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Men Playing as Women
A reader writes, "According to this report written by an on-site psychologist, 20% of males surveyed play female characters in computer and console games for "gender exploration" purposes. There are some pretty amazing stats cited there- check it out- Pretty hip site. "
I play games as women. And its not for "gender exploration". Its to see... well...
Yeah, gender exploration. I'd like to explore those nice...
Anyways, thats part of the reason I like Quake better than Unreal.
I can't spell or type, but that doesn't mean I'm unusually stupid.
Just think of how many people play as "females" in cybersex chats.
I play my female cat (Mignon) on Slashdot. What about other people's nicknames?
Am I the only person wondering who gives a damn? This psychologist clearly has too much time on their hands.
It offends my incredible masculinity!
When I play as Major in Q3, it's because she's a quicker and smaller target. Also, men are less likely to frag a hot chick!
Personally, I'd like to check out Major in the buff, but that's just me.
thank you.
I wonder how a survey would result if the question was proposed...
Do women play as men?
-- ladies and gentlemen we are floating in space!
For me, it wasn't really something psychological...
Too many repressed socially-inept nerds seem to want to 'become' a woman, since they can't seem to find any who will allow them to see and touch their breasts.
Sure, I play as a female, 'cause they make much more interesting noises when they git hit...
I play female on EverQuest, People give me stuff. And on Quake, because of the target size.
As for the issue of gender exploration, can't do to much of that in quake. I mean how much exploration can you do when its run,run,run frag,frag,frag?
I would be surprised if the number of men playing women isn't pretty high.
Now it still creeps me out when someone plays an opposite gender character in pen and pencil games. Mostly because it gives a little too much insight on how a particular male thinks women should/do act. shiver.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Maybe we'll have to wait for TR 8 or 9, when we find out that Lara Croft is actually related to Pitfall Harry, and we get to play either char. ;)
Seriously...
I think "tactical crossdressing" is an appropriate description. In some games, the female models are indeed harder to hit, especially with sniping weapons. But nobody outruns blast damage, so always pack a rocket launcher and a couple of grenades.
It's fun to play Tekken 3 with my brother-in-law. He always picks the biggest toughest characters. I choose one of the petite females, whipe the floor with his ass and laugh at his whining... :)
does the net allow people to explore both sides of their sexuality? it's fairly common, i believe, for psychologists to see each human as having both sides of the sexual duality within them. therefore,, using computers as an outlet for that "unused" side is pretty interesting. as far as gaming is concerned,, women are often superior to men in many ways. ( as stated, agility among them ) but is the percentage higher than the rate of men who played woman in traditional RPGs? i predict that it would be higher, simply due the anonymity factor. 3x kevin
<3x, kevin
Do you think tomb raider has a female character because they want to target the female audience? I don't think so, I think they want something on the screen adolesant boys will enjoy looking at. I mean If I got to look at someones ass while I play a game, why not some hottie?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Only 33 surveys were completed and a few other comments were included in the findings. The researcher spends a paragraph explaining that this was very informal. Thus the results should not be taken with any weight. However, the discussion on why men play female roles is interesting.
At least for gaming. In Quake 2 I always enjoyed being the crackwhore. There's just something appealing about being a sexy bitch who runs around and kicks everyone elses ass.
YEAH BABY! I'M A SEXY BITCH!
I mean come on man, sure I play as a girl sometimes, but that gender exploration thing sounds totally gay. I mean, sometimes I pretend to be a girl on IRC, but its only so the total gaywad guys will hit on me which proves they're gay. I mean, sure sometimes I feel more comfortable as a girl in video games? So what??? Are you calling me gay??? I'll kick your ass!
Stupid fags.
cutiechick@hotmail.com
"Well it should be obvious to even the most dim-witted individual who holds an advanced degree in hyperbolic topology...
In Quake III, I usually play the female skin. Not because I want to explore my feminine side, but because she seems to move quickly, and more gracefully, plus she's not this big grunt that you can see/hit easily.
Fifteen subjects, or 23%, reported that they play female characters because they are "more aesthetically pleasing" than male characters.
That goes for real life too. The female form is a much more pleasing shape to look at than the male form. (Don't think I'm biased because I'm male, ladies. Anyone who's ever studied art knows this.)
Respondents commented that if they have to see a character running round a game for hours on end, they prefer to be looking at a sexy female rather than a hairy male.
Duh...
Yeah, I'll agree with most aspects of the article. I do catch myself occasionally wondering what it would be like to be a female in life situations. Every guy does this. If you say you don't, you're a liar. Once you accept you are male early in life, it's natural to wonder what it would be like to be female. I also say that anyone who says "Oh God, you're a guy and you're playing a FEMALE?" is pretty insecure about themselves.
Some guys want to explore feminity, that's fine with me. I'll do the same. (Although I think I need to cut down on those weekend trysts with Barbie Dream Designer.
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon? :P)
(If you can't figure out how to E-Mail me, Don't.
At first I felt somehow dishonest by playing a female character... like I was lying to someone. After a while I got over it. After all, it is "just for fun". (Besides, sometimes I think about half of the females in the game are men in RL anyway.)
In my years of MUDing, I started to play female characters a lot. It's rather fun. There are a couple reasons.
1.) Female characters don't get whomped right away. - People tend to be nice to them.
2.) They have more style. I don't know why, but rarely is a female warrior disgusting and brutish. They're mean, nasty, tough, but stylish.
3.) It balances the game a bit more. I'm sorry, but, well, there are just too many mail characters.
4.) It helps stop dorks from hitting on people in games. When they realise that they've tried to hit on a guy, they feel dumb and wonder a little before they try again.
Oh well. Those are my reasons. What reasons do the rest of you have?
The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it. - G.B. Shaw
... when kingpin came out.
The female model is smaller and harder to hit. However I quickly found that other players respond to you differently if they think you are a woman. They call you bitch, ho, slut and basically LOSE IT when they get beaten by a "woman". Anyhow I tend to be a real shit distruber so any time I can elicit this kind of reaction I'm happy as a pig in shit.
I started playing female characters years ago in DND. The group of friends I played with was (as almost all DND groups I could find were) predominately male. We ocassionally had a bona-fide female game with us, but it was rare. Anyway, a complete DND contingent really needed a female; there were always situations where one was needed.
In some games... one on one fighters (my favourite of which is still the Soul Blade/Soul Caliber setup), most people I know play all the characters and just pick the one they're best at. If the coders have done their job properly, that's as likely to be a female as anything else (male, green electrical mutant, whatever).
In games like Quake and Unreal, I just don't see it. Alright, someone suggested that female characters are quicker, more agile, or have a thinner profile, but is that really true? I'll buy a thinner profile, maybe, but quicker? More agile? Isn't all this stuff running through the same code? Hmmmm...
In the end, tho, it is fascinating. Virtual worlds; the internet, video games, RPGs or whatever, are among the easiest ways to see what it's like being someone completely different than who you are. That's why I played RPGs... to go to a mythical place where I could imagine magical beasts, mythical places, and being someone else.
Can't wait to see the second part of the article.
Competetive advantage. . . Hmmm, too bad none of the game companies have come up with the "Wife" character set. These would be a winner every time. Every guy who has been married for over two weeks knows that in every way/shape and form, he will lose. sulking the ever familiar "Yes Dear" as his closing remark.
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
Does this mean that 20% of game players are gay? :-)
:(
Why do I destroy my Karma so?
............ no.
When people play games of fantasy, they play as gnomes, wizards, warlocks or whatever. You get a chance to play as someone you are not. So when I play a female online, it doesn't mean I'm a transvestite or anything, any more than those who play wizards actually think they are wizards. Its just doing something you could never do in real life. That's why people play games in the first place.
But I generally do it in games where fragging isn't the only part of the game. I tend to Role Play a female. The major reason is I'm an evil person and I love to watch the reactions of male players as I let them hit on me for a day or so, and then tell them I'm actually a male. That's always good for a laugh. Another reason is that I just enjoy role playing in a gaming environment. I enjoy hanging up my "self" and acting out the life of another person who is for the most part totally different than I am. It a stress relief for me. Yes I know that I'm just ducking reality. But I think we all indulge in some sort of escapism, be it the movies, fraggin, reading a book or what not. I just choose to fsck up other peoples escapism when I practice mine.
GIHM -The light at the end of the tunnel is only the oncoming train.
In High School and college I did a lot of RP Mudding. And while I didn't spend much time on FurryMUCK, I knew some people who did. For those of you who don't know, FurryMUCK is an anthropomorphic mud-- everyone role plays a character as an animal. Furry eventually became the red light district of MUDs, and that's all I have to say about the place.
:)
Anyway, I knew more than one real life women who had alternate male characters on the MUD simply because they were sick of getting hit on. On the internet, no one knows you're a dog. So that 14 year old lesbian school girl is probably some twice divorced 35 year old guy named earl. The real question is, "Who's playing the 35 year old guy named earl and what's her phone number?"
-Ted
Oooohh, she's such a hottie! If I were reincarnated I'd like to be her! There's something about army boots, semi-automatic guns, and huge tits!
(disclaimer: this was intended to be humorous.)
Hehehe. I'm suprised this wasn't higher. Back in my days of heavy mudding, I always played females. Cause stupid horny guys give you stuff. Yep, that's right, they *give* you stuff. For free. All you have to do is wink at them.
Pretty low, I know, but if you weren't a sneaky sonofabitch people would find a way to unfairly pk you at an early level anyway. You had to take every advantage you could just to stay alive.
This sig is false.
but not because of that reason.
My reason is because the women are generally smaller and faster than the male characters. This is an important factor in fighting games which are about the only kind of games I care to play anymore.
--
for identity purposes, I'll just name him "spank".
