I love this topic, and it's great when more data comes in to confirm my suspicions that most female characters you meet in online games are actually played by men. In fact, according to Nick Yee's latest addition to his MMOG-demographic site, the Daedalus Project,
Given a hypothetical pool of 1000 players [in World of Warcraft]: 840 would be male players 160 would be female players
Of the 840 male players: 193 would be playing a female character 647 would be playing a male character
Of the 160 female players: 5 would be playing a male character 155 would be playing a female character
...
In other words: about 1 out of every 2 female characters is played by a man about 1 out of every 100 male characters is played by a woman
The RL gender distribution is 84% male vs. 16% female. The in-game gender distribution is 65% male vs. 35% female.
The most fantastic thing about these numbers are the responses they get over the interweb.
From comments on Nick's site:
I'm a female who plays mostly female characters. Whether or not you get attention from male players who want to shower you with "gifts" depends, like rl, on if you act like a tramp or not. The sexier, flirtier, more helpless you act, the more you will attract that sort of organ-driven male player to give you things...
So before you assume that every female character gets more stuff because of the sex of the character, know that it has nothing to do with the sexual representation of the toon, but on the flirty, slutty way males play those females.
I will also tell you that most women can tell which females are being played by males after hanging out with them even a short time because they play women the way their little pubescent little dreams WANT their women to act. Most women, women of any quality at all, do not act in RL the way most males play their female characters.
And another:
My husband plays female characters in WoW because he thinks all the male models are ugly and strangely proportioned. Playing an attractive character is more important to him than matching his gender.
From Wonderland:
Erk. The M-F ratio is very scary, I thought WoW had got it more right than that, but I guess MMOs still fall into the OMG THAT'S SO NERDY bracket. Cute night elves are clearly not enough of a draw for the mainstream - or, they haven't been marketed right.
For other thoughts, check out Dr. K's classic investigation on WomenGamers about why men gender bend.
