Today we'll be going into the eternal mystery, why do guys play as girl characters? Males tend to play female avatars for a Varity of reasons, so let's go ov...
  • Ho_Chi_Chungus [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
    57·
    10 months ago

    men play as women in video games, but i am a man and i do not play women in video games (if given the option)

    the only conclusion i can draw from this is that i am a woman

  • aaro [they/them, she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
    38·
    10 months ago

    there’s simply no shot that a sizeable percentage of men who play girl characters aren’t eggs shrug-outta-hecks

    very surprised to see the video not even mention this possibility

    • chatokun@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      33·
      10 months ago

      What if we find gender fluidity interesting, but lack body dysmorphia(well, regarding sex anyway. I don’t like my body, but that’s because I could stand to loose some weight). I also grew up a bit on Ranma 1/2. I don’t have a particular body I want to be in, but I think swapping on desire would be cool. There’s no trauma or hardship in my feelings, just general interest.

      • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
        26·
        10 months ago

        How long have you been exploring this?

        This is the kind of thing I’ve seen people in their first years exploring gender say, only to then later on come back and be like “yeah lol lmao” at their earlier thoughts when things change for them later on.

        This will probably come across as condescending but it’s not and I sincerely wish you all the best. It’s just difficult to guess this information through the internet you know.

        • kristina [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
          30·
          10 months ago

          yeah i kinda loathe the idea of the ‘prime directive of transness’ that some people espouse. nah im for trans colonialism of every cishet mind. jokes aside, i think a lot of people are afraid of pressuring someone, when really all youre doing is stating similar experiences to avoid thought termination. i kinda wish i had someone grab me by the collar and trans my gender forcefully inform me of trans shit in a detailed way when i was younger, would have saved so much heartache and wasted time.

          • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
            22·
            10 months ago

            I think the problem is that it always comes across as if you’re speaking down to someone like they’re a child. It’s a very much a “you’re at an early stage” thing and inevitably because you’re talking about a passage of time experience it ALWAYS comes across as “you just need time to mature”. The roles are always sort of someone more-developed vs someone less-developed, and for the person being placed in the less-developed role essentially against their will (they didn’t choose to have a teacher/student conversation) of the interaction this feels like condescension.

            So I have to hedge like crazy while doing this to try and get it across that I am saying this because I genuinely truly care and want to help. It’s quite plausible that it might not be that, but it’s also going to be better for them to explore faster, sooner, rather than slower and feeling dumb about earlier-self later like literally everyone has had that shared experience.

            There has to be a better way to go about this for more positive outcomes.

            • kristina [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
              21·
              10 months ago

              yeah thats true, i find it more helpful to just describe my experience in detail, theres been a lot of people that came to me and talked about stuff but just ended up being cis guys that like cock and crossdressing. they felt like they didnt fit in the masculinity box and felt weird because of it, but really they just wanted to redefine what masculinity was in their head, and the real masculinity is not giving a fuck about what other men think and being a sigma chad into the maid girl outfit grindset

              ok i really need to stop making really shit jokes in this thread. if you wanna amplify your experience of my posts, please imagine noam chomsky saying what im saying

            • Dessa [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
              2·
              10 months ago

              Sometimes, knowing earlier just ramps up angst earlier. One situation that comes to mind is the teenager with no means to safely pursue a transition. Once an egg cracks, if you can’t act on it, it’s agonizing

        • Findom_DeLuise [she/her, they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
          24·
          10 months ago

          One minute, you’re giggling at one of those sissy hypno videos because the “subliminal” messages are just so over-the-top silly. The next, you’re buying a copy of The C Programming Language by Kernighan and Ritchie off of Amazon and there’s a pair of striped thigh-highs in your cart because hey, bundle deal. Then you wake up one morning and start cruising the Turkish dark Web for DIY hormones.

          It’s not a vicious cycle, per se, but there’s definitely a point in there somewhere that you have to stop and say, “yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m not cis.”

