A look at some possible reasons why male gamers would choose a female character over their male counterparts when given the choice.
Replaying Skyrim after 13 years is a reminder of the progress made in western RPGs over the last decade, but also what's been lost.
RPGs are often huge, sprawling endeavours. With limited playtime, we have to choose wisely, so here's the best western RPGs available today.
"I started playing games yesterday" the List... Meh!
How about a few RPGs that deserve some love instead?
1 - Alpha Protocol - Now on GOG
2 - else Heart.Break()
3 - Shadowrun Trilogy
4 - Wasteland 2
5 - UnderRail
6 - Tyranny
7 - Torment: Tides of Numenera
And for a bonus game that flew under the radar:
8 - Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden
Not only glorious jank, but the idea that the story can completely change depending on what you do, or say, or side with, makes it one of the most forward thinking games ever. The amount of story permutation is the equivalent of a Hitman level but in Story Form. And it wasn't just that the story changed, no, it was that you met completely new characters, or missed them, depending on your choices. Made Mass Effect feel static in comparison.
Alpha Protocol was absolutely glorious, indeed. And it was, and still is, more Next Gen than most anything out there these days. In this regard at least.
Pity.
A new Partner Spotlight Sale is now live on the Switch eShop, including Skyrim, lowest price ever for Bomb Rush Cyberfunk, and more.
Its just a matter of choice, it isnt wrong to play as the other sex
I think for a game like Skyrim the gender gap in terms of who's playing it is fairly small. It's a big release and it's not marketed in a way that targets men specifically. Statistically, the woman audience for video games is a lot bigger than it is often given credit as being.
That aside, the reasons given for why men might play as women in these games seem to be pretty accurate, with the exception of the escapism bit. It seems to misunderstand the perspective of trans women somewhat, though it's nice in that it recognizes how this freedom in a game would appeal to them.
The only other thing I'd say is it's not necessarily a chance to view things from the perspective of women, because of who's writing the stories, who the stories are being marketed to, differences between real world behavior and video game behavior, etc. The sentiment that it allows players to experience a story through the eyes of someone who does not necessarily reflect themselves is true, however.
Anywho, good article about an interesting topic.
Depends on the type of game for me, if it's something like an RPG where I can choose freely what gender my character is (and therefore can customize them too) then I'll usually try both sides of the coin to see what differences there are (unless it's an extremely long game which takes me months to get through, although I might at least try it and see if I can continue it on). Of course I'll usually go with a male character first since I'd feel I could relate to them better / make a somewhat realistic version of myself in-game, but that doesn't mean the playthrough with a female character would be of much less value.
The Pyro is my favorite class in TF2. Sometimes you prefer to use them
I never choose a female unless for some reason the female has a special ability I like better. And in most games the female is just a skin with no differences to speak of so I always choose a male.