I was looking for material on game design the other day (I’m planning an educational game to use at work) I came across some stuff about the gender gap in gaming. One issue that was discussed was how male and female players responded to male and female avatars.
I was curious what SDMB gamers had to say about this. If you’re playing any kind of video game (including arcade and computer games), do you care what the avatar looks like? Do you prefer to play your own sex, the opposite sex, or do you base your choice on something else? What type of avatar do you prefer in a game where you can customize your own? Although I’m primarily interested in the male/female avatar question feel free to talk about other aspects of the avatar’s appearance like skin color, body type, etc.
I’ll write a bit more later about my own opinions and what I read about research in this area, but I wanted to hear from others first.
I’m a female, and in the one game I played where I could customize my avatar, I chose to play a female. I don’t think I really care that much, but I would prefer to have a choice of male/female, just for kicks.
I play both. Sometimes because the female ones look better than the male ones and sometimes because I have a “concept” in mind for the character and one gender fits better than the other. This was especially the case in City of Heroes where you have an amazing degree of control over your character’s looks and so one moment I was making a male minotaur looking guy and the next moment I was making an assault rifle weilding nun.
Edited to add about console games: I often used to tend towards the female characters in side-scrolling beat 'em up fight games because the females were usually the “low damage high agility/speed” characters which fit my own playstyle better. If the chicks were slow and tough and the guy was some wacky flipping ninja then I’d have picked the guy. As a matter of fact, not a side-scroller but I played a lot of Vega in Street Fighter II-Whatever.
I am female and I have chosen to be females in most RPGs. I’ll choose a male avatar if I think it just looks better for that race, or if I’m bored playing females.
I tend to create my female avatars based on what I look like. My males are based on what I think looks attractive or cool.
Initially, I will play humans over other races, unless each race confers a racial advantage that works well with the class/job I intend to play. Eventually, though, I get sick of humans and pick another race just for variety.
Female, and prefer to play female avatars if I have the choice. In Rock Band I made an avatar that looks a lot like me. In other games - I mostly play MMORPGs so I don’t always get the choice of a human, even. I don’t have much preference for one thing over another in those games, but I tend to not pick an ugly character for that race - I’m going to spend a lot of time looking at her, after all.
I play only female characters in WoW, which is my only on-line game.
MOST of the time people just assume I’m a guy playing a female, since most of the players are male, even most of those playing females (I’ve also heard that recently a lot of men re-customized their characters to be female). Once in a very great while I’ll run into the “girls can’t play” or “dude, why you playing a girl, are you gay?” type memes, but it’s a vanishingly small number and invariably there are undesirable qualities in these people to the point that few, if any, want to associate with them.
Why play only girls? I dunno - just do. Maybe it’s because for so many years computer games only had male characters. Maybe I’m just totally comfortable with being a girl.
Come to think of it, almost all my D&D characters were female, too, despite the fact that being a female could penalize you on some traits. *>shrug< * Whatever.
If the game has any role-playish aspects, then I pick whichever seems to better fit the character concept I have in mind (more often male, but not uncommonly female). If there are gameplay implications of gender (such as certain classes being certain genders, as in Diablo II), then I pick based on gameplay. If the avatar is supposed to actually represent me, as opposed to a character, then I try to make it look as much like me as possible (which generally means male). And if none of the above apply, then I just pick whichever avatar looks coolest to me (in Quake 3, I use the Orbb avatar, which is officially neuter).
I tend to do the same thing. Female characters tended to be better-balanced in the games I’d play (even as far back as the arcade game Gauntlet, where I routinely chose Valkyrie), or matched my preference for high-maneuverability (like Chun-Li in SF2). When the characters are all balanced, I’ll tend to choose one that resembles me or is visually striking (to make my character easier to spot in a crowded scene).