      • aaro [they/them, she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
        24·
        10 months ago

        I will definitely let you know that (I’m assuming you’re AMAB) that’s not a thought that most cis men have. That also resonates super deeply with me, not only do I like expressing some masculine and some feminine qualities, but I also have a lot of qualities that I wish I could control on demand too. Genderfluidity and non-binaryness are definitely identities that can be “hatched” imo. I consider myself someone who used to be an egg and hatched, I’m on a typical transwoman’s hormone regimen, but I’m definitely more nonbinary/genderfluid than I am trans woman.

        • kristina [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
          14·
          10 months ago

          this is a fairly common subset of medical transitioners too, theres a lot of people that really dont wanna fuck with gender (or really wanna fuck with it) but love tonguing some estradiol

          shits complicated and can really give you a lot of clarity and purpose once you figure it out

      • Dessa [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
        21·
        10 months ago

        Dysphoria/Dysmorphia isn’t a requirement to be trans or nonbinary. There are folks who only get euphoria from it

      • CrimsonSage@hexbear.netEnglish
        16·
        10 months ago

        Sorry new law by Joe biden you admitting this means you must now be trans. Please report to your local queerification clinic to have your genders applied.

    • YuccaMan [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      23·
      10 months ago

      I play girl characters in games far more than I used to, but I mean, I don’t think I’m uncomfortable with my assigned gender(?)

      However, I wouldn’t be truthful here if I didn’t admit that I’ve started to question how comfortable I really am with living life as a man. I can’t tell if there’s something about that I don’t like, or if I’m just dissatisfied with life in general right now. Or both.

      One thing I do know for sure is that girl characters are just more fun to look at. Seriously, my favorite Tav on BG3 is just the most beautiful Amazonian tiefling, I love her so much

      • JohannaChittarra@hexbear.netEnglish
        20·
        10 months ago

        Questioning is good! I love when folks take the opportunity to explore their gender. Even if at the end of it you find you are in fact cis, you are deepening your knowledge of yourself and your gender identity. Honestly, I think the world would be a better place if everyone took the time to do that. All the best to you in the new year!

        • YuccaMan [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
          17·
          10 months ago

          Thank you so much, you as well! And yeah, this has been a weird, difficult year for me, and it’s come with a fair bit of introspection for sure. I finally admitted to myself that I’m bisexual, though I’m already committed and haven’t been able to really explore that yet.

          At any rate, my most honest answer that I can give right now is that I’m probably cis, but not terribly interested in performing manhood traditionally. How far and in what fashion I want to break away from that is something I haven’t yet figured out. But I might also on some level be conflating those feelings with the deep envy and yearning I feel when I see the solidarity between women, particularly trans women, and other queer people generally. It’s made me realize just how lonely I’ve been for so many years. Part of that is on me, I’m terrible about putting myself out there, but I suspect it’s also to do with manhood generally. Whatever the case, I really am tired of it.

          • Dessa [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
            12·
            10 months ago

            … deep envy and yearning I feel when I see the solidarity between women, particularly trans women, and other queer people generally…

            This is another common trans thought. Doesnt necessarily mean anytjing though either. Gender envy isn’t entirely within the realm if trans, it just manifests differently.

            Best way to know is to try acting on gendery thoughts you would normally suppress, if touve been suppressing stuff. Experimentation is key to ajy self discovery.

            If you’re sure you’re cis, the point of experimentation might be lost on you, or at least not particularly appealing on some level.

            • YuccaMan [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
              3·
              10 months ago

              It’s pretty hard for me to imagine what I would look like lol, tall and burly and hairy as I am now, but certainly nothing about that possibility bothers me. I’ve always preferred the company of women. Totally not incriminating myself further here, I know

        • YuccaMan [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
          4·
          10 months ago

          I’ll have to give that some thought myself, but of course, in the best of all possible worlds, we would redefine what masculinity even is, as it’s clear that many aspects of traditional masculinity are harmful, to us and to everyone around us

    • AlicePraxis [any]@hexbear.netEnglish
      22·
      10 months ago

      in my case I turned out to be agender, and although I am not a woman or femme IRL I gravitate more towards female characters in part because I don’t like identifying with men. also girls are pretty

    • GarbageShoot [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      14·
      10 months ago

      A bunch of them are eggs, but I genuinely think a lot of the people who do are just cum-brained (Blizzard characters doing a good job of demonstrating that point for me). There’s a thing in de-facto harem anime like SAO that there basically can’t be other important male characters within the MC’s peer group because there can’t be even the vaguest notion of his female peers possibly being attracted to someone that isn’t him. There can be no competition! I think in a cishet cum-brain’s conception of things, playing as a female character can have a similar appeal because you control her agency and constantly have her in view of your camera, typically completely oblivious to your perspective as you look at her from whichever which way.