"spank" has a few issues, one of them being that we all think he's not quite certain of his masculinity.
anyway, I have found that he overly enjoys being the female character in most games, and can often be seen trying to mimick sexual positions with the characters on the tv or monitor, and making them make sexual sounds (ie bumping lara croft into a wall).
now, does this mean he's an over-sexed male doing male things, or is it that he's exploring his feminine side?
Ok, maybe I'm easily humoured, but I found the above post funny...
And it seems to prove there is only a short thread left for trollers to post their crap.
I wonder how many women play as men? There are a lot of other questions to be explored here as well - such as do women reap similar benfits as those expressed in the survey results in their game play or even in real life?
- passion
Gawd, he looks good. It's almost enough enough to make me think that maybe gender is irrelevant... almost. But so damn close, though, to the point of making me uncomfortable. Any FY fans know what I mean?
So is this Dr. Kathyrn Wright male or female?
Me, I always try to help all the newbies, just so I don't end up looking like a jerk when I find out that she's a guy gender banding for fun.
-Earthman
Earthman
Say it to me face w/ out wasting space...
I like the item referring to tactical cross dressing. I'll have to try this one myself. Meanwhile, I think the military might want to look into this. Why, I can easily picture a day when elite anti terrorism teams storm the bad guys wearing falsies and heels. It might also really freak out the opposing side if the opposing side is one of those misogynist middle eastern countries. The image of spandex clad drag queens with stiff hairdos charging in with big guns and grendades is pretty unerving no matter how progressive you are. Yeah, I think this study raises some real possiblities.
I typically will play as a female model if it will give me a competitive advantage, i.e. the bounding box for collisions is smaller, or the model is harder to see at great distances.
________________________________
C'Mon. It's the Internet. Where men are men, and so are the women.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
"IRC Users Victimized"
2/23/2000 (AP)
A report released by the FBI NIPC today indicates that 93% of the attractive women logging on to Internet Relay Chat (IRC) servers are actually men who fit the "lonely homosexual man" criminal profile.
An international man hunt has been launched in an attempt to locate a criminal using the alias "lolita69" in #netsex on EFNET.
"lolita69" is the suspected mastermind behind a recent campaign of distributed deception that has caused approximately 1.2 billion dollars in damage to major IRC servers throughout the United States.
-- ken williams
Another interesting thought is just how many women on IRC happen to be men :)
--
I began playing Diablo as a wizard. I found it not to my liking, I tried the brute strength of the barbarian. That too was not to my liking, so I tried the Rogue. It was sweet. She could fire arrows at incredible speed. I liked ranged attacks. Then when they introduced the Bard I fell in love. TWO swords AND the ability to ID stuff. It was great.
When playing a FPS, I usually choose the one who looks the *most* like me.
I don't think that there's anything "odd" or different about it, you just use the characters and models that you dig.
However, it did freak me out when I was playing as a Rogue on Battle.Net and some guy kept calling me "Baby", "Honey", and "Sweet Cheeks".
OK, I made that last one up, but you get the point.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Try Unreal Tournament. It has female characters.
--
Patrick Doyle
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Yeah, so now all guys who use computers must be transexuals.... :-)
I played Ms. Pac-Man once...
As someone who is currently grappling with gender identity issues and has been since the time I was about ten years old, I can say that I found a lot of release for the way I was feeling by playing female characters on online RPGs (roleplaying-intense MUDs and the like, not your general hack-and-slasher) when I was younger and didn't think I could deal with it in any way in real life.
This certainly is NOT to say that every male who plays a female character is someone with some sort of gender identity crisis (I would guess that 90% of them are not, and simply do it because female characters get better treatment, etc), but for those of us who are grappling with those issues, this sort of thing can be an outlet for feelings we can't deal with at the moment.
I am posting this anonymously because I can't really talk about this openly in my current situation, so I hope people understand.
The troll doesn't care that his IP is banned by slashdot for a day. He just dials in again and gets a new IP. Perhaps repeating this over the whole freaking day using up half or so of the total dynamic IPs at his ISP. The result? Troll wins. He gets to post all of his drivel successfully. Others users on that ISP all get screwed. Does anyone else see a problem here?
Usually, when I met someone who was "cross-dressing", I found that I was rather suspicious of them in general. When the nickname was ambiguous, I tended to correctly label the gender subconsciously. And I was always right.
The fact is that, despite what many people claim, there are some serious psychological and behavioural differences between men and women. And, if you pay attention, you can almost always spot the fakes.
--
-- Slashdot sucks.
If you've ever played old-syle Capcom fighting games, the female characters (Chun-Li springs to mind) were always (I found) the easiest to play with, insofar as they were usually the quickest players, and were able to execute moves with considerably more speed. This sort of stereotype carries over even into Soul Calibur. Play as Taki and compare her to Nightmare or Astaroth. The female characters are almost exclusively lithe, quick and more fun to play.
In Everquest, if you're a female character, the players are usually chivalrous to a fault, and even the lowliest newbies can get twinked by complete strangers, simply because of their feminine avatar.
I don't think it has a whole lot to do with gender experimentation - although I'm certainly not discounting the article - but, in general, the programmers of these games are male, and maybe it's an odd sort of respect - coding chivalry? - to make their female characters the most fun to play (in my book, at least).
I remember (vaguely) a quote from the lead programmer of Tomb Raider when it was released. The interviewer asked him why they chose the woman, and he quite frankly replied that due to how the camera was situated, he'd rather spend 40 hours staring at a female bum than a bloke's.
I have yet to see somebody do any "gender exploration" in Quake3.. that usually fares worse than doing so in real life - you usually don't explode into giblets for cross-dressing. Try IRC if you're into that kind of thing...
... nothing, and I mean nothing, is cooler than a woman who kicks ass.
Gender exploration, bah. If I want to do some "female exploration" I'll become a gynacologist. I, and most of the people on that survey, get off on the idea that there exists a woman who can kick their ass and snarl fiercer than they can.
------------
"Okay, who taught the cat how to type ctrl alt delete?"
Speaking of gender roles, here is an interesting study that was conducted in Australia about it. It's a very interesting read. Talks about how computer use plays a role, especially among Windows users.
Hardly worth of anything more than a glance. Why the hell is this on Slashdot? Let's get a bit more statistical data before we make it news, guys...
"Woo Hoo! We got another one, Bob! The percentage of gender-crossing male video-game players just jumped 50 points!"
Jeez!
----
Lyell E. Haynes
+1 Insightful, -1 Troll. What can I say, I'm an Insightful Troll.
1) Dont feed the trolls
and 2) Moderate UP only. Save the -1's for the real flamebait.
Trolls are harmless and will go away when you don't feed them, meaning, don't respond either with comments or with mod points.
Leave 'em at zero and set your browser to +1.
Thank you
I play females sometimes. Its interesting to try to get another perspective in role playing games, in other games it is for tactical advantage. In Soul Edge and Soul Calibur, Sophitia is faster than most, deals more damage and can take more than the few who are faster than her. So I play her, she is well balanced. I won't play females in LARP though. That would take a bit too much costuming to pull off..
I have played as a female character solely to see if what you mentioned is true. Even though I have thoroughly cleaned up numerous times, I have never had anyone make any mention of the gender of my character.
Harrumph. Ahem. Cough. Shouldn't your female cat's name be Mignonne?
Sure, the body shape is female, but that doens't make them female. Gender is more then just body shape. It is no coicidence that men are stronger then women. Oh sure, a really in shape girl can out run me, or lift more then me, but if I as a normal male started exercising that much I would be able to out do the girls in any strenth contest. It is all about testostorne and a few other hormons.
No look closely at the so called girl players. They are men in strenght every aspect. Many guys in high school play sports (okay, not /.) and are in peak shape about the age of most game charicters. Most girls, even if in the same sport are not as strong. Oh they might be more agile (I don't have knowlede here, but I don't think aglilness is gender related - can anyone clarify?) but they do not have the strength to do the things that men can do. Very few people can do what Lora is doing in tomb raider, but men will have a much easier time devolping that strenght.
So my point is these are not girls they are playing, they are men with the overt features of women.
Now in D&D it is possibal to play the opposite gender, but video games don't provide that. Even in D&D type games, can you really say that you are doing a good job? I tried it once, and I won't again - girls think differently, it isn't something I can put my finger one, but they do. Now maybe with some study I could duplicate that ability, but not now.
Note, when I say that girls are different from men I'm trying not to put judgements on it. Yes men are stronger, but that doesn't mean better. And calling women weaker should not be used to imply they are not strong enough since for most tasks they are plenty strong. And thinking different is something that I can't put my finger on and even then you have to realise that I don't think like most men either.
When games get female roles that are female and male roles that are male, without reverting to sterotypes then we can compare.
See a lot of discussion in rec.arts.interactive-fiction (or whatever the group is) on the subject of gender. It turns out to be hard to do gender correctly.
P.S. All generalzations are false. Be careful when/if composing a rebuttal that your not pointing out and exception. Anyone can find an exception.
In that time
she declared war on Argentina
decimated a very strong Miner's union
killed off all industry outside a 50 mile radius of London
Scared the living daylights out of the rest of Europe
Made millions of children have nightmares
Privatised everything that moved
In short, she was one of the most successful Prime Ministers in the history of the UK, measued on a scale of 'Michael Foot' to 'Genghis Khan'.
I hope that this thing doesn't catch on. Women play too rough to play as men.
Stephen Hawking has written another book. It's about time as well.
Its important to note that this was an informal and nonscientific study--33 people doth not make a sample population. I would classify it as "interesting", yet far from "pretty amazing stats". Twenty percent of a thousand participants comprising a genuine cross section, maybe (if you beleieve that the majority of gamers are 25+ as was the population of this study, you are Sorely Mistaken).
I have to say I'm surprised. I would expect
Let's take these points one at a time....
