Male players: Why do you play female characters?

Damaskox@kbin.social to Gaming@beehaw.org – 105 points –

Got the idea of posting this when I watched this YouTube video that talks about reasons men love playing as girls.

Why do you do it?
Are there more than one reason?
What do you enjoy about it the most?

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There are a few things I consider when picking gender in a game.

  • Is the character voice acted? Which voice actor do I think performs better?
  • is the game third person? Which gender has the better look in armor/clothing in the game?
  • Does the game feature romance? If so, then I almost always pick my own gender for a first playthrough at least.
  • Which gender do I think the plot of the game will be more compelling for?

In tabletop D&D, gender tends to be the last thing I choose in a character (as opposed to video games that usually want it to be your first choice), and I basically just look at the made character including personality and backstory and realize that it's more interesting or fun to play as one gender or the other.

I pretty much agree with everything here except D&D. I just don't have enough confidence in my voice to play a female character exclusively. I already have some difficulty doing it well enough for DMing, but this is something I hope to change. Maybe that's because I've never played with a premade though.

I don't generally force a pitch for different genders if that's what you're talking about. If I'm doing a voice, it'll be in the accent and/or volume more and maybe the mannerisms.