour etc... They are all things that we can experience.

There are fundamental differences in the way that men and womens brains are structured, therefore we respond to situations in different ways. I think it would actually be impossible for a man to fully understand a womans motivations and thought processes, and vice versa.

I had to edit this post three times and I'm still not happy with it. Hopefully everyone gets what I'm trying to say though.

Well yes, but in 90%+ of situations they will react in the same way (especially since games ignore so many of the situations where men and women do think differently). I still have trouble deciding how a male would react in that less than 10% of situations though :shrug:

always male, cause i am too

For me it depends on the graphics. If they're not that good I'll play as whichever gender; it probably works out to about 50/50. If the graphics are good enough that you can design reasonably attractive female characters, though ... well... >_>

I don't tend to play female characters. No real reason for me to. I'm not a female nor do I like staring at them all day.

I'm a guy, and my female-to-male ratio is about 60-40. I don't really know why, but this ratio extends to any game where I'm given the choice between male and female characters. Maybe it's because playing a female is just so different from myself. Maybe its because I like playing as decent looking characters, and it's easier for me to make female characters look good. I don't know. But I also don't think its all that weird. I mean, its only a videogame. It's not like I try to be a girl in real life. In fact, I think that being able to play a female character means I'm more secure in my masculinity than people that can't without feeling gay. Just my thought on the matter.

I normally play the same six in TES because, in this context, I just tend to find them more appealing. The female NPCs annoy me incredibly and I'd rather emulate the bloke on the cover, for some reason.

On Fallout I go for a woman, because I wanted to see how that would affect the story if at all.

In all honesty I don't find it weird of anti-masculine to play a female character, as really they're only a character and I don't think myself quite so insecure.

I think I understand what you're getting at here. But really, you could say the same thing about any and every individual, when it comes to not being able to fully understand a person's motivations, thoughts, and such. People say I'm a lot like my father, yet when I look at him, I see an entire world of differences that I know I will never understand.

Iam a man i play as a man its just much easier and for me more gratifying because i can get into my charecter much more because its me in a game. and the whole would you rather be staring at a guys butt then a girls butt well... you see there is this wonderful thing called a girl friend and yes they do svcks money and time out of you at an alarming rate but when it comes to female but staring.... lets just say kinect cant make everything more emmersive

I play as a female for the same reason most of you other guys do. I used to play as a male a lot when I was younger, but then in my early 20's I had fun making a good looking girl and playing as her. Plus it's way more fun to stare at a hot babe while you invest 200+ hours into your game than a guy. And... sometimes... I even get emotionally attached to my avatar...

I think I just nerded. Bigtime.

That's funny, never even thought about creating a female....... wonder if there would be any new twist in TES 3 or 4. This reminds me of when I saved up $1,000,000 in fable2 to buy that fairfax castle, thinking I would be getting something really cool.... instead I get a chance to take gender bender potion, I'm sitting there thinking "if I want to be a chick, i'd would of started the game as one".

Well you guys just gave me an excuse to start an other game in OB & MW!
Thanks

except that most men understand most other men. women are just weird.

they have the most illogical thought process that i have long since given up trying to understand. if their boy toy cheats on them they are more angry at the girl than at him. they have to have tons of shoes.....why? if you listen closely to them talk to each other on the phone they parrot each other and will repeat the same conversations over and over again even if it was discussed one hour ago. if they dress like a hoochie mama, they complain when guys ogle them and really get mad if some other girl calls them a [censored]...... :rolleyes:

i love my gf and all but ive gotten very good over the years of being able to simultaneously tune her out but retain enough of the conversations or "talks" to be able to get the gist of it and keep out of harms way. its like im trying to fool the KGB or something.

ive often wondered if "invasion of the body snatchers" actually happened but somehow they messed up at the pod factory and they ended up only working on the females.

Im a male and 75% of the time if i play Char-customizible games i play as a female.

What you got a problem with that...?

I'm a guy and I almost always play as females.

All that butch, macho BS kills me.

"hurr durr, no grrls allowed!" or "I play as a guy cuz i'm not a [censored]" or some retarded garbage.

In Mass Effect 1 and 2 I played as a female Sheppard and as far as i'm concerned femshep is canon. The male Sheppard was a joke.

Male -Female whatever. I play them both, I dont become my character the character is just a "vehicle" and I am the "driver".
My last character is a she Orc.She's a mercanary specialized in stealth, using a bow, drinking and loving the other ladies.
Before I played a Breton male mage using blade.And after I'll play a male Argonian vampirehunter.
For the record I am male and yes when i was playin an imperial female and listening her while taking damage was "aaaaaaahh"
But I had the same problem with the Breton male who sounds "gayer" than the she orc. My english svck, I know .

I think I only made 2 female characters...don't know why but I almost always use a male character :shrug: Maybe it's because of the characters I RP, usually a knight in shining armor or a barbaric hunter or Gandalf-like mage...I usually use females to RP as the sixy catwoman-like assassin (not that catwoman was an assassin...).

I'm a dude, and I usually play a female character in Oblivion and Morrowind. Emphasis on *a* female character, as it is always the same character( I've played through twice I think), a female wood elf, who I've given a bit of thought to the back story. I like playing as a stealthy character, and a wood elf, and since I really dislike male bosmer, I had to start the game as a female anyway

Also, on the role-playing front, playing as a female separates me from the character and makes me feel like I'm following a story about someone else, rather than being myself. I mean, I played a male for Fallout 3, and I acted much more like myself - ie, a cold, ruthless and unpleasant moustachio'd man, who goes about screwing up other people's lives and stealing their stuff. So in Oblivion and Morrowind, where it was less appropriate to screw up the world as it was in Fallout 3, which is already pretty screwed up, I play a female.

QFT.

I'm male, I will play as a female character, but I usually play as a male character.

You want me to give an explanation?