Guild Wars 2

I read somewhere the reason why alot of guys make female characters, is that

“If I’m gonna be looking at my char’s behind all day, it’d better be a nice behind”

or something to that effect. :P

It allows me to live out my deepest fantasies. Beware, gentlemen!

I’m not a guy, so I can’t say from a male perspective…

But I was always under the impression that for hardcore gamers, it was all about the fantasy. They can fantasize about this “sexy” female character that they’ve created as an ideal.

I’ve decided that if I was to ever get struck by an epidemic, it would have to be the Human Female Epidemic. I wonder if it’s fatal?

I am a guy who rolled up a female Asura. Man, those sexy, sexy ears!

Ehem; There’s a lot of the use of the word “Gay” as an insult and offensive term in this thread and every time you do that you’re not insulting the person or thing your talking about, you’re insulting gay people. It is exactly the same thing if you were to go around using the word, “black”, “jew”, “asain”, “chick” etc. as an insult. Let’s try to be grown ups and avoid doing this; thank you.

For me, gaming is escapism and the ability to enact something which I cannot do in real life.

As someone who has no gender identity r/l, gaming is my method of playing a feminine role.

Hey, I’m honest!

Here we go again. What…this is the 3rd of 4th thread by someone lamenting the fact that guys play female toons. Its just game. Lighten up.

3 guys / 5 gals here.

For those of you who were complaining about lack of manly faces for male humans, I have contracted my wife — who, I have on good authority, likes roosters a lot — to construct me The Manliest Man that can be made in Guild Wars 2. She has been giggling for 20 minutes now.

Being a student of history, she wanted to name him Marcus Manlius, but it was reserved. And Gaius Manlius was in use. The GW1 community rocked, apparently. In the end, we went against history and named him Manlius Manlius, which is at least twice as manly as those other Manlii.

Menfolk! Cover your eyes, lest you be smitten with confusing feelings! I give you your new emperor of masculinity:

Athenodorus.2583:

For those of you who were complaining about lack of manly faces for male humans, I have contracted my wife — who, I have on good authority, likes roosters a lot — to construct me The Manliest Man that can be made in Guild Wars 2. She has been giggling for 20 minutes now.

Being a student of history, she wanted to name him Marcus Manlius, but it was reserved. And Gaius Manlius was in use. The GW1 community rocked, apparently. In the end, we went against history and named him Manlius Manlius, which is at least twice as manly as those other Manlii.

Menfolk! Cover your eyes, lest you be smitten with confusing feelings! I give you your new emperor of masculinity:

Begone…Oh ye of the sense of humor…this is a place for serious discussion (unfortunately)

Raf.1078:

Begone…Oh ye of the sense of humor…this is a place for serious discussion (unfortunately)

I for one applaud his humor. I can’t possibly take this particular topic seriously. I once did when I was a very very new gamer, but in the end, it doesn’t matter one bit if you play a male or female character.

On topic:

I got a disease… and the only cure is… more Female Human.

Have you seen the male human options? I already have one male human with the best options that doesn’t make him look like he belongs in a boy band or something. The male human faces are horrible in my opinion. I do not like the teenage, twilight look or young clean cut jock look. I have the one gruff/rugged face in use already, so I’m obviously not going to pick it again.

I also don’t relate to my character or put any part of me into a character. I make characters/concepts based on fiction like one does in a novel or story. I used to write a bit, so it comes naturally and I always make up character concepts, even when I’m not roleplaying them/ I don’t roleplay anymore. I never “pretend” I’m a female, nor do I have a hidden desire to be one.

I also enjoy femme fatale type of concepts in general, so I’d naturally make one or two of them in any game. I’m sure it’s a subconscious fantasy of that type of woman, but I’m not actually making them for that particular reason in game, nor do I stare at my characters “assessts”. I design and make all races/types/genders/characters though, and I never limit myself to anything or one type, unless I can’t stand something due to personal taste or animations/etc.

I’ve often wondered why there are so many female characters in a game with a high male RL population as well. Currently, my main is a female toon, but that’s because I designed the character to be based off Lightning from Final Fantasy XIII.