I read somewhere that one of the effects of having a third person female avatar, in say Tomb raider, was that the players felt a need to protect her, keep her safe
personally I tend to play the female character in solo games, and a guy in multi player games, especially in role-playing games
first I decide what class/race combo I am after, then I think of a name, then I pick the sex that best fits that name.
so
Mack theknife (male)
Elegance Poopeepants (female)
Iforgetwhat Eightisfor (Male although it could have gone either way…erudite females where homely as hell though)
Eloquence (male)
Diabalein Avidyia (the only mis cast toon I have, the name was one I was going to use for a male but my then female shaman Kamletow Kweefsalot ran into trouble with some GM over her name and Diab was the best name I could come up with on super short notice so when I started WoW my Female rogue inherited the name)
Sunyata (female although this one was also an either or, I think the deciding factor here was that dark elf chicks in eq1 were hotties)
for me the name I choose is part of the character, going way back I have always felt something of the power of names. if its a toon who wont be used for much they get a silly or stupid name, like Iforgetwhat Eightisfor I never even expected to get him to lvl 20 (and thus the surname) when I rolled him up, his sole purpose for existing was to be a jewel crafter, but once I discovered the insanity that was an eq1 enchanter I blasted him to max levels in no time.
Thyra the Valkyrie was my least favourite in Gauntlet - slow, poor shot speed and power, mediocre HtH that meant she got hit a lot before putting enemies down, and third-best magic. Best damage resistance in the game didn’t make up for it.
I don’t play MMORPGs but in tabletop games I must’ve played female characters about one out of three, maybe two out of five.
I rarely ever make avatars that resemble myself, but that’s usually because I can’t. Granted, I haven’t played games like City of Heroes, with its much-lauded character customization, but I find that there’s often no middle ground between making characters like “Legolas” and “Hercules.” Also: facial hair customization is usually painfully limited, if present at all. That always irks me.
That said… If a character’s gender has no bearing at all, be it in gameplay or role-playing, it’s more or less a coin-toss for me.
I’m male, and (all other things being equal) I’ll generally favor male avatars when creating a character. All 15 WoW characters I’ve created (including the 3 that I’ve deleted) are/were male, and I’ve never wanted to roll a female character in WoW. There’s something about female characters played by men that rubs me the wrong way
That said, I’ll happily play female characters in games such as the Dynasty Warriors series, and IIRC I made at least one of my quicker custom characters female.
If I’m playing an MMO/RPG where there’s customisation, for the most part I’ll play a female character. Though in Warhammer Online (WAR) my favourite toon was my Black Ork. An greenskinz is only da boyz.
However, my favourite game of all time is TF2. There are no girls in TF2 (though suspicion is rampant regarding the pyro). I don’t even play the usually-favoured chick class - the medic. I’m a Heavy, through and through.
I don’t care if the main character of a game is male or female. I love Tomb Raider, and think Lara is sexy as hell. I enjoy playing her. But then I also love Resident Evil - all of them. Which splits main character genders pretty squarely down M/F lines (even allowing you to play one of each with different scenarios). I also enjoy Silent Hill, and most of the protagonists in those games are Male.
What was I answering again? Oh yeah. Short answer is if I create the character, I mostly will use female toons. Unless the concept or race won’t allow it. If I’m not creating the character, if I like the game I don’t care who/what I play.
-Character role: Guys win out for stuff like knights, or soldiers, etc. Girls tend to win for spell casters, nimble rogues, that sort of thing. If the armor is ridiculously skimpy on the girls(chainmail bikinis… ugh… protect the useless tits and the already protective ribcage, leave that stomach wide open for disembowelment! ), then a guy is going to win by default.
-Looks. Depends entirely upon the game… In Neverwinter Nights 2, there is exactly one decent looking human face that does not have a stupid expression, a female, sooo… female it was.
-Animations. Not so bad anymore, but back in the distant past(as far as gaming is concerned), lots of times they would cheat and give female avatars male walks. I think the worst offender i can remember was Jedi Knight 2. In mass effect, the animations for male and female were different, but female was clearly superior. The male running animation was horrid(which was copied onto the large alien companion, making it even more horrid since it obviously didn’t fit the body).
Generally though, I’d have to say I prefer male, and only go with female when circumstances warrant it. I’m male, btw.
I don’t have much preference for one thing over another in those games, but I tend to not pick an ugly character for that race - I’m going to spend a lot of time looking at her, after all.
), then a guy is going to win by default.