The only time I roll a female is when I play an MMO, since UO and EQ conditioned me to believe that if I was a female character, the lonely nerds of the land would give me free stuff.

This.
It's roleplaying now I personally don't see myself as a smoking hot woman with poorly constructed clothes and an impractical weapon.
I'd much rather play as a generic looking Viking badass rather than attempt not to be mainstream... but then end up being mainstream because everyone has the same idea o_0

"Why would you even want to "role-play" as a (anything other than exactly what and who you are IRL) if you aren't one?"



The key to the issue for me is - the character isn't a representation of "me". It's an action figure or playing piece that I'm running around on the game board. So there are no "implications" to be raised be playing a female character (or orc, or cat, or lizard, or..... :tongue:)

Beyond that, most "role players" feel that just playing as "yourself" isn't really role-playing. You're not playing a role - you're just being yourself.

The actor playing a sociopath on Law & Order isn't really one - you wouldn't say "There's something wrong with you! You're a sociopath!"

So why would you say "There's something wrong with you! You're playing a woman!" to someone who picks a female character in an RPG?

Actually, most people choose male, but instead of posting pics on forums they are playing the game.

I'm a girl, so I play female, that's natural. From my experience with gaming, men who roll females usually do so because they'd rather spend a hundred hours looking at a woman than a man. Natural as well
You say you're tempted ro create a female character yourself. If I may ask, why? Were you inspired by the threads on the forum? I'm asking, because you might have the answer to your own question

I would rather look at eye-candy for 100+ game hours instead of a dude. Since there are no restrictions due to character's six, why not? When there are romantic situations my female characters tend to be lisbians.

Based on posts and polls from previous games, most people don't choose female characters.

It just appears that way on "post pictures of your character" threads because a lot of people that post there are interested in making pretty lady characters.

It appears that ladies tend to prefer lady characters, and guys tend to either prefer guy characters or mix. And there are more males on these forums than females.

In games like this (Morrowind, Oblivion, Fallout 3, Skyrim) I tend to have a mixture of characters of both genders.

Keep in mind men who roleplay a female are more likely to post their pictures than men roleplaying a male. I'm of the latter group and have exactly zero reason to bother taking a picture of my character.

I am a guy and play both.

However, I tend to play male characters more because I can connect to 'em much easier from the role-playing perspective. And no, I am not sixually insescure to think that playing a guy makes me somehow a homosixual which seems to be the usual argument these days.

You know, the usual "I only play girls because I am no gay for staring at manbutts, man!" <- Implying the game is only about staring at two pixels of your avatar. :tongue:

It's not very often you get a choice in video games to play a woman, so I make sure to make the most of it when I can.

Couldn't agree with you more, much much better looking at females in 3rd person.

That's odd.... I mostly played female characters in WoW (with a good portion of the later ones being Blood Elves who I tried to find good looking outfits for), and I never got one solicitation or any free stuff & help. A small handful of people, over the years, complemented me on the outfits I'd been able to assemble, but that's about it. :shrug:

Agreed!

@Smert

sixually insecure are the guys who talk about roleplaying and therefore not being able to play a female character.

I am male, and I think I create female characters ten times as often as male ones.

The reason is that I enjoy looking at females, especialy if they are showing some skin.

I admit it.



When I do create a male character, it is usually when they look very badassed in that particular game.

In Morrowind I played only male characters. In oblivion I played only female characters, because the men looked dumb.

But in Skyrim I play male characters, because I like how rough and tough they look. They look like true warriors.

I play as a female character because the idea of a girl slaying dragons is more epic to me. *shrugs"

But mine isn't really eye candy, I just went with one of the default blonde Nords.

Damn, I knew I'd get bashed for saying that. Anyway, yeah I see your point about role-playing, but IMO when it comes to gender, I just don't feel the need to change from my own in RL.

Because I wanted to play a female Nord barbarian. The whole "Male warrior" archetype is so cliche anyway.

QFT.

I'm female. Both my Skyrim characters are female, and future playthroughs are also likely to be female. I don't think I've ever made a male TES character.

I dunno really, i guess the pictures of the female characters i saw generally did look better graphics wise then the male dark elf character i've created myself, seems asif you can dress them better and make them look more luxurious. But i guess thats why people uploaded the pics of their female characters, because their simply nicer to look at.

Always play Male characters as I feel it's something I can associate myself with more so than a female. For those male members that genuinely enjoy playing as the opposite six, my hats off to you. As long as you're excuse isn't a response along the lines of: "I'd rather stare at a female ass rather than a male ass." All this tells me is you're uncomfortable with your own sixuality.

"if your going to stare at a butt for 6 hours, might as well be a pretty one." -roomate years ago when asked why he rolls girl toons

I have a female toon that i play when my daughter is watching/playing along with me. otherwise its back to my heavy armor 2 handed monsterbasher redguard man.

I am male. I play male characters sometimes, and female characters sometimes.

I do it because I like the entire concept of role-playing, and simply consider the act of getting into the mindset of a female character to be a part of the proper challenge of role-play. If I could honestly not get into the mindset of a female character and play a proper and convincing character, then it is a failure of my own mind to understand and empathize. To simply refuse because "icky, girl" is to purposefully limit my own emotional growth for the purposes of some archaic gender role nonsense, which I find abhorrent.

I'll even go for the option of having my female character get married to a male NPC. (And then tell the burly oaf to stay in the kitchen and make me more pies, damnit!)

It depends on the game, though. I did males nearly exclusively in all the Fallout games - the brutality of the setting still makes me uncomfortable with the notion of putting a woman through all the crap (like swimming through an irradiated river, etc.) that the player actually goes through. Call it a strange quirk, but I can stomach the notion of watching/being a women being stabbed or bitten by all manner of beasts more than having to survive on radiated giant cockroach meat.

When I start getting lots of mods that involve really spiffy armor, I tend to play more the female characters, though, as if the point is to make them look good, I do like the looking at a glittery curvaceous plate mail body. I'm particularly fond of going for the lady-scholar-mage look, and loved having the glasses mod and the custom bun hairdo and giant chained tome as a shield with a gown-like set of robes for Oblivion. Nothing says "class" like making your enemies drop with a snap of the fingers while you walk on their corpses with your heels on.

I lean towards female characters because I take screenshots. The shots I take are meant to look good, and I don't think big hairy dudes look good, and said big hairy dude would most certainly not fit any of the shots I've made.

I also try to set my character apart from the slew of half naked chicks running around the image share, no chainmail bikinis or nonsense like that.

I was not aware that roleplaying equals sixual insecurity or inability to play the opposing gender. Does that mean RPG(Role-Playing Game) is only for such people now? :wink_smile:

Like I said, I play both, but tend to make male characters as my main. Call it whatever you want. :rolleyes:


Pretty much was I was trying to say. Unfortunately, Engrish is not my first language.

Now the best argument I've seen so far was something like "Well, I play woman, because I'd like to see them kick some major ass instead of the usual monotone hunky macho man".
That's something I can relate to. :goodjob:

I pick females cuz they look better primarily.

Another part to my decision playing mostly females is that i do not pretend to be my character, but rather make up a character in my head beforehand.
After determining who my character is - personality traits, likes/dislikes, attitude etc., i roleplay my character according to that image, which may or may not be like the actual me.