Why is this study dumb? First of all because it's likely not accurate. How many people did they sample? Oh yeah, that's statistically significant! It tells us something about the real world! Yup, sure does! Secondly this study is stupid because
its conclusion is self-evidently wrong. Guys don't play female characters to explore their gender. Guys play female characters for two reasons, and both of them are shown in the followups to this story: 1) To oogle the female character they're playing or other "asthetic" reasons and 2) to tease other guys. And that's it, folks! There may be some 1/10th of 1% people who want to be transgendered, but the vast majority of guys (even gay guys, I suspect) are quite comfortable with our level of masculinity. Looking at a chick's tits or using an image of a chick to tease other guys isn't exploring a feminine side, it's just boys behaving like boys.
You don't learn anything about how society treats women by playing Tomb Raider, and it's ridiculous to argue that you do. Everyone knows that Lara Croft is just Indiana Jones with a female bitmap.
That's a real exploration of women, all right, slapping a faux-female skin on a male icon. Essentially making her into a guy.
On to point number 2. Even if some people do use video games that way, who cares? I find posting this story to be rather adolescent. Like some schoolboy who sees a cross-dresser on the street and sucrries home to tell all his friends about it so they can all snicker conspiratorially. There's nothing interesting or unusual here, unless you're an easily-shocked narrow homophobe.
-Ben
Snooze for Dorks, Stuff for the Crapper.
I am a troll, and I am responding, so there.
It is quite useful when discussing a topic online to pretend to be a certain gender with a certain opinion. If you for example discusses in a anti-porno forum you can post like: "I would rather be in a porno movie than flipp burgers at McDonalds /Tracy" and watch the reactions.
Can someone settle an argument for me? As a long time Sluggy Freelance fan, I've got the Bun-bun q2 model. Its teeny, its primitive, and Polycount uses it as the standard measure of a bad model. My friends and I keep arguing over weather or not it has a special bounding box or something. Are such things possible for a Q2 model, without making a mod? The thing goes up to a normal player's knee, so if it has a normal sized box, then I've gotta revise my aiming strategy.
I am a troll, and I am not... er, nevermind.
If you look a little at the figures presented :),
there, you get a little doubt about the quality
of the stats.
The data used (33 surveys) is not a very large set
and presenting numbers like "6% of the respondents"
is nonsense: when a about 2 surveys show a
specific detail, this is just random noise in
the data. You could say 6% by 60 out of 1000
(I'm not sure if this is sufficient)
Please note that the noise hasn't have to be
introduced by the respondents (random answers
just the fact that the selection of people, who
answer, is random
adds noise to the data (you'll never
get the identical same relations of people in the
population and in the set of respondents).
Statistics isn't all that easy.
Fortunately ?
THE MASTER OF SPELLING ERRORS
Why do you ask? I mean, does it matter whether you're the only person who gives a damn?
By asking the question, you demonstrate an interest in a question that is similar to the question she asks.
...because the women characters make smaller targets.
And on Alpha Centauri, because the factions have hardcoded leader sexes (yet another failure on fireaxis' part, imo). If I want to play as Spartans I can either be a really pretty guy or a female character... Same with the Gaians. Of course, I edited the datajacks and believers so I can play as male characters (Hiro P. and Rev. Neh., respectively) if everyone I am playing with wants to download my customized .pcx and .txt's before they play; but this is annoying and takes too long usually. Also, most people don't trust an edited faction.txt file... especially when they are losing as badly as most people I play with seem to. :)
Rev. Neh
... and there is no doubt, that one day he will be
where the eye of his telescope has already been
I havn't ever MUDed or played alot on FPSes or on IRC...I MUSH and theres always been alot of men playing female characters, and it's funny how different a male playing a male will act towards a female character or Admin. Very difficult players will be totally passive towards a female admin.
I would say that there was more to the issue than for exploration.
While a number of people have raised the point of the woman playing a man to avoid sexual passes and so on, there has always been a tactical advantage as a hacker to pretending female gender. In the eighties most of my friends had gotten free accounts on systems with special features by finding a girl to talk on the phone and 'Prove' they were female, at any number of systems.
The fact is that having females on a BBS was a huge draw, and sysops were VERY horny boys most of the time.
Exploiting this issue has always been one of the humorous side-effects of a desperation for female attention even in a virtual world.
In recent play on Everquest I found that as a female I was FAR more likely to be simply GIVEN stuff because I was in a female character. I actually stopped playing female characters because I felt that it was in some ways a cheat. The females are projected on the screen as scantily clothed buxom lasses, who despite the fact that they might be 50th level warriors, might not have had the wearwithal to buy pants.
In Clan Lords (another multiplayer game) I found that by creating a female character I was absolutely treated better than the males. In a game where I was represented by a 32 by 32 icon of an elf in a dress, guys would go out of their way to help me.
As a former administrator on a mush for 6 years, I have seen a number of players be given advantages based on their gender.
In truth, as a 14 year old boy, I used to log into DDials as Generic Girl and log the disturbing modemsex so that I could show it to the other members of the systems I was on.
And as to getting away with pretending female gender, I found that it was easy. Just act like a person and don't make a big fuss over your gender. Most people don't actually pay much attention to their gender until it is brought into question.
As I like to say, "Actually I am a superintelligent blue hamster developed at MIT."
if you do a google search for 'fbi home page' the results ar (in order) fbi.gov, cia.gov, microsoft.com ...
With Quake II, the female model was fine, but she just couldn't match up to Chun Li. I thought the magic was gone. A Chun Li model came out, but by then I was playing Half-Life with that boring Gordon Freeman.
That brings me to the crux of the problem. Now that Quake 3 is out, there's a model named Mynx who looks good, isn't too weak, doesn't have annoying pain sounds, and doesn't have any weaknesses. The problem is that if I were to play as her my son would rag on me and make fun of me. What should I do? I'm all confused.
Just sign me
Mixed up in Mississippi
The cues are subtle enough that you would actually have to practice at it to get any good. It's not anything so simple as "all the sex-crazed ones are really men." An awful lot of real sex-crazed women are on the net too. Nevertheless, the cues (such as the linguistic style and conversational themes they use) do exist, and they're the sort of thing you would notice in real life if you were paying attention, like, "didn't that hottie have an Adam's apple?" for the electronic world.
Yet nobody seems to notice. Maybe everyone is too polite to mention the obvious, but I tend to think that's not the case because so many men are getting genuinely fooled. I see it happen all the time, when Lilah logs into the mud and all of a sudden every male character in town is handing her virtual flowers, and you're going, "Didn't that chiq have an Adam's apple?"
The insidious answer: Men don't care about the object of their fantasies as long as it's not possible to dispel the myth.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
I don't know about the rest of the gameworld, but for us Unreal and UnrealTournament fanatics the reason is practical.
The Unreal female bodies are rendered smaller and thinner, thus are harder to hit. Playing as a female character gives the player an advantage in gameplay versus the thicker male characters' bodies.
Life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
William Shakespeare
The author points out, clearly and up front where it belongs, that this was NOT a randomized sample. That means that he only heard from guys eager to talk about this.
What's the point? Don't take his results as being typical of gamers. They aren't. They are typical of gamers who do this and like to talk about it. So, still interesting, and a fairly respectable piece, but recall that little limitation that the author warned you about.
See what I've been reading.
I play q3a as female with a female name just b/c im too damn lazy to change it all back after my gf gets done playing. Plus she plays more than me anyway.
lotsa guys play as females in Quake.. I doubt it's for gender exploration though.. and in some other games, the female charachter is better. i think its an effort to throw us off.. same goes with decent/good quake players picking a female character..
Hehehe. Just thought of somethin, I know this is infantile but: If Lara Croft is just a female Indiana Jones, shouldn't she have a whip? Somehow, I don't think that would improve the reputation of the game.
I don't care if you're giving anal sex to a guy or a girl, face it you're gay!!
I have to admit, one of the reasons I sometimes play a female is that I feel they have more power in real life. By that I mean they're more able to deal with people, more popular and charismatic, etc.
This is most evident in chats, it's incredible how many more people seem to want to talk with you when you have a female-sounding nickname.
The funny thing is, I know one guy who always plays a female in violent games, and he's a very timid person in real life. Maybe I do the same thing a bit too - almost like it's easier to be callous if you're female. That old song just popped into my head - "The female of the species is more deadly than the male"
It really gets weird in realspace RPGs - when you try to use your feminine wiles on someone and everyone can see you're an ugly, balding guy with bad skin. Guess us wierdos will have to wait until VR becomes realistic.
If you ask me, every female is just like Lara Croft. Especially in body shape.
Well, come on tell me. email me, at least
--ell7
Just don't forget, it goes the other way too. What woman has not wondered at some point how it could be different to be a man? (Especially in the online world, in which truly knowledgeable females are few and far between.)
Have you read the Moderation Guidelines Addendum?
We're all wondering. What does gnarphlager mean? Google just gives me four pages of Slashdot posts and a tripod homepage about pancreatic aardvarks, than which otters are way more cool.
--80md
Here's why I do it: Sometimes you don't have any choice! The last time I checked, Tomb Raider doesn't give you the choice of playing as some male alter ego! So you're Lara Croft; end of story. It's sort of disingenuous to suggest that anybody who plays Tomb Raider is doing "gender exploration."
Just because I sometimes intentionally work Lara Croft into a tight spot to get close-up views of her fun-bags and ass doesn't mean that I am Lara Croft! Trust me; her chest is much larger than mine!
I'm curious as to the data on the inverse.
How many women play as men??
For some reason I'm of the opinion that hardly any do. (Not sure why this is the case though)
Men posing as women as nothing new. IRC, MUDs, RPGs, have had this phenomenon for years.
Cheers
The problem is, when you play a wizard, you're just playing a wizard. When you play a woman, you are lavished with gifts and an abundance of unfair advantages by guys who somehow think they're increasing their karma with the fairer sex by giving their game players nonexistant goodies...