I tend to just make up a character concept and go with it. I don’t think I ever set out with a “dang, I need to make a female character” or anything like that. In most games, I stick with a Male avatar, and even now, all my alts are male.

Another reason why I picked female human for Guild Wars was because it was one of the avatars with the greatest customization choices. I love Sylvari and Asura but could never play one because their options are so limited and I hate running into clones of my character. I have yet to run into many toons than resemble my human female.

I’m a guy that mainly plays a female Norn. Why, you ask? Because I dislike male Norns looks, as simple as that.

Really?

Is this an issue at all?

As a female I really dont care if males/transexual/gay men or women play female characters let alone female humans.

This is a game

This is fantasy

Enjoy yourselves without hurting others is always my motto and I fail to see how this would hurt anyone or be an issue:)

Happy gaming

Athenodorus.2583:

For those of you who were complaining about lack of manly faces for male humans, I have contracted my wife — who, I have on good authority, likes roosters a lot — to construct me The Manliest Man that can be made in Guild Wars 2. She has been giggling for 20 minutes now.

Being a student of history, she wanted to name him Marcus Manlius, but it was reserved. And Gaius Manlius was in use. The GW1 community rocked, apparently. In the end, we went against history and named him Manlius Manlius, which is at least twice as manly as those other Manlii.

Menfolk! Cover your eyes, lest you be smitten with confusing feelings! I give you your new emperor of masculinity:

My GOD! I sprouted chest hair just looking at that picture of manliness!

They look best. /shrug

wumpusrat.4769:

In WoW at one point I tried to counter all the “elven mailbox dancing” by making a really ugly-looking burly little dwarf guy and having him dance around in his skivvies in the same area, trying to chat up any of the guys who seemed to approve of the naked elf-girls.

/snicker

I approve of this

It would be an interesting social experiment to see if gender/race/profession (profession, because of the differences in armor type, and how they portray different attributes such as femininity, masculinity, strength or weakness) had any effect on how often a player was helped, rezzed or given more leeway in a dungeon.

I would suspect on some level people aren’t even aware, that it does.

I might be the odd one out of the bunch, and while I do have two female characters, I’ve always wanted an MMO that allowed me to make a character that resembled how I look in person. I look like young, mid to late teens and a very youthful face. This game ninja’ed the look for human men. Even has some nice hairstyles to match.

Now yes, I do enjoy having the big noble “hero” cliche look, but I also want to be able to make an old geezer and a youth fresh out of training. No 18 year old ever looked like they were 30, so why do I never get the option to play what I want? I usually wind up having more females than males because my limit of having a “manly” character is like, one. It’s because so many other games I play have the “man’s man” hero that I’m turned off of them in MMOs.

I loved the default male Shepard in the Mass Effect games, liked Snake from the Metal Gear, even enjoyed Halo 1.

I think you know now what I chose lol

This was the first time I have ever made female character in all the MMOs I have played. Both are to honor my wife and step-daughter. Since I did my best to make them look like them. (didn’t quite make it but oh well.)

in addition the female Norn ranger I made. the animation that goes with the sword and horn make more sense to a female character then a male using the same wepaons

I’m female irl and a proud Norn Warrior lady in GW2. =) Humans are overrated. Anyway, I’ve never had male character in MMOs. And just because I prefer female chars that does not mean I’m lesbian, so I don’t understand guys’ drama about looking at male butts or whatever, lol. I guess I just love being a woman in real life and in games.

If I could delve into the dark recesses of my mind to discover why I prefer to play male characters I’m afraid that I might uncover some dark cosmic Cthulu-esque secret and render myself permanently and irrevocably insane. It’s better to just accept that I don’t enjoy playing female characters as I don’t connect to them as much as I do a male character. Maybe I see my characters as an extension of myself, maybe I just don’t like 12 year old kids trying to chat me up because they think I’m a real gurl, or maybe I am a Human Thief of Divinitys Reach playing an Electronics Technician in remote Australia doing mundane quests for a large organisation with little reward.. kitten . now I’m confused.

