Even in single player RPGs the characters I created were male, and in all types of games the mini-Reds have rather unhelpfully pointed out to me how much those characters actually looked like me.
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| Okay, he's in the ballpark, if I were abput 30 years younger and my hair were a bit more bleached. |
It was only when I created Nevelanthana back in 2010 that I decided to consciously create a female toon. It's kind of surprising that a lot of my toons these days are female --especially given that I do have pretty much an equal mix between the sexes-- and I really don't play them differently either.
I discovered pretty quickly that people did treat female toons differently as opposed to male toons. Even though I know I don't say anything in raid or group chat anything other than I as a person would, you'd be surprised the number of times I've spoken up in voice chat only to have someone whisper me "OMG you're a GUY!" There must be something about me and how I act toward people that triggers that response, but hell if I know exactly what it is.
Still, yes, I've been on the receiving end of some interesting commentary regarding my female toons, and so in the (dubious) honor of that, here's a few memes of what it's like to play a female toon:
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| As the old saying goes, GIRL = Guy In Real Life. From PvPBoost.com. |
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| This is... a thing, unfortunately. From Amanda Webb. |
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| Okay, it's one of those you'll have to open up to see the whole thing. But yeah, I've received some "special favors" because... I guess people think I'm a woman or something. From pinterest. |
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| Indeed. I've been propositioned just because I happen to be parked by my usual spot in Stormwind or Thunder Bluff, or in Isle of Conquest or Alterac Valley, or... Well, you get the idea. From Pinterest. |
It is a really interesting topic, gendered character play in MMORPGs. I've always played a mix of genders although in later years I mostly play females for reasons that are unclear even to me, although I think the prevalence of voice acting has something to do with it. It's probably no coincidence that I also mostly listen to music with female or female-sounding singers.
ReplyDeleteIn all that time, I've hardly ever had anyone hit on any of my characters, give them stuff, flirt with them or any of the other things that supposedly happen all the time. All of those things certainly has happened but very rarely. Mostly my characters get equally ignored regardless of gender.
Back when I grouped regularly I did occasionally feel the need to make it clear when joining a party with people I didn't know that I was a male playing a female, just to avoid any awkwardness back when people were a lot more sensitive about that kind of thing than they are now. Usually no-one really seemed to care. Very early on, around 2001, I did lose an in-game friend in EQ when he discovered, after we'd been hanging out for a few weeks, that I wasn't the same gender as my character. He didn't specifically say anything but he was clearly uncomfortable about it and after a couple more meetings I never saw or heard from him again. I think in nearly 25 years that remains the only significant issue I can recall that arose directly out of a clash between in-game and real-life gender.
I'm still not exactly sure why my mains are all female either, although I think the switchover happened when I started using a female Night Elf Rogue in WoW's Mists expansion. After that, I mained a female Nightblade in Elder Scrolls Online, and then when I switched to WoW Classic my main leveling toons were female as well.
DeleteI mean, I still have male toons out there, most recently a Troll Mage in WoW's Season of Discovery, but the females get the most game time.
I do believe that I've seen less and less harassment playing as a female toon over the past couple of years, although the longer I play on an RP server with the RP third party apps turned on, that might change. The worst came about in early-mid 2010s on Retail WoW (and occasionally on ESO), but I still got some shenanigans thrown my way after the release of WoW Classic.
It's kind of funny, since I know the well worn meme of Night Elves dancing in various stages of undress on the Stormwind fountain for tips, and I even created a toon specifically to test that urban legend out, but I've chickened out each time I figured I'd go ahead and actually do it. So yeah, even when nobody would know it's me up there fooling around as it were, I still can't do it. Too embarrassed.
I originally played all of my CRPGs as a male characters, except for games such as Kotor 1 & 2 where I wanted to see the female romance options during a subsequent playthrough. Basically, I was trying to play as some form of 'me'.
ReplyDeleteMy first Wow character was a male paladin, but when I went to make a second character I decided to try a female character to see if people really did react to me differently. One or two did -- usually being more polite -- but for the most part I received the same reactions as before. However, for me, it started to feel like I was playing with someone, not as someone.
Part of that I think was that I was missing playing games with my late wife. We used to play the same single player games together and talk about what each of us did and how we approached things. (Think pre- to early-UO days.) Since then my characters have been female unless I wanted to see the male side of things (*cough*Swtor romances*cough*).
Another part is the realization that character creation systems seldom allow me to create a male character that would feel like my avatar. Not only in body shapes, but also age. Too many overly muscular male figures that were in the prime of life for me to relate to. If I couldn't immerse myself in those characters, playing 'alongside' a female character wasn't much of a stretch either.
So I'm a bit weird ^_^, but that's ok. I'm having fun.
I can agree with the "with someone" as opposed to "as someone" comment. In a very real sense, I've been able to slip into "RPG mode" more easily in an MMO than in a video game version of an RPG --Baldur's Gate series included-- because the latter feel more like a story I'm watching whereas an MMO has more freedom to just basically screw around as you wish.
DeleteAlas that my wife isn't interested in RPGs (video game or pencil and paper), and prefers to play some board games and Mario Kart. I blame her lack of interest on one of her exes, who when she was interested in playing he brought her into his campaign, only to try to force her to play "his way" rather than letting her explore the possibilities more freely.
I have created "older" characters in some games, but SWTOR was the only one that actually let me put gray hair on and look a bit more aged than just a 20-ish young and fit variety.