Most men playing women on online games are not in it for the gender exploration I'd bet... my bet would be on them playing it because they suck at games and are too cheap to buy a cheat book, so they take a "legal" cheat built into the brain of all those guys that help chicks out in online games.
Esperandi
I am a troll, responding to a troll, responding to a troll, responding to a typical Slashdot suckhole. Let's keep this train movin'
I've been noticeing that Slashdot is posting a lot of gender-focused articles. I haven't been reading long enough to know how far back this leads. Am I the only one to think that this topic has been getting enough attention to merit its own icon? You know, the usual linked circle symbols would be fine.
I must admit that my "handle", blood_rose is somewhat femmy. Even so I still use it as I have for the last five years. Couple that with playing as a female in Quake2 (and just about every other FPS) and people just assume you are female. Even worse is that I belong to an all female clan. Is it gender exploration? In a way yes. I do wish I was a female (a real one not a post-op) and playing games as a female gives me a chance to do that. I wouldn't call it exploration though, as I know what I want. Aside from that, I like messing HNG's heads. It's damn funny when some guy tries to get your number while playing Q2...
I'm curious as to wether the study asked about playing games specifically targeted for girls. (can't reach the article)So how many of you who use female personas have one of the barbie programs on your computer..none? I thought so. oh, and since no discussion of video games can be completle without mentioning Lara Croft. I've always prefered the Castlevania series to Tomb Raider.
------ Work is so much easier when you don't
Actualy, a lot of female gamers like toomraider. Ones I know anyway. They identify with the 'strong female lead'. I'm sure she was made to appeal to guys though...
[ c h a d o k e r e ]
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Hmmm, interesting thought.
<Dungeon Master> You encounter a script kiddie!
<Haxxor> Heh, I'm compiling "trinoo"
<Wumpus> I'll use my P3 +5 on him
/Wumpus rolls dice
<Wumpus> shit! I missed
<Dungeon Master> Ok
<HaXXoR> I'm casting "trinoo" on his P3
/HaXXoR rolls dice
<HaxxoR> Hah! a 20
<DM> Sorry, Wumpus your Pentium is DoS-ed for the rest of the battle...
<Wumpus> I draw my dual 486s.
/Wumpus rolls dice
<Wumpus> Hah! a hit with cpu0, but cpu1 misses. Take 33mHz!
<HaXXoR> Ok, that's it. I'm compiling "kill"
<Wumpus> I'm stepping back and pinging him with my +3 TCP stack.
/wumpus rolls dice
<Wumpus> bitch! take 16 pings!
<HaXXoR> That's ok, I'm gonna kill(1) you this round.
<HaXXoR> BTW, I hardly felt that, I'm wearing +8.2 send mail
<Haxxor> I'm going to kill -9 Wumpus
<DM> "kill" has no effect.
<HaXXoR> WHAT?!??
<Wumpus> That's right, I'm running as root, fool.
Moderation Totals:Flamebait=1, Funny=4, Overrated=2, Total=7.
:(
Its good to see (some) of the moderators here still have a sense of humor. It seems like there a deing breed though
[ c h a d o k e r e ]
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
I am a troll, responding to a troll, responding to a troll, responding to a troll, responding to a typical Slashdot suckhole. Let's keep this train movin'
Two words:
Lara Croft
duh. All us guys want to see if the other female characters in video games can measure up to her.
Sure, I have a thankless job. That's okay. I have a lot of (non
In a FPS like Quake 3, I find it really doesn't matter what model you use. Sure, Slash has some very funky movements that will throw you off the first few times you try to rail her, but the model doesn't modify the fact that that you can be gibbed by a few rockets. So, there is no advantage in Quake 3, as far as I can discern. So there is no real reason to play with a female model.
In a fighting game, such as Street Fighter or what have you, there are sometimes advantages to being female characters. It depends on the game or characters. I feel that in Street Fighter Alpha 1, Chun-Li was the most powerful character. In Street Fighter Alpha 3, she is not. Sometimes certain characters are more in synch with your playing style, and sometimes those characters are female. If the character has the set of moves that are to your liking in a particular game, who cares what gender the character is? Of course, most people do just fine with Ken, Ryu, Akuma, ......
In an online role playing environment, there is a true advantage to being female. As others have said, people give female characters things, even when it is blatantly obvious that the character is played by a guy. Even though there is no possible way to "score" online. I've even seen this phenomenon in traditional RPGs, where a female PC played by a male player (who'se sitting right in front of the others) is given stuff by the guy PCs. I guess if the guys can't score, they might figure they can at least get their PCs to score. X_X
I'm not sure if what they say about a psychological advantage is true, that guy players will go easier in a head to head competition. I don't seem to have any problem shooting down female models in Quake 3 at the same rate I shoot down male models. I know that the player on the other end is more likely a guy, and even if they are infact female, there is nothing saying a female can't be a good Quake player.
But I don't really think people actually do "gender exploration," or at least most people. I think they do it for other reasons (perhaps to check out Lara's "polygon count" or something).
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
What's that? Don't I deserve a (Score:-1, Troll) or at least Offtopic anymore? Well, at least it wasn't moderated Insightful.
I play using the typical 'he-man' skins in quake, but I like to wear an old gingham dress while doing so. It's comfortable and doesn't make me look fat. The blousy sleeves make for some rapid mouse-handling as well, and help show off all my tattoos and piercings.
**>>BELCH
But untimately irrelevant. The survey was too small to be called anything near scientific, and it lacked the formality that goes into scientific research.
I'm currently running eight characters in an online RPG, six male and two female. Why do I do it? I'm a writer, and I've been working on stories of various types for a long time, all of which include at least a few women. I play female characters from time to time to see if I can do it convincingly; it's an exercise to improve the way I write female characters in my stories. I also use all of my characters to establish each others' pasts; the eight I currently run are tied together in a rather complex web which I somehow manage to keep straight. This, too, is a writing exercise. It lets me work on establishing the way characters interact in a manner that's realistic, not contrived.
By the way, I do know for a fact that there are women who play men, also, and not always just for role-playing. On another messageboard I frequent, someone once posted for a year and a half before finally letting everyone know she was female (I didn't mind, she pissed off more than a few people with that because they hadn't figured it out).
One last thing: unless you're actually doing it as a writing exercise, I don't recommend playing all of your characters simultaneously. I've never had more than three of mine in the same room together; above that it becomes headache-inducing just keeping everything straight.
How does having a few extra polygons up-top qualify as "gender exploration?" The female model Major in Q3A operates the same way as Sarge, or any other male models and skins. In fact, you can't even tell the difference. Only in RPG's where you view the character from third person can you make the distinction, but even then it doesn't make much of a difference. The only difference is, usually, a lower strength rating and higher agility, and these stereotypes are not great to point out when talking to women.
If you honestly believe that by playing as a female character in a flipping video game is a great way learn about women, you need some help.
It doesn't matter if the cup is half full or half empty. Whatever's inside it is evaporating either way.
Thank you.
Back when I was seriously addicted to Nethack, Valkyries were my all-time favorite character class. They're tough, they're neutral, they start out with pretty good stuff, and best of all, they always get Mjolnir first when sacrificing at an alter. And with 25 strength (gauntlets of power), if a Valk throws Mjolnir it will return to her hand, making it an awsome projectile weapon that's also good for hand-to-hand combat.
While the results are kind of interesting, and probably tell us what we already knew (a bunch of guys like playing women for various reasons), this is hardly a decent study - a small, self selected sample is lousy methodology, and I'm surprised someone claiming academic credibility would conduct it that way.
I mean, who doesn't love playing Voldo in Soul Calibur and prancing around the ring, rendering your opponent helpless with laughter..?
--- Where's my X.400 protocol decoder?
*plays with breast*
lose != loose
1) Dont feed the trolls
:-( A steady diet of goats alone will not suffice.
:-)
but I get HUNGRY
I agree with your second point, and I always moderate up good trolls. And any troll worth his/her warts is going to troll if they're responded to or not. This isn't a problem; according to even the people at sid=moderation seem to appreciate a good troll
in Gauntlet I always played Valkyrie cuz she looked pretty cool.
In Unreal, I play a female skin, but my name is my USENET handle "ReggieFromRiverdale," which is definitely a guy. Besides, you don't see yourself in FPS, so what's the big deal?
Anyone play "Mutant Chronicles: Siege Of the Citadel?" I always play Bauhaus team because you get one male character with the Big Guns Big Death, and a female (coincidentally named Valkyrie ??!) character with a sword/gun combo. It's pretty cool.
Pope
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
It takes a big man to admit he's playing the part of a pussy
I can't speak for females, but I do it because I'm a lesbian trapped inside a man's body. I mean, come on, what guy doesn't fantasize about being a woman and having hot lesbian sex?
I sometimes play a female because my 9-year-old daughter insists on it.
The sample is self selected and way too small to be in any way reliable. The data collected is completely useless and could easily have been obtained by chance or bias.
Well, the pictures on your homepage do look quite gay...
Two things: First, it's a joke you idiot. He's making fun of people who talk like that.
Second, from his webpage:
Another fact about me you may find interesting is that I'm bisexual. Some people may hate me for this, but it's not something I'm able to change so get used to it (note: for those too soft-hearted for the above link, try this one instead). Some people have told me that I must be either gay or straight because bisexual people don't exist.
Needless to say these people are not exactly doing much to further my estimation of them. That's really all I can tell you about that subject...if you want to see gay/lesbian/bi resources on the web I'm sure there are only 2 billion pages about it, so use a freaking search engine.
--
grappler
Vidi, Vici, Veni
This is a huge leap of faith here, but I would make an assumption that most men who play female characters in a role-playing environment aren't doing it for the sole reason that they can shave their legs, but for the experience.