Do you become your character or do you move the chess piece?

This is it in a nutshell.

People who play 1rst person just don’t get that a lot of us play in 3rd person.

I like my gal toons. But they ain’t me. They are cartoons in a video game.

My human female is a mesmer. Mesmer to me just seems a bit more of a feminine class even though I’m sure others might have a different opinion….to each their own. I do have male toons too just in case it matters.

I don’t get the point of this thread. Some people like to play human females, some don’t. What do you want exactly?

I find it funny how some men tend to get annoyed and not want to play them if they think the male characters are too beautiful/youthful/“hot” — ha! Now you know how the ladies feel when they make a character in many games! :P I kid, I kid ~ I am only teasing, so please do not take this to heart. ^^

That silliness aside, as someone who plays both genders in equal number, I have no problem with people playing whatever gender they want! And y’know, it has occurred to me that if everyone strictly stuck with playing their own gender, it would be weird. Sure, a lot of women play GW2, but I don’t think the m/f ratio is 50/50. And it would be rather jarring to run around in a game world with way more male characters than females!

I think it’s funny that this thread has gone on this long.
Nayru said it as well as a few others…
Basically.. “BECAUSE”… What more reason do you need?
Why do people pick X with Y and Z?… Because they do…
Unless the OP is doing some Thesis for a Psychology Masters degree or something there really isn’t any need to defend/explain/antagonize about what model/race/gender you like to play in an MMORPG (or other game for that matter… Lara Croft games you only play the Human Female, right? Silent Hill or Resident Evil you play one or the other (or both) genders…

I saw this thread when it was just one page long and thought that was enough, but 7 pages later?.. Sorry to go off topic (or maybe I’m dead ON topic), but it seems like the OP has enough “research” to go on now.

Although, people DO get curious about train wrecks, so by all means play on.. = )P

Personally, I just like to have some female and some male. The artwork for GW and now GW2 lends itself more, in my eyes, to female characters. I have a male Human Engineer, though and a Male Charr, so what does that say? I originally had a female Necro in GW1 as a main but then I also had a Male Warrior.. and then a Female Dervish…

But back to my point.. it really doesn’t matter… “Variety is the spice of life” so go on out there and live how you want.

Heh, reading this thread makes me wonder how some of you deal with reading a book where the main char is female…

Ive a human male warrior, male asura engineer, female norn guardian, female norn mesmar, female humna elementalist.

Im sure someones gonna say I race and gender confused now right?

BTW female norns are hot!

I have always played female characters in mmo’s. I like the feminine touch to burying an axe into some poor fools head. The thing that disappointed me the most about GW2 character generation is that I could not make a fat female character. I could not make her look battle scarred. I could not make her ugly. It was quite a challenge to get her looking the way she does and people say my norn is ugly, but it is not close enough for me. I want more battle scarred, uglier and fatter.

The epidemic in my eyes is not the human / norn females everywhere, but the lack of body types and the over the top baby doll looks of them all. Bring in the battle scars and the ugly!

I play female characters both here and in WoW because 1) male models are never very appealing to me (maybe because I’m a dude? maybe because they’re just poorly drawn?) and 2) because they’re just easier to look at for hours on end.

That, and I’m comfortable in my masculinity. So what does it matter?

I have characters of both sexes.

I play chars of both genders, with more females because I can relate better but have only 1 human female. I choose always a dignified way of portraying my characters, so I never dress em up in silly clothes but go for practical. In the end it doesn’t matter to me as long as they look kitten

Male IRL, 3 females, 2 males so far.

Norn female ranger – Played Amazon in Diablo 2, so ranger characters being female just stuck that way since Diablo 2.

Human female necro – Made a GW1 variant of Schala Zeal from Chrono Trigger (dark magic) but had to go with a translated version of ‘Zeal’ for last name. When GW2 came out, I told myself I wouldn’t use character names from other games, but tried to name GW2 Necro Schala Zeal, so ofc made it female, but name was taken so borrowed my GW1 rit’s name instead.

