Originally posted by eyelolled

And remember, the reasons that I was directed down this line of thinking is that a developer was making a game with no male characters.  To me, it seems the "sex sells" aspect of mmorpg games creates a progression towards a game world filled with  childlike adults and female characters running around.  So if it's not a disparity between a particular sex's mechanics, than what can we do to bring more male characters into game worlds?

Typically such a game results in buru-sera models (a few screenshots and most sane people would avoid it anyway).

I have rarely if ever been able to create a male toon in a MMO that didn't look stupid in some way.

Probably because these games are mostly made by men for males, but it's a lot, lot, lot easier to make a good looking female toon than a good looking male toon.

And no, I don't mean "good looking" as in attractive but more of "doesn't look unnatural and terribly ugly."

And yes, that of course applies to humans and human-like characters mostly.

Stuff like dwarves/gnomes/Charr/Asura etc. etc. generally have much better male characters.

So apparently both Western and Eastern MMO devs just suck at creating likeable options for human males.

TERA actually did a fairly good job of making human males that could look "manly" enough and "cool" without looking too gruff or like young boys/anime characters (though they had that too.)

Originally posted by VengeSunsoar

Originally posted by LadyEuphei

The problem with this idea is it takes women and men as statistics. I for one fall into the general classification of what you mention for women,but there are some that do not. 

I think about Game of Thrones and Brienne of Tarth. For a woman she is super strong and not so graceful. They do play on her "womanly weaknesses" but overall she is a very strong "manly" woman character. I think to be completely fair everyone should be equal. If you want to be a beefy woman, then so be it! If you want to be a scrawny man, have at it good sir! 

In the end I like choices and diversity, but I believe that having everything equal makes sense. Taking an average just shows you the average, not every individual member. Think about this...would you want to fight some of those body builder girls?

Actually that brings up something I would rather see.  I don't support trait differences in male vs female characters, yes there would be some somewhat accurate generalizations.  However those generalizations have more to do with form resulting in function than gender resulting in form (yes we know hormonal differences exist which influence the form which then determine the function, lets not go there).

I would be very interested in having the body shape you choose determine your stats, or the other way you determine your stats which then dictate your body form.  That could be kinda fun.

This is a great expansion on what I was thinking. If a person wanted to have gigantic proportions, then there would be encumbrances, and dainty waisted fashion models couldn't even wield a greatsword.

Originally posted by BadSpock

I have rarely if ever been able to create a male toon in a MMO that didn't look stupid in some way.

Probably because these games are mostly made by men for males, but it's a lot, lot, lot easier to make a good looking female toon than a good looking male toon.

And no, I don't mean "good looking" as in attractive but more of "doesn't look unnatural and terribly ugly."

And yes, that of course applies to humans and human-like characters mostly.

Stuff like dwarves/gnomes/Charr/Asura etc. etc. generally have much better male characters.

So apparently both Western and Eastern MMO devs just suck at creating likeable options for human males.

TERA actually did a fairly good job of making human males that could look "manly" enough and "cool" without looking too gruff or like young boys/anime characters (though they had that too.)

>cough< Excuse me...

But I look good.

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Originally posted by eyelolled
So the other day there was this thread about Scarlet Blade and it's rather skimpy armor. I don't know much about this game, but someone mentioned it was only female models in the game and it got me thinking. In most mmo's that I've played, I would say there is a highest percentage of female avatars and i'm doubting it because mostly women play mmorpgs.  I think it boils down to a large portion of male players, would prefer to see a female character.

Now I don't want to let this thread derail into "why I play female characters" discussion so please don't take it there.

There are definately differences between men and women that go beyond the types of equipment each is packing. Men are statistically heavier, stronger, taller, and so on.  So why are these differences not kept within games like mmorpgs?

Now I'm not implying that female characters should be gimped either, but what if the females were disadvantaged in one area and strengthened in another.  And more, that the female characters were designed in such a way that would benefit the "average" female play preference.

unfortunately, I do not claim to understand what an "average" female gamer would want, nor do I imply that women deserve any less than what a man deserves.  I'm not trying to be sexist, or bias, or create any angst.

I simply suggest, that creating a bit of disparity between the choices of sex in a videogame, may create a better balance within the game world. I suggest that when people decide what sex they choose to play, they are left to choose between the sacrifices of that choice as well as the benefits.  

EDIT: The reason I titled it so, is as a play on words about the excessive use of the jiggly bits in many modern mmo's.

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I think there should be trade-offs between male and female characters. Men and women are definitely not the same, for sure. Right now, the only difference is the "jiggly bits" you mentioned.

I have no clue what would be good here or what would even work. So if men are stronger, maybe women are more dextrous? If men are made of hardier stuff, maybe women are more intelligent? You start messing with attributes and soon you'll see all male fighters, all female spell users and everything in between.

I would not want to be a dev on this game but would like to see what they come up with :) Right now, it is the "take the easy road" mentality and I have to admit I can not blame them.

Virtual cross-dressing is popular with a lot of gamers. Never understood it myself, it's like lusting after yourself.

/shrug

Remember female assassins in the original Guild Wars?

People complained about them being to... udderly deficient.