Truthfully, it can give insights into how the gender roles work in real life. Not that any of us have social lives, but that's not the point... The point is, it can assist you in learning how to interact more effectively with people of opposite genders. Being hit on, though it does happen more commonly for female characters, doesn't affect things that much; if anything, it's true to life, and true to RP.
I've played a few female characters, and they are a fun alternative to the "battle-worn warrior orphan". You can do a 'who' on any MUD and see about five of those... Females have more variety, as -- I believe -- there is no stereotyped role for them on MUDs or other role-playing games.
The only problem is, I imagine MUDSex could get a bit strange...
-herd
Julian Dibbell wrote an interesting book, My tiny life: crime and passion in a virtual world, in which he talks about gener-bending, cybersex and other such stuff in MUDs -- particularly, LambdaMoo. Most of what's discussed won't be that surprising to /. readers, but I enjoyed reading it.
This was particularly significant because the items being sold were personalized, and there was a policy in place that the personalization could not include certain selected words. If a customer used words from the "banned" list, they got a polite email saying that their order couldn't be completed and giving a reason why. I suspect that a lot of nasty responses were averted because the email came from "Cheryl" or "Sue."
For the indignant, the reason for the banned list was that the company in question didn't want to have products out there that visibly included both their name and even mild profanity. They were concerned about tarnishing their image, and given their wholesome reputation I can understand why (though I thought and still think their list was a bit too restrictive).
fencepost
just a little off
Yes, self-selected survey groups are about as "scientific" as push polling. But on an issue like this, who's going to fund a REAL survey? It's an interest piece, nothing more. That said, it's _interesting_. I never slack on "female" players in Quake 2, but that's because I try to shoot 'em before I can see what sex they are >:-) It's illuminating to see what reasons these guys gave: I mean who woulda thunk that RPG players would be shelling out their hard-earned magical items to the first pretty-young-virtual-elf that came along? Certainly not me. But as a Guy, I understand. It's instinctual, sort of :-)
Freedom: "I won't!"
You don't expect me to read that far down on the page, do you?
When I play a character in a RPG, I must relate to "it". Which means... I think of myself as some kind of wizard, so I'll tend to choose that kind of character. I *won't* play a troll or any kind of beefy creature, since my mind is not of that nature (or else, I would do more exercise, right? ;).
I will play a magician, an engineer, whatever I feel like, whatever I *am* (so yes, I am a Wizard despite what AC said;). But I find it extremely difficult to relate to something I am not. So maybe I can play a woman character, maybe I can't, that's not the point here. Just that somehow the character we play represents a strong part of us.
JulyenFREAK! You sick freak! Now, in order not to upset a lot of people, I will prove inductively you are a freak. By inductive I mean I will just try to do an inductive proof but just end up saying I proved my point.
First let me say that as a IRC whore, I know from experience when a person by the name of ******grl or **girl etc, comes into a room, 40% of the people try to talk to her, 10% actually try hitting on her, and 50% just idle. I dont hit on irc girls, because, its sick. Its a text-based conversation place for bored kids. Not a goddamn bar.
1) you are straight ->
a) you are thinking of becoming homosexual ->
i) you will freak out the 10+40% who are interested. this is mentally stupid, they will flame you for years.
b) you are disturbed, mentally ->
i) see i for a)
c) you cant admit youre a homosexual ->
i) see i for a)
d) you are just a guy.. ->
i) see i for a)
2) you are homosexual ->
a) see i for a)
**I say we have something along the lines of area codes for all online nicknames. This entails email addresses, irc nicknames, game nicknames, anything!**
Rules.
The first 6 characters can be anything, the seventh will be your gender (m/f) the eigth will be your "orientation" (s/g/b). If you dont comply we (the collective irc mafia) will send rabid hamsters to your house.
[w00t@freaky.bish]# rm
That one really deserved a "Score 4: Informative"
Well in fighting/adventure games, the female is usually more nimble and less strong. Therefore they reqire more skill to play, and you can be more 'stylish' whuppin ass Think Kitana in MK2. Sakura in SFA, Seung Mina and Taki in Soul Calibur. You get the idea.
This is typical of every psychological study I've had the dubious pleasure of statistically analyzing. Between that, and the total leaps-of-faith conclusions, I'd question calling it a 'science.' -just an opinion.
http://www.theonion.com/onio n3604/sucking_my_cock.html
"I like female voices, and the female characters
in games generally make all kinds of cute little grunts and moans and groans. I don't mean that in any kind of erotic manner either, it's just that they sound nice."
I got a chuckle out of that one. Must just be some of those non-erotic but just aesthetically pleasing moans, groans, and grunts. Ok, so did none of the respondents admit that the female pain sounds turn them on? Sure, it's disturbing, but hey, pain moans sound a lot like sex moans. Deal with it. No one wants to admit the models/skins turn them on? I mean, there are other reasons to play female characters (artists DO put way more time in to them), but I think basic issues of libido were WAY minimized.
Seems like a lot of guys that sent in comments were quick to say that although they enjoyed the aesthetics of female models, the sounds, movements, etc - none of it is (*gasp*) erotic, mind you. Well, hey - I can just speak for myself, but I think they are. The reason I like the female form is because of beauty and eroticism, not some sterile, art-gallery appreciation. Possibly guys don't want to say this because they're afraid as coming of as being sexist or freakish? Or maybe I'm the only guy who feels this way and will say so.
(shrug)
-lx
While I am sure thoses statistics are probably true, I disagree on some things. The way it is written makes it seem like we are all sex-crazed desperate fiends. We can be sensitive, and we don't only think about sex. In yahoo's boards, someone asked for nude pix of the ff7 and ff8 girls, and you should have SEEN how many men went against it! I have used male and female characters, but it was NOT due to the gender. If the character happens to be sexy, it's an added bonus, that's all. I am growing tired of this stereotype of men, making us out to be sex-crazed barbarians. I always choose who I think will get the game done best, and gender has little (if anything) to do with it! Maybe WE should be the ones calling the women sexist pigs, and not vice versa, because you see a lot of them calling us sex-crazed, and they can be just as sexist as us. I've gotten off topic. I just wanted to say that 64 men do NOT represent all of us. It's biased. Most likely, the men who DON'T do it for the sexiness passed at the chance to say so. I would...
"As many of you know, I was very instrumental in the founding of the Internet" --Al Gore to Katie Couric 3/99
we have someone who obviously likes to explore the "rodent" side of thier sexuality.
Thank you, thank you, I'm here all week.
--
Does narcissism count as a hobby? --Shawn Latimer
Sorry, but it's true. Time to face up to the truth. You too, Mojo.
"Prejudice is wrong; you should hate everyone the same."
>Hey honey, what's your name?
>>Steve
>Uh, look at the time! I've got some laundry to do...cya later...
You and your stupid "train!" It's annoying! Where does the joy come from? You're behaving like a 7 year old, repeating what others say. It's just stupid. and chances are, this is only going to encourage you. Moderators, save your points. These petty children don't deserve the points.
"As many of you know, I was very instrumental in the founding of the Internet" --Al Gore to Katie Couric 3/99
In Gauntlet Ledgends for her stats.
Now I found out its because I wanna explore gender. Wow.
If it was said on slashdot, it MUST be true!
Basically most responses tend to be towards the guys saying "Heck yeah I play Lara.. have you SEEN her ass???"
Games are designed for men in mind. I mean come on. HOW many women walk around in those damn outfits? And I want one woman who has breasts like that to walk up to me... Esp. if they are natrual.
Games, being a visual stimulation... which we all know most men run on....and since we are engineering the game towards men, they make the characters something the men want to see.
Besides there arent enough gurl gamers out there that would make the game..."visually stimulating" enough for men.
I mean come on. whem men close their eyes, and picture their top ten women.. if they could have them. What geek doesnt picture Lara...
She became a geek by absorption, one day she woke up with a bad taste in her mouth.. and knew how Linux worked
If your playing as a female model just because it's slightly faster or smaller and you cant do as well with a male model then you must be pretty crap at playing. It reminds me of people who use scripts nonstop in TFC and CS (Half-life mods) because they believe they can't do well with out one..
Please list all the games you can think of where cute females are (or can be) transformed into statues.
The person who names the most unique games wins a special prize.
1- The boxes around each models are *exactly* the same. That means it's no harder to hit the female model than the male on in q2, nor is it harder to hit, say, Crash (female) than Doom (male) in q3.
2- However, the female models are (sometimes alot) smaller on screen than the male models (but that also valid for some weird ones like Orb or Bones). I personnaly feels that it's make them harder to see, harder to aim at them precisely, and thus harder to hit. Agreed, that's arguable, but still.
3- BUT, the *true* reason why you should play a female model in Quake2 is because the footsteps sounds coming from them is much quieter than the one from the male models. Now before you say "bullshit", let me tell you than anyone who ever played 1 on 1 (and especially those of us who play in official tournaments), *sound-awareness* (if that's a word) is what makes the difference between good and great players. If you can not only tell where your opponent is from by the powerups, weapons, etc. they pick up but simply by their footsteps (louder footsteps = you can hear them from further away), you have a huge advantage. That's why you'll see alot of (good) players walking in Quake2/3 when not engaged in combat (so they won't make any noise).
The same is not true in q3, as some female models make more noise than male ones, and vice versa. But specific models, like Anarki (male) and Slash (female) make noticably less noise than the others.
All in all, the difference between the male and female models isn't all that great, but why don't take all the advantages you can get?
-Earthling
-Earthling
"I'm sorry, I had to; the irony was just too thick."
That .wav file from Everquest is great... I just found a new "Exit Windows" sound!
It's not like the environment in most games is rich enough to express your femininity. You walk around and beat up or shoot your opponents. What was the last computer game you played where you nurtured caring relationships or reasoned with opponents? I remember in Fallout you could go the diplomatic route with your character, but still you couldn't negotiate your way through every encounter.