      But I broadly avoid media and people like this, so I wouldn’t know

    • bigbologna [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
      6·
      10 months ago

      Genuinely I think if I bothered playing as a female character in a game I think my egg would’ve cracked 5-10 years early. Spent nearly a decade insisting on playing as a man in RPGs while fighting character creators and getting pissed off at male character bodytypes, animations, voice acting, clothing options, so on.

      Repression’s a hell of a drug lmao

  • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    35·
    10 months ago

    I think there’s a large degree of “this question is not nearly as important to me as it is to society” here. It’s very important to have an explanation for why you, a man, want to portray a woman in a fictional context up here in our culture.

    But i don’t really care about that. That’s something other people care about a lot. I just made up this cool lady in my head and want to go be her while i murder things for a while.

    I think there might also be some “the only way to not portray a toxic masculinity manchild in a lot of games is be a woman or an alien” , too. Like most shooters are made for a statistically average 24 year old American man and I am extremely not that and often find almost any other character more relatable than dudebro mc doodbroson.

    I wonder if there isn’t an element of “if i’m portraying a woman i can also, for once, take off the cloak of fear and violence that i must otherwise carry around as a man in this society” thing going on. Cause that cloak is really fucking heavy. I don’t like wearing it. And sometimes in fictional spaces, by portraying a woman (or, in one notable case, a genderless pile of greasy rags with a katana sticking out of it that would sometimes do extreme violence :kenshi-ninja: on behalf of their friends) not so much bc i want to be a woman, but bc in that moment i want to escape from the weight and terror of being a man in our society. Idk gonna have to think about it. Bc what if the gender expression you dislike isn’t the internal self-conception, butt he horrible social, political, and economic realities that come with being assigned that gender? Like I don’t have strong feelings about being a man, but it is very definitely what “fits”. But i have very big feelings about being an American man and a white man and a straight man and a bunch of other kinds of man in this specific violent and awful culture, and i’m thinking that sometimes being not-a-man is a way to escape that burden of cultural horror, rather than a desire to not be a man. Damn, that sounds smart, i’ma have to work on that, i’ve been trying to figure out how to express that for a long time. I don’t want to be a man, not bc i want to be something else, but bc being a man in this society makes your a person who harms other people, even when you don’t mean to or are actively trying not to, and i don’t want that part, but there’s no way to get rid of just that part in this society at this time.

    • fanbois [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      23·
      10 months ago

      I think there might also be some “the only way to not portray a toxic masculinity manchild in a lot of games is be a woman or an alien”

      I would very much concur with that. I would rather be portrayed by a woman than that guy. It’s more interesting and and flavourful than generic dude xyz. I reject most of societies notion of being a man, so why not be a woman here in this space free from consequences.

    • TraumaDumpling@hexbear.netEnglish
      7·
      10 months ago

      i basically feel the same, i don’t really have anything physical i want to change about my body, but i hate how much my decisions are constrained by the gendered expectations of others. i mean i guess i wouldn’t mind having tits and shaving more but i’m terrified of needles, paranoid about cardiovascular health problems, and i pass out or come close whenever i bleed or get injections

      • Dessa [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
        3·
        10 months ago

        Hormones come in pills and patches too, and you’re likely to lower your cardiovascular risk by taking female hormones. Your risks of blood clots raise to the average level of cis women, and your much more likely odds of heart disease, stroke, and high blood pressure drop tonthat of a cis woman’s.

        Your greatest health risk in taking hormones is men

    • lorty@lemmy.mlEnglish
      5·
      10 months ago

      This is how I’ve felt for a long time. I’m happy with my body but I really, really hate many social aspects of being a man. Even stupid shit like how uber drivers will happily talk about all the times they’ve cheated on their spouses to me just because I’m a guy (like I’d endorse that) just pisses me off.

      And the worse part is that I know how, in many ways, I play that stupid part. Being able to log on and just be cute helps me a lot, in a way.