Originally posted by BadSpock

Probably because these games are mostly made by men for males, but it's a lot, lot, lot easier to make a good looking female toon than a good looking male toon.

And no, I don't mean "good looking" as in attractive but more of "doesn't look unnatural and terribly ugly."

CoH probably ruined me for life, yus indeed.

If you wanna see the "whose tookus would you rather look at all day"-effect raised to its ultimate limit, put them both in spandex.

Meh, no different for the stats than classes than come with default stats. Instead of making it sex based, just renew it to be body type based, there you go, want to be large, you get more x, want to be small, you get more y. Now you have taken out the traditional male/female part.

The thing about clothing is a totally different topic. I am a woman and there are women that don't show cleavage and don't dress in skimpy clothing. Women know that some women use their "assets" for display, it's not unknown to us. We chose the clothes we wear and buy. The biggest complaint about clothing for the non-skimpy dressing women has always been the realism of the metal bikini for a warrior. Someone that fought without body protection would be a bad fighter and survive less blows. Just because females are prettier, the presentation in the game doesn't always have to be about looks or focused on showing more skin, especially in an RPG where people do roleplay. If you understand it from that angle then you get the complaints about clothing. It's just not realistic that a man or a woman would wear the equivalent of a string bikini into combat. I haven't seen any games with men in speedos going into combat but maybe one day both sides will get that treatment. Just need more female gamers to push it I suppose that direction or gay male gamers, ooo lala.

If sex sells, well, it does. So what, I have a commodity in a post apocalyptic society. In a game, we sometimes expect those communities to rise above because they are fantasy BUT marketers stick their fingers in and things end up like this without the sprained tongue thought lol https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8dldLG_ZhI

It all comes down to which butt do you want to look at if you are playing a 3d game. That's what you see anyway all the time.

I'd rather be given the opportunity to stat my character own my own, rather than have gender imposed stats.

After all, "how do you know you haven't seen a female Dwarf, eh eh?" ~ Ogden

Originally posted by eyelolled

So the other day there was this thread about Scarlet Blade and it's rather skimpy armor. I don't know much about this game, but someone mentioned it was only female models in the game and it got me thinking. In most mmo's that I've played, I would say there is a highest percentage of female avatars and i'm doubting it because mostly women play mmorpgs.  I think it boils down to a large portion of male players, would prefer to see a female character.

 

Now I don't want to let this thread derail into "why I play female characters" discussion so please don't take it there.

 

There are definately differences between men and women that go beyond the types of equipment each is packing. Men are statistically heavier, stronger, taller, and so on.  So why are these differences not kept within games like mmorpgs?

 

Now I'm not implying that female characters should be gimped either, but what if the females were disadvantaged in one area and strengthened in another.  And more, that the female characters were designed in such a way that would benefit the "average" female play preference.

 

unfortunately, I do not claim to understand what an "average" female gamer would want, nor do I imply that women deserve any less than what a man deserves.  I'm not trying to be sexist, or bias, or create any angst.

 

I simply suggest, that creating a bit of disparity between the choices of sex in a videogame, may create a better balance within the game world. I suggest that when people decide what sex they choose to play, they are left to choose between the sacrifices of that choice as well as the benefits.  

 

EDIT: The reason I titled it so, is as a play on words about the excessive use of the jiggly bits in many modern mmo's.

Unfortunately a lot of MMO's have gender locked classes. I'm pretty sure that this is the main reason "men" have to play as a female character. (I hope at least).Men that have the need to role as a female otherwise have some issues. (We'll save that for another topic).

Originally posted by Volkon

Remember female assassins in the original Guild Wars?

 

People complained about them being to... udderly deficient.

Or what about the Female Ritualists? Get them in the right armor (depending on the armor the bust the bigger or smaller) and they bounced when they dance.

Originally posted by botrytis

Originally posted by Volkon

Remember female assassins in the original Guild Wars?

 

People complained about them being to... udderly deficient.

Or what about the Female Ritualists? Get them in the right armor (depending on the armor the bust the bigger or smaller) and they bounced when they dance.

How could I have forgotten?

I have a solution:  no more humans in games.

While human men are, on average, taller than human women, that's not true of every species.  One could say about the same of many other ways that men and women differ on average.  So there's no reason why it needs to be true of fantasy species that don't actually exist.

Originally posted by Angier2758

 Are you seriously thinking that men and women aren't different?

Originally posted by maplestone

Originally posted by Angier2758

 Are you seriously thinking that men and women aren't different?

I'm saying that difference between gnomes and humans is far, far larger than the difference between human men and human women, and that Xena is a lot stronger than the average man, so I'm aggressively challenging the thinking behind why people think a forced statistical difference is a good idea.

so, because 1 mythical female is stronger than the average real male, that it doesn't make sense to use statistics?

And as an additional counter to your point, Superman is wayyyyy stronger than Xena so does that mean that all male character should be able to shoot laser beams out of their eyes?

Having the male / female chars have different stats is a bad idea that'll cause major backlash from the public / media.

I seriously doubt any sane company will do so.

Originally posted by eyelolled

so, because 1 mythical female is stronger than the average real male, that it doesn't make sense to use statistics?

Correct.

If a player wants to make a heroine in a fantasy world who is as strong as the strongest man, then why go out of your way to stop them?