Sylvari female ele – Male sylvari looked weird to me.

Male Charr engineer – I wanted to play a wild cat, not a house cat. Yes, the female Charr look kinda docile.

Male Asura guardian – Dunno why I chose male over female here really.

Whew, from the title I thought perhaps a plague was infecting all the human female characters. Good to know that is not the case.

Wow, this thread lasted a lot longer than I thought it would. I guess I’ll toss in my two cents as well.

I don’t think it matters much what gender someone chooses to play, and there are any number of reasons for designing a character to look a particular way. Some people who will only play one gender because they find it to be more comfortable, or simply prefer being called a ‘he’ or a ‘she’. Not all of these people are necessarily trying to role-play or become their character (though some do); it’s often more a matter of “this is familiar” or “this suits me”. Other people have a specific design in mind for their character (this necro should look scary, this mesmer should look haughty, this warrior should look tough and battle-worn, etc.) and choose whatever gender has the options that best allow them to match the character to their original design concept. Others design characters that they hope will be perceived in a particular way (a comical character to make people laugh for instance), and still others go in without any design concept at all and just run with whatever looks best from their point of view at the character creation screen. Then there are people who leave their character decisions completely up to the random number generator – and the list goes on. There really is no wrong reason for picking a certain gender, so long as you have fun playing the game.

Raf.1078:

Do you become your character or do you move the chess piece?

This is it in a nutshell.

People who play 1rst person just don’t get that a lot of us play in 3rd person.

I like my gal toons. But they ain’t me. They are cartoons in a video game.

This is the concise nugget of insight the thread should have ended on. But instead it will inexplicably stagger on until it falls down from exhaustion.

I have never understood this question.

It is a video game, you can play whatever you want and none of them are real.

Raf.1078:

Do you become your character or do you move the chess piece?

This is it in a nutshell.

People who play 1rst person just don’t get that a lot of us play in 3rd person.

I like my gal toons. But they ain’t me. They are cartoons in a video game.

ahh perhaps this explains the question, cause for me the toons are not me…. they are what i want you to see as i kill your toon in pvp.

and thats about it

“Overwhelming majority”, my Charr’s hairy fanny! :P

As a female player, all but one of my characters are female and the lone male is a Charr, I chose his gender because it suits the name I picked out for him. Many of my male guildmates choose female humans because they (by their own admission) like to ogle the pretty girls, but my attention is focused on the environment around me, not my character.

OP, your post assumes that the players you see in female human skins are male. I’m learning that this game has a large population of female players. Who’s to say that many of them aren’t women? It may sound odd, but I’ve tried rolling a male player and it just feels strange to me to play a male character so I tend to roll female. My daughter makes fun of me because she says, “Mom, its just pixels” I know that… I have no problem with other women making male characters, it just doesn’t feel quite right for me. shrug

I do use male characters on a lot of games. In fact, the only games I play female characters on so far are this and WoW. I play a female character on WoW because I play a Draenei for the racials and male Draenei are…well, stupid-looking, as are human males (too square all over). If I played, say, an Orc, I’d play a male because they just look a lot better than female Orcs.

As far as this game goes, I simply find the female Human animations to be more fluid for Guardians (I don’t know if different professions have different animations, heh). I’ve actually never known anyone to straight up ask me why I play female toons. I know a lot of other male players that use female characters and I’ve never thought to ask why. Does it matter?

My personal reasons are strictly aesthetic though. Female models just look nicer, I guess. Male models and voice acting are just never that pleasant for me to look at and listen to for hours on end.

For reference, I play male characters almost exclusively for games like KotOR, Elder Scrolls, Runescape (laugh it up), and whatever else you can think of. With that in mind, I think it really is the “what’s easier to look at for a long time” thing that draws me to female characters for MMOs. You spend a lot more time (typically) looking at your characters in MMOs than you do in console-based games and coffee break-sized browser games.

some people have too much time on their hands to think about the how and why…. Some play Char, some Norn, some Human, some male, some female.. who really cares?