Anyone who's noticed how much more games are becoming part of the culture. One of the guys at my work is about as committed to Quake as most amatuer sportspeople are to their sports code - he practises the same amount of time I would if I were a club rugby player. And that's hardly uncommon. So, from a cultural/sociological point of view, there should be an interest.
I mean who woulda thunk that RPG players would be shelling out their hard-earned magical items to the first pretty-young-virtual-elf that came along?
's pretty amusing, for sure. It would be kind of interesting to get an idea of the thought process behind the action theough - to what degree it is based on traditional notions of "chivalry" and to what degree it is sad gits who imagine that someone will turn up on their doorstep offering sex 8)
The homosexual epidemic has spread wide over the world since the Americunt George Freeman invented homosexualality in 1794, which was registered in the constitution two years later in Washington. That is why people play female roles in games today.
quote of the millenium: Everyone hates America!
(pretty cool huh? yeah!)
Anyone play Tekken 3 anymore?
moderate that shit up, bitchass. That had me on the floor laughing!
For me it's a bit like the way Lewis Carroll made the protagonist of his Wonderland books a female- there's a certain type of geekiness that just can't relate to trucks and boasting and fragging people in Quake and all that stuff, and this can easily be seen as a more female perspective. Perhaps it is. Perhaps it'd be equally helpful to just interact with really intense geeks who cared only about nifty algorithms and programming APIs (not so much CPUs- cpu dicksize wars is, well, rather male ;) )
I did, however, spend an adolescence feeling very frustrated and outclassed and afraid to talk to girls, and never understood why none of them made the effort to reach out to me- and this is why I _know_ the genderbending thing can be educational, I've learned from it. I know some people get flustered from being hit on when they pose as females, but since I was trying to work out a comfortable persona to _stick_ with, I had to find answers to that problem- and I ended up being just like the girls who'd intimidated me so much when I was a teenager. There was no way around it- to cope at all with a flirting sort of situation I needed to deal with more confident people who were able to say what they thought, just the kind of person I wasn't. That kind of insight is something I never had as I was growing up.
I certainly agree that many males passing as females do a questionable job of it- certain attitudes and especially descriptions (!) just scream, "horny teenage boy living out fantasies!"- but it's not a rule that such genderbending is always spottable. I know that I've occasionally startled IRL women who'd assumed, after getting to know me, that I _was_ one of them. The trick is that you can't really cover up your true self, it will always show through one way or another- and hell, I've never understood Guy Stuff or felt like I belonged to Maleness anyhow. When my true self shows through, people take it to be a female self. This doesn't trouble me, because it doesn't really matter much in the long run- not like I have an active sex life so it's rather a moot point most of the time.
Oddly enough, I am not wildly effeminate. I have to shave or I get 5-o-clock shadow, my voice is pretty deep, I have no complaints on a certain very private level *g* so I have to wonder- is my basic confidence in my physical maleness strong enough to totally permit my embracing of a _personality_ oriented femaleness? In other words, if I was hung like a chihuahua, would I be driving a pickup truck, lifting weights and fragging people in Quake with massive displays of virtual testosterone? *g* this notion amuses me greatly.
Well, _that_ was bizarre to talk about on Slashdot. Back to the normal posts for a while. Yeah, gimme that crakhor quake model! She's a real hottie plus I think the bounding box is smaller so you can beat the other guys and frag their asses! (huhuhuhuh, he said 'box') ;)
That said, yes: There is a 'competative advantage' to being a hot girl even in shooters...
-Elendale (of course, most of the guys asked for the skin, but she fragged them again while they typed... gems like that only come along so often)
IANAT (I Am Not A Troll)
This is really not too new or surprising. Anonymity of the internet brings out many things. Here it brings out another.
This has really been going on for a long time. MUCKs and MUs are fine examples. I have been on a certain MUCK for years now, and it is very common for males to play the part of female characters, and sometimes females to play the part of male characters (among other *things*). Some play it for the day and that is it, but there are some others who have played out the lives of these characters for years. Close friends tend to know, but some have had these characters without another soul ever knowing.
It is not just because they are "sick in the head," homosexual, bisexual, or something weird. They do tend to have something in common though. I tend to see that these people usually feel that their feelings are repressed.
I think this shows off a bit of sexism that exists in almost all human societies. This that males and females are supposed to be different. Males are not to be caring, kind, or trusted as much as females are. You have to think into the social qualities of people.
I am a male, and I have never played the part of a female character, although I have thought about it. I do not do it because I consider it a bit of deception -- be that completely in conflict with the nature of MUs.
Ask someone who has played the part of a female character in an MU. They will tell you, they ARE treated different.
We are in a time when the definition of the sexes is in question. The American public is becoming tolerate of those who are different and want to live differently. The lines are fading away and a mix is occurring between. Therefor, we see what we do.
Those differences that are not real, will fade away. Each will be judged by their own ways.
Back when I used to play Quake I sometimes took the opposite gender just because it was cool to watch a heroine doing things she'd never do in real life. Just like women programming, women running for president, women participating in the economy in a meaningful way, these are all erotic ideas we can only realize through virtual reality.
Personally, I've never thought of the those on-screen characters as myself. Rather they are someone I'm travelling with (even though she does all the fighting :) Not so hard to choose your character's gender now, is it?
I hear lots of people here ranting on here about how some women pretend to be male just to fit in with the gender climate at /.
However, the thought occurs to me that converse might often be true. What I notice is that everytime some gender oriented article is posted here, some "female" posters make comments like "HEY I'M FEMALE, THIS IS WHAT I THINK" and of course get moderated up fast. Not trolling here, but I noticed that an incredibly easy way to get karma points is to write a short "I'm a grrl geek" spiel and make a few obvious observations. I'm not saying that females don't post anything insightful... it's just that a lot of comments can get moderated up easily merely because the poster says (s)he is female. I'm pretty sure a lot of males have caught on to it and some of the "I'm a girl!" posts are really guys trying to whore karma.
Yeah, so I'm pessimistic, it's not an unreasonable claim though.
I find that whenever I play, I just assume that every player is a guy. I don't feel any remorse when I kill a chick in a game. The article said there were some psychos who started cussing whenever they got killed by a "woman." What kind of messed up crap is that? Who in their right mind actually thinks that a woman would play a computer game? I know there are the exceptions, but those are few (even though they cluster. :-P)
I play a male, it's something that I just don't give a crap about. I choose a model that looks good. I know some guys who play female models for the main reason that whenever they get injured, it sounds like an orgasm. Makes you raise your eyebrow, when intelligent kids are ignoring the women around them, so they can hear a digital orgasm. (Same goes for all you porn freaks out there).
P.S. If you play Blade on Quake 3, look at her in third person from the legs... They actually pu a bunghole on the bitch.
You need to restart your computer. Hold down the Power button for several seconds or press the Restart button.
I play as a woman, as well as in real life.
Some day, may be I will eventually become a woman.
--
The shareholder is always right.
So, this guy won't release his source because he wants a quake client
incapable of cheating. He's in violation of the GPL, no matter how
commendable his intentions. Couldn't he (A) release a "reference"
client, along with source code, and (B) release a seperate, closed-source
program, that does some kind of checksum check on the client, communicating
with a like program on the server side? In order to play, you'd have to
have compiled your client with no modifications to the (freely available)
source code, or simply have downloaded a legitimate, pre-compiled binary.
The programs on the client and server which check the purity of the client
would be closed-source, and use some kind of encryption to communicate. I
think I saw this mentioned somewhere back when the Q1 source was released.
If it's feasible and potentially effective, then why hasn't it been done?
I'm sure the GPL will get it's day in court, but I'd hate to see it be with
a sucker like this guy. Great, Carmack has the $$$ to sue him into oblivion,
and it'd most likely be an easy win for the GPL. The spirit of the GPL as
I see it, though, has nothing to do with beating up on well-intentioned
little guy hobbyist hackers.
If we're going to talk about how traditional hetero couples use each other. The man expects a pretty trophy wife who can bear children and rescue him from his inability to take care of himself. (My father definately had the inability to care for himself thing going... before my mother he lived on tuna fish sandwiches and grapefruit.) Now the traditional woman is looking for a guy that she can manipulate into trying to provide her with a stable environment and pleanty of status symbols since she's not allowed to go do anything on her own. So the guy is being objectified for his ability to get stuff in the world. (Let's see, wasn't there some show called who wants to marry a milionare recently?) So the traditional model you've got everyone using everyone else, gee what fun... let's through some random bits of everyone manipulating everyone else too, and just a dash of no one being able to communicate the hopes, dreams, and fears to each other either. No Thanks! I'm happy being a feminist/humanist. I don't want to be used, nor do I want to use my partner. One of the things I like about being involved in same-sex relationships is that there's some level of equality in them and less opportunity to for manipulation. But I've been in opposite sex relationships that have been rather equal as well (with more progressive guys though). So are you going to get all bitter and unhappy when some chick tries to use you as a source of free money? It's what you're setting yourself up for.
I don't like being male, and I never have (or, rather, I don't like the surplus of unpleasant baggage associated with "maleness"). I am not a transvestite, but I suppose you could say that I had gender issues. I don't like anything macho, and feel perplexed by any of my peers attempts at being "cool" or 'tough." So, yes, I play female characters 100% of the time. When I am reincarnated, I don't want to be reborn male (assuming that I am given the choice). I see nothing odd or unusual about this study at all, or even particularly newsworthy.
Neopets - the best free game on the Int
There were 64 people surveyed dude... Check it out: In the end, I received 33 completed surveys, and informal comments by another 31 males who wanted to add their two cents worth, either via email or through the message boards. The informal comments typically addressed why they choose to play as female characters, and in what game genres.
