Playing Your Own Gender

[Calindor]

Originally Posted by Celestin

I'm just going to throw this thought out.

While there is a clearly defined and generally agreed upon "ideal female form" ( you gotta be slimmer around the waist then around your bewbs and waist, roughly this tall, and have legs this long in proportion to the body ) no such standard holds for men. Some people like their men built like the Governator. Others prefer somewhat skinnier dudes, like pop stars. And some prefer an inbetween, not bulky, but still cut and not skinny.

So maybe because whereas their is a consensus out on the ideal female form that game makers can adapt, no such consensus exists for males. Therefore game makers are kind of left in the dark which leads them to design characters that are either unappealing ( WoW ) and even if they are appealing, appealing to only a portion of the player base.

A university study on daily planet determined that women prefer men with baby like features, skinny guys, pop stars etc 90% of the time, the only time they really prefer the governator style is when they are starting their menstrual cycle.

[Heinel]

Originally Posted by Calindor

A university study on daily planet determined that women prefer men with baby like features, skinny guys, pop stars etc 90% of the time, the only time they really prefer the governator style is when they are starting their menstrual cycle.

I remember watching that >.>

I also remember they said the study was inconclusive and further investigations have to be done for dependable results.

Not to mention there was another study about how baby-like features trigger primal responses, and that one is regardless of gender.

[Eyrie]

There's one and true formulae to create the perfect male form.

Presenting it to you.. Don't be afraid, you will find it most pleasing for your eye.

[LaSirene]

Originally Posted by Eyrie

There's one and true formulae to create the perfect male form.

Presenting it to you.. Don't be afraid, you will find it most pleasing for your eye.

I am both horrified and intrigued....

I think people should play what they want but I could never play a man myself. My character is an extension of me. And I'm a girl, so it'd feel like cross dressing.... Plus I like being the cute and/or sexy little (insert class here).

[Vanna Kjyshy]

What's wrong with cross-dressing?

Anyway, I'm still waiting for a smileyface game where we are all genderless, can only laugh, smile and sing song - thus being in the same boat.

[LaSirene]

I cross dressed cos'd Vincent Valentine. So I've gone to the lowest of the low. But DAMN was I a hot gothic gunman.

[ProphetX]

I'm a guy, and thus I play a guy.

[Lyneth]

actually my mains are always female and alts mostly male. Dun ask why...i have no clue

[Tareith]

Originally Posted by Lyneth

actually my mains are always female and alts mostly male. Dun ask why...i have no clue

Cause when girls go shopping, guys are there to carry all the stuff. Male storage characters ftw! ^.^

[Mattguy]

i only play male characters and i only create one character. i try to make it look somewhat similar to me. i just dont see the reason to get a character to max level and work all of those hours just to start over.

[Eyrie]

"I am a guy, because I'm one."

"I play a girl, because I am one."

"I make the character I play to represent -me- from the real world in the game."

"I'm a guy, but prefer playing girls because of the looks over guys."

"I'm a girl who plays guys to not get harrassed by people."

"I play which ever gender I feel like at the time, having class [x] as a factor on choosing it."

Personally all of these reasons are quite redundant in the end and quite weird. Especially having RL gender a reason of choosing your characters gender.
Have any of you thought of a proper role background for your characters and gone with that what kind of character it'd become along it? Men or women in a fantasy setting can become anything we want in the lines of the classes given to us. Their stories, strenghts, perks and talents even professions, special charasteristics and all. Everything is out in the open for to be chosen, to actually create a new character out of ones own imagination, always saw this as the sole reason to even have customized character creation in the first place.
I just feel that it takes something of the whole game when you take out such choices you can have just because of seemingly stereotypical visions, but I guess that's just me.

And giving the topic how I choose my gender now.. I choose it by.. Not or playing my own gender depending on my situation.. Although there's a one in a million chance that I might be a RL hermaphrodite (There would be no proof on the internets against this hypothesis either.) and wouldn't be able to choose my own gender in the game, wouldn't that be quite troublesome?

[Kaldur]

That's beautiful, the problem is that most often than not, people use genders to take advantage of others. It's unavoidable, but I know where some people's beefs come from.

[Lady Odessa]

Everyone should play what they want to play as long as they don't try to bring rl into it thats when things can get mess for them and for the one they are flirting with :P

[Kaldur]

Heh, it's unavoidable, most of the time, when people get involved with another in-game it's a russian roulette game from there on. You'll have to bet that your partner is the gender you were hoping for in RL.

[Eyrie]

Originally Posted by Katrina

Everyone should play what they want to play as long as they don't try to bring rl into it

Quite the point I tried to bring out. And forgot to meantion that making the 'stereotypical' character types wouldn't be bad at all if that's what you see your character as. Just doing what would be the most fitting for oneself but at the same time trying to be as open for the free choices at hand.

As for those who exploit people. You can quite easyly notice who's manipulative and who's not. Those who are clever enough to hide their trueselves and play along til the final betrayal are dangerous and all but I believe that is a fact of life in general. The person you meet on the streets could be a murderer for all you know. Only thing you can't do(Unless you are -really- good in it I suppose.), would be hiding ones own gender in the street encounter.

But on the interwebs there are no genders so everyone's on equal ground here.