  • Comp4 [comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
    26·
    10 months ago

    I guess I prefer to play women in games because most games dont let me play as either VERY feminine guy or a guy clad in heavy and spiky armour. (or the options for black chars suck but thats a whole other discussion)

  • Vncredleader [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    26·
    10 months ago

    Better customization options. I remember a Poke-tuber talking about watching his GF play Pokemon sun and moon and being like “wait you got a skirt? why don’t I have one” and realizing that it was not so much that he wanted his character to have a skirt, but that he was uninterested in having like 4 options for pants that only changed in slight ways. You usually get shorts and pants, maybe a jeans option. As opposed to shorts, pants, tights, skirt, mini-skirt, and dress just for starters in a lot of games.

    Also so many games have male protagonists, and for games with an option the male one rarely matches the uniqueness or skill of a Nolan North or Roger Craig Smith, usually they feel generic even if not bad, but due to the lack of female protags their voices really get to shine even when just one of two choices.

    Best example is assassins creed Odyssey. Alexios’ voice is made fun of a lot and while it is not godawful, it feels like less of a full performance of a unique character, whereas Kassandra’s VA won awards and it so beloved. She gave a performance that MADE that game and sold Kassandra as a full character. Now Kassandra was supposed to be the only protag so that makes the comparison a bit unfair, but you get my point

    edit: Shepard is another good example. one performance is just way WAY better than the other

  • RyanGosling [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
    23·
    10 months ago

    Usually there are more interesting customization options other than “big coat” and “big coat with a belt”. Plus for me, it’s no different than me playing with Barbie’s as a kid. They’re all just toys available to me and I’m not going to deprive myself of fun because some other guy wants to restrict himself to a single figurine. Not that deep for my experiences at least.

  • CrushKillDestroySwag@hexbear.netEnglish
    22·
    10 months ago

    I’ve always felt like I played girls in games because I really dug Xena: Warrior Princess as a kid and she became the default “action hero” in my head.

  • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
    21·
    10 months ago

    I had to check if this was in dunk tank or not as I didn’t like the start of this video and nearly turned it off, but I can not fault the hypothesis or conclusions being put forward. It’s a genuinely excellent explanation.

    EDIT: Is 6:25 a cry for help?

  • carpoftruth [any, any]@hexbear.netEnglish
    21·
    10 months ago

    For a significant percentage of men I bet it’s specifically because of Jennifer Hale. She was a way better voice actor for Shepard in mass effect than the dude, all players just keep chasing that high in other games.

      • autismdragon [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
        7·
        10 months ago

        Its so funny to me how they designed Thane to be the hot one, like they literally designed him with appealing to women in mind, but everyone wants to bang Garrus instead.

        Similar thing happening with Liara and Tali.

    • Orannis62 [ze/hir]@hexbear.netEnglish
      5·
      10 months ago

      Bioware says that despite that reputation, the vast majority of players still played men.

      Which is weird to me because the reputation is totally deserved. Granted, Mark Meer was pretty alright by ME3, but still

      • Vncredleader [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
        3·
        10 months ago

        Finally playing ME3 and yeah he does genuinely improve and it is right away noticable. I will say, a lot of men might play male shep their main playthrough because of roleplay and self-insert as well as the wish-fufilment fuck everything that moves fantasy they have, but when people do walkthroughs or upload scenes they like they often pick femshep and I think that is because when you are not self-inserting, she is so much better as a character. You can only get anything out of male shep from the perspective of seeing him as your avatar, but Hale manages to be good enough to give a real performance as a character in and of itself.

        I played male shep both of my main playthroughs cause those are my role plays, that’s my more or less self-insert shep, but when I play to role-play as a character with a personality not my own, I always go with femshep and I think that’s the case for a LOT of people.

        Despite not being voice acted this is what I did for both KOTORs and dragon age origins. My way more personally-invested playthroughs are male MCs, but subsequent ones like my current dark side Exile is female

  • Dolores [love/loves]@hexbear.netEnglish
    21·
    10 months ago

    i play third person games and i want to look at someone appealing. if they had better twink options we could reconsider this but i am not into gruff video game protagonist man chic. no i havent played zelda