There were 64 people surveyed dude. Read the article.
Ok, I will only admit that IF I looked like Laura Croft, I would never leave home. I would spend too much time in front of the mirror. However, I look like Dave, the guy who geeked when he got DSL. Bender Gending in a video game isn't new. I've played as Sonya on Mortal Kombat and who's her face on what's it called. It's part of the game, not a sick fantasy. Let's not get Freud about being a chick in a game. If you GB in real life, you have issues.((enter the sarcasm)) If you are GBing virtually because you want to know what it's like to be a woman then I must say, you're going about it the right way. Most women spend there whole lives kicking armed people's asses, slaying demons and finding gold that seems to hover in mid air. ((exit sarcasm)) I don't know what's worse...trying to be a woman through a video game or BELIEVING that you can be a woman in a video game. -----OR----- I don't know what's worse...trying to take up space with additional comments or BELIEVING that taking up space with additional comments really serves a purpose.
Umm...i think the researcher fails to take into account the overwhelming majority of men who had to watch their friends play parasite eve.
And what's with final fantasy VII anyway?? i mean that Tifa chick follows you around everyhere
Although, i have to say...when participating in a brisk game of Gran Tourismo 2...i find it much more comfortable and relaxing to play as a woman.
-FluX
-FluX
-------------------------
Your Ad Here!
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"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -David Hume
If I'm going to stare at characters ass for a zillion hours, I much rather it be a woman's than a guys.
Take legacy of Kain. Very similar to tomb raider but instead of getting a woody watching Lara shimy up a rope I get to watch this but ugly vampire thing.
Now what you really need to worry about are that 80% of guys who play guy characters because they rather watch guys asses on-screen
That is AlL!
Ignoring games for a moment, my name is "Chris" and on the phone my voice comes over as female. I am not female. Every so often I get called "Ms" on the phone - this mistake is often accompanied by a particularly condecending tone if the person at the other end is male. I rarely correct the mistake, but the one time I did the change in attitude was so pronounced that I appologised to any women within earshot after I hung up. (On behalf of all men, I'd like to appologise for the Pigs among us)
Back to games, I now just like to screw with people and generally cause chaos whenever I can - but in an intellectual, constructive manner, not a script kiddie way. As such, my favourite gaming character is "Chaos" from Battle Arena Toshinden II. Particularly, my favourite way to select Chaos is to use the random character function and then attempt to pick Chaos by reflex.
http://kimberly-69.secret-playmates.com
its idiots like you who have ruined slashdot. the trolls are cool.
just like the males who post on /. with nicks that imply femininininity.
these sickos must be stopped.
Somebody get our flag back!
... in SuperStreetFighter II Turbo.
Not because of any "gender exploration" bullshit, but 'cos she's fast and there's many special combos...
;-)
I've run into a lot of players that use
;))
:)
female characters in MUDs. This playing has
two aspects - the pure game, where I can
understand the curiosity of trying a female
character like you try different race.
But there's as well social aspect of behaviour
and sometimes in MUDs people attempt to get
much more personal, and if here one attempts
to continue to pretend being a female and
playing along then there's some abnormal
in him in real life as well.
Of course there's a category of players who
just want to embarrass other guys in any possible
ways, and there are even teams of male gamers
from one site that decide to play females all
along to pull someone's leg.
I never played as a female. But I played as a
neuter being which also has some fun because
it offers unique RP abilities. Now,
I am asking myself, am I not queerest?
As for solo RPGs or combat games I can't state
an opinion because I never played one.
Let's stick to strategic games.
-- "If you had fallen into a shit pit during a battle, lick yourself off and move on." - Jaroslav Hasek
This is an interesting conversation the two of you have started. I hope you don't mind if I throw my two cents in :). I'm a guy, and I normally play a female model in fps's. Why? umm...I think they are more aesthetically pleasing, basically. Mainly I play tribes. I think the female model in tribes looks infinitely better in terms of balance and body proportions than the male model (the male model is soo top heavy and has chicken legs!). In the short time I played quake 2, I used the Athena model (female, blonde hair) because I'm blonde, and I always wanted a twin sister :). That and the model looks like Linda Hamilton, and Linda Hamilton kicks ass.
:).
;).
In RPG's I play a male character, because in RPG's I try and play myself. I also use female characters, because I have female friends. The female characters in RPG's I don't play as myself, I play them as my friends. My female friends I think of as fighters I make fighters, the ones I think of as mages I make mages, etc. It's much more fun to have a party of 6 PC's in Baldur's Gate composed of yourself, your girlfriend, and 4 of your close friends to go through the game and eradicate evil
Personally, I try and treat all players the same, because I expect most other female models in fps's to be guys as well, and I'm not going to underestimate them. In role-playing games, I play my character. I normally play a Paladin, so I'm polite and chivalrous to everyone, but that's mainly because that's the way I am. I'm running a clan on a competition ladder for Tribes. I don't let my team taunt, I don't like it. Here at school, I have to treat the girls with respect, because most of them are smarter than I am
Those are just my two cents. Personally, I wish more people at least tried to be polite in games, especially fps's. When I get totally abused by someone, I usually at least tell them "nice shot." Likewise, when I'm winning (which I'm happy to say is usually) I try and be a good sport about it. There's nothing more I hate than poor winners, so I try to be a good one. I wish more people were like that. Ok, I'm done ranting.
-------
CAIMLAS
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
I once came across a website named "Digital Phlargnarph", or something like that. Could this word be related to "gnarphlager", or is there some emergent neurolinguistic attractor that makes certain textures of nonsense words particularly appealing?
i play female models often. Not for "gender exploration", but because i want to. In many console games, the female charecters often have increased speeds, and better "special abilities". If u have ever played Q2 as the "nekkid farie", and u see the words, "hey look at a farie" right before you frag them, its all worth while.
May the source be with you \0perator
anyone here play castlevania64? I use Carrie all the time. though gender exploration has nothing to do with it. I just like beating the holy F*ck out of the prince of darkness with a 12 year old girl. I'm sorry. Did I run over your dogma?
The Spice Girls claim her as a role model.
"stand down Margret stand down please, stand down Margret..."
having always considered myself more interface than plasma, i'm personally flattered at XY-chrom gamers' affinity for my binary sisters. keep it on, space cowboys.
Katsuyo Mori
I think that the rise in compelling female characters in videogames may be related to a similar rise in female action heroes in the mainstream media. Consider the following examples:
;-)
- Sigourney Weaver in Aliens
- Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2
- Sarah Michelle Gellar in Buffy the Vampire Slayer
- Hillary Rodham Clinton in the New York Senatorial Race
Seriously, our culture has become more accepting of strong female characters - even/especially when there is some butt to be kicked. And I haven't even mentioned the prevalence of bad-ass women in cyberpunk novels!
How many women action heroes can you name from the popular media (film, TV, literature, videogames, etc.)?
Also here's a mind trip for all of you, some of the men that said they play as women could actually be women that say they are men that play as women in online games. Makes you think huh?
You have to admit that there are big mysteries to being a woman, at least from a guy's point of view. The opposite isn't nearly as true; "the guy experience" tends to be a small subset of "the girl experience." Consider:
1. In the average deparment store, womens' clothing takes up an entire floor, where mens' clothing is maybe 1/8 of that.
2. Anything a guy wears a woman can wear, but there's a long list of things that are only for women: dresses, skirts, hose, lots of types of shoes, formal wear other than tuxedos, much greater variety of colors and materials, etc.
3. If a female college student suddely took her shirt off in the middle of campus, there would be catcalls and hollering and lots of attention. But if a guy took off his pants then there would be screaming and the police would be called.
4. There are entire stores in every shopping mall devoted to selling things that make women look hot and turn guys on (e.g. Victoria's Secret).
5. A girl who wears a miniskirt or tight top *knows* she's going to be getting stares and be the subject of fantasy. Guys never experience this.
Weird? Yeah. But no wonder guys wonder.
Given how many games don't have female characters to play, women have to play as men. Ever play that old game Castles, where you build your little castle and the Celts come and try to knock it down? It had a setting to play as "Queen" instead of "King," but the graphics were always still of a King and the readme file basically said they couldn't be bothered to create Queen graphics. Not that it mattered beyond the graphics, for that game.
The first game I recall giving me a choice was the Infocom classic Leather Goddesses of Phobos...hardly the epitome of bash-you-over-the-head feminism. But it did let you play as either gender, and the game took shape accordingly (ie you could boink the opposite gender in the unforgettable "lewd" mode). I played as both just to see what amusing differences there were. IIRC, if you played a guy you had an impressive "unit" and if you played a gal, you were blessed in the chest area.
-- Kimberly "couldn't play Arthur Dent as a female, though" Chapman
What a total crock. There is little to no "gender" involved beyond the male in video games in any case. Even the female characters are male-like in behavior/agression (there is a biological difference) and, invariably, built like brick sh*thouses. They are male-derived archetypes of hot female forms that deal with the world in a male-like way. There is no gender-bending at all. No dating issues, no sex, no menstruation, no huggy-kissy female friend interaction. Its all basically men with boobs and perfect female asses. It's men taking advantage of false "fringe benefits" to female characters - some special skill that wasn't given to the artificial male characters. It's men playing female characters to be able to ogle the big breasts and tight asses (and "interesting" poses). There is little true identification with the character (which is very 1-dimensional, be it male or female...basically run shoot, blow up stuff, avoid getting shot or blown up). It's crap like this nonsense that turned me away from the bogus-ness of psychology to the reality and harder REAL science of biology/genetics/sociobiology/ethology. I guess the proper review would be BULLCRAP top to bottom. Junk "science", junk sociology, bullcrap psycho-nonsense.
I, for one, am really glad that this article made /. This is the second WomenGamers.Com article that I have seen posted on SlashDot and I must say that I have learned a great deal from BOTH of them... and so has my wife.. and my daughters (they both hog the computer playing Asheron's Call at night so I can't even log on to /. till I get to work the next day). These women are obviously trying to make a difference in an industry that has 1) COMPLETELY ignored them as a viable market 2)in most cases portrayed them in a degrading manner ( Read Magazine Ads: Failing the Female Market posted here a few weeks ago.) I think that this new article shows some insight as to what kind of experiences *men* are having playing female characters. Are they too getting harassed when playing? What kind of issues do they have to deal with that they wouldn't notice playing a male character? I can't tell you how ticked off I get when I catch some prick harassing my girls cause they play games online and happen to be good players.
Someone moderate this moron down.
-David T. C.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
I couldn't manage to email this to the author of the survey, so here ya go. Enjoy! :-)
=
;-)
:-)
:-) I have only rarely
===============================================
Gender-Bending in Games: Survey
Interview on Males Playing Female Characters in Games
Many males play female characters in games, whether they choose the
female character in Quake3, or Lara Croft of Tomb Raider, or a female
archer in an RPG, or they check out Ivy's moves in Soul Caliber. The
reasons for this are varied, such as gameplay advantage, visual
stimulation, or social reasons, to name a few. I am after your
reasons-- why do you choose to play as female characters? Be as
detailed as you'd like, and as frank as you'd like. I left the
interview pretty open-ended in order to get at your own unique
experiences. Some of the questions might not apply to you, or might
get redundant, just indicate it when that happens.
1.) Your name/handle that you wish to appear in the article (can be
anonymous). Of course, not everyone will be quoted in the final piece:
>>Weasel Boy
2.) Age:
>>31
3.) In what game genre(s) do you typically play female characters?
Please list all genres, all platforms.
>>Online FRPGs and MUDs
4.) Approximately how often do you play female characters, in terms of
your overall playing time?
>>75%
5.) Why do you play female characters? Please be thorough.
If you play female characters in different genres, for example in
FPS's and RPG's, please explain the reasons why you play females in
each genre.
>>Originally, it was to experiment with discovering how females are
>>treated by society and how to deal with problems men don't usually
>>face. What a learning experience!
>>I tend to alternate playing male and female characters in these
>>MUDs/RPGs; however, I find myself increasingly playing the female
>>characters because it encourages me to develop areas of my
>>personality that aren't ordinarily exercised. Plus, my female
>>characters are just more interesting. The males are all insensitive
>>jerks.
6.) When you play a female character, do you tend to put yourself into
the role of the female character, and see yourself as that character,
or do you just use that character as a pawn in the game?
>>The character has no existence other than what I give her, so I owe
>>it to her to do a good job of it.
7.) When/if you play female characters in online games, do you try and
"pass" as female? For example, do you use a female-sounding handle,
gender-neutral handle, or a male-sounding handle? Do you pretend to
actually BE female when you interact with other players during/after
the game? Why or why not? Again, please be specific as to what game
genre(s) you play when you give your answer.
>>I try to make it so nobody ever asks. The truth of the matter is,
>>of course, that I am probably so bad at it that nobody is ever
>>fooled. I always admit being male if asked.
8.) Tell me a bit about your experiences when you do play as female,
in terms of how other players respond to you. For example, do you tend
to be treated better or worse than when you play as a male character,
and do you notice a difference between genres? For example, when you
play a female in FPS's are you treated differently than when you play
a female in RPG's?
>>Nobody ever flirts with my male characters.
>>had to deal with lewd conduct when playing a female character.
>>One of the neat aspects of playing a female character is
>>participating in "girl talk". I'm sure it helps that I'm not just
>>another 14-year-old twerp.
9.) If part of your reason for playing female characters is gender
experimentation, or exploring what "masculinity" and "femininity" mean
to you, can you share some of the things you have learned?
>>Females do experience some unpleasant sexual aggression that men
>>don't usually think about. It's quite bizzarre to put myself into
>>that situation and actually feel the stress that my character feels.
>>I can always log out, but I feel as though my integrity requires me
>>to overcome the problem in-character. Fortunately, it's only
>>happened a couple of times.
>>In the same vein, this experience has led me to always look for
>>hidden overtones when dealing with people of the opposite gender who
>>I don't know well.
>>It is my experience that female players and, to a lesser degree, men
>>playing female characters, tend to be more involved in the social
>>aspects of the game and less in the action and game mechanics. Most
>>of the hard-core gamers who only care about running up their stats
>>are male players behind male characters. Female characters who are
>>interested in their stats are often played by males. This is one of
>>my weaknesses.
10.) Do others tease you, insult you, etc. for playing as a female character?
>>No. On the other hand, I don't go out of my way to mention it to
>>people who are not RPGers.
11.) Are there any drawbacks to playing as a female character?
>>Not that I haven't already mentioned.
12.) Some people seem to believe that there's a link between playing
as a female and being homosexual, or being confused about your sexual
identity. Do you agree with this?
>>Absolutely not. That's complete rubbish.
13.) Do you believe that you can tell what gender someone "really" is
online (i.e. you can tell when males are trying to pass as females and
vice versa)?
>>I'm pretty good at spotting males in drag, less so females.
>>I don't usually try. It's only respectful and courteous to treat
>>the other players totally in-character.
14.) In your estimation, what percentage of people playing online
games as female characters is ACTUALLY female, if you had to guess?
What makes you come to this conclusion?
>>In the games I play, 25% to 35%. This is based partly on a sample
>>of players whose gender I do know, and partly based on intuition.
>>:-)
15.) What effects do you think males playing as female characters are
having on the overall gaming scene, if any?
>>It helps add variety and make the environment more realistic. Under
>>the right circumstances it can both foster tolerance and
>>understanding, and make the game more welcoming to female players.
>>Under the wrong circumstances, it can foster misogyny and
>>disrespect.
16.) If you have anything to add to the discussion that I haven't
asked about, here's your chance to fill me in:
OK Here's my 5 c worth. I sopmetime play female characters for a laugh because it is hell funny when you beat one of yer mates when you play a female character. But all in all they aren't female in nature apart from obvious physical differences(breasts etc). But no game character is really the true reflection of gender since gender isn't really the true aspect of games(maybe for political reasons only gender is important) but physical representation is what is the only difference. The true nature of gender is never a feature of gamin.
You know/knew lots of people at tech? Techers are...unique. :) (and I'm being nice when I say that). but seriously...
:) In hs I was the only kid who wore only plain black clothes and a black trench coat. Here at tech there are...lots of them. But at least here there isn't pressure to fit any sort of mold. My ex visited me a few weeks ago. (she wasn't my ex then). She said how much she liked tech because her college (a state school in NY) was a place where everyone acted just like they did in hs. She was happy people were mature (for the most part) here at tech. We just have other problems like being socially-maladjusted pencil-neck geeks with monitor tans :).
:). That and tech seems to have drained my vocabulary and eloquence...doh...
I understand everyone being forced to fit the same mold. The guy in the room next to me just had his gf visit. She talked about how at her college (a state school with a couple thousand people) she would walk into class and be the heaviest girl in the room. This is coming from a 5'1", 110 pound waif. It's disgusting. She agreed it's disgusting. The health center at that school said that, unofficially, probalby 7 out of 10 girls had eating disorders.
I can relate a similar experience to yours at a concert. I went to the SnowCore tour, the only bands of note being Blink 182 and Primus. It was very very funny to see the hordes of bleached hair sweater vest yuppies and their make-up laden girlfriends moshing to Blink 182. Everyone looked the same. Then Primus came on. The sweater vests mysteriously vanished, and were replaced by a crowd that, albeit dressed in the same fashion as each other, were not cookie-cutter replicas of each other.
To answer your question about what I would do if a balanced model was presented for an fps, I would probably take it. I can see models being done on the form of track stars (for the female model at least), since track stars never seem to have those insane proportions we see everywhere on tv and in movies. For guys? If I could get a model that looked like the picture of me on my webpage in my trench coat, I would be all over that. Too bad they don't model short white guys who aren't rippling with muscles.
It is disturbing how uniform everyone is becoming. Yes, this is partly because the media and pop culture are continuously bombarding us with images of gorgeous, athletic, funny people with great hair and great clothes, and everyone jumps up and says "ooh! ooh! I want in! I want to be popular!" I'm sorry I haven't been able to catch Freaks and Geeks on whatever network station, because they atleast had normal looking actors on their show, not like Dawson's Creek or Buffy. People are insecure, they want to belong to something bigger than themselves so they can feel more secure in knowing there are others like them. Yes, I'm generalizing horribly here but I'm tired and I don't want to do my phys set
In Baldurs Gate I played druid w. a Female skin and a male voice. Just seemed suitable for a druid somehow. :)
We use GNU/SunOS.
Yeah, more than likely from time to time ... been a while though. But why ask any way, is anyone going to lose sleep over it? Is it a sign of a social/sexual upheaval/shift - I think not. Gender has very little role (in the instances that there are Male/Female characters) in this kinda stuff. Cam
Well, the sig and the name are both from Monty Pyton and the Holy Grail but the idea of antiKwsNI comes from Scot Adams and Dilbert. Scot Adams took flak for making Tina too feminine so he brought in Antina for a while to be an anti-feminine character.
kwsNI
I think this is all down to the novelty factor. It would be interesting to find out the number of female playable characters in games as compared to male playable characters. I'd wager that it's be about a 10-90 split. So, when presented with the option to play as a female character people choose it as it is a fairly novel concept, 'cept for things like Urban Chaos, and the whole Tomb Raider series.. This could also explain why newsagents always keep the computer magazines right next to all the adult mags. They obviously think us Nerds don't know what a real woman looks like! Well, I do. I saw one once...... Robmonster
I have no sig yet I must scream.