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Old 01-29-2009, 04:38 AM   #2
Kleothera
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Join Date: Apr 2007
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Re: Male and Female Players: Are the experiences different?

Firstly, there is no such thing as a typical MUD- both in terms of theme and quality- therefore what anything I say may not hold for many people who play a different kind of game.

Are there differences in experience?
Yes there are.

What do men and women look for in a MUD/Differences in game play?
I agree with NW in the original thread, women do tend to be attracted to a more RP oriented, less hack and slash oriented gameplay. Its not really about men being more oriented to abstract thinking vs women who do other-stuff as nasredin suggests in my opinion. I wouldnt think MUDing to be a very abstract experience (unlike chess in his original post). What may be taking place is a bit of left-right brain thinking where the male player is oriented to a more mathematical-aggressive game play and women are more into a social mode of gaming. I don't know, while I may have been trained as a development psychologist a decade back, I dont claim expertise on this particular issue.

I also find that the presence of other women tends to attract more women which reinforces itself. I am female, my clan tends to get a disproportionate number of female players. There are clans which don't get a single female. I have no way of knowing how much of that is because the climate is attractive to women players to begin with, or is it because this nice older female player is in it, therefore, I want to join it too. I guess they arent really mutually contradictory either.

Advantages and Disadvantages?
In my opinion, the situation is mixed. On one hand, there IS a clear advantage that female presenting players have in a MUD. I cant quote the exact reference from Bartle or Pavel Curtis on this, but I know they have written about it as well. Guys tend to be more helpful to female players- thats one reason why (in my experience as an admin) a lot of (especially younger) men create female characters. A lot of guys tend to be truly chivalrous. Of course, there are also other men (and I am sure every female player has had this experience, as every women using a chatting program and having a clearly female name), female players DO get propositioned for netsex (with varying degrees of smoothness, including my own personal all time favourite- "Male Newbie: Hello" "Me: Er Greetings, Youngling. Newbie performs social to ascertain the character's gender. Newbie: Are you really female IRL? Me: Huh, Yes, so? Newbie: Want to marry me?). I have created male characters at times to avoid unwanted attention when I just wanted to play free from all sorts of males trying to be "nice". As an ordinary player, however, I tend to think all things being equal its probably easier to be a female player than a male. Providing one develops a thick skin to some unsavoury elements.

The situation becomes different when it comes to taking positions of power- be it mortal leadership or as game staff. I think there still IS something of a glass ceiling in place. A female staff member (in my experience), finds it harder to be taken seriously by his/her colleagues, and experiences some of the usual stereotyped views that a female boss experiences IRL. There is also the problem of breaking into some of the male coder cliques (again, I am perfectly aware that this is a situation that isn't uniform everywhere) which places people who aren't part of the boys' club are at a disadvantage. And no, I am not saying ALL women have this experience and that these limitations cannot be overcome- I am a female admin of the highest rank in my game who has spent 10 yrs on the staff. At the time of speaking ALL clan officer positions in the clan I am associated with are filled by females. I am just saying it can be harder for women than men to be seen as firm (without being called bitches) and fair (without people raising questions about favouritism). I have managed to stick around myself, but god I have seen a lot of female staff members lose interest (although, family obligations- which are often greater for women than men- also took a fair toll in this regard).

Why are there more men than women?
Personally, I think its because (especially in the beginning), men computer geeks formed the backbone of the internet community. While this has since changed, many of the developers remain men and tend to think from the game mechanics (rather than social skills) point of view. I KNOW I have very little hard evidence for this and I can fully expect the male admins of NewWorlds, IRE and Aardwolf and all the other superb games with a good social interface tell me that I am wrong- I am not talking about these exceptional games that set the industry standard. That is probably the weakest argument that I have made so far. However, there is WAY too much adrenaline on some MUDs. Lastly (something that I mentioned earlier), family responsibilities. Women players tend to have more of a responsibility for the household and eventually often tend to get entangled in handling a full day job, kids and a husband that doesnt leave with much free time to make one's way up the MUD heirarchy.

I end with a disclaimer- I don't know if I am right about any of these things- its one of the issues that probably could do with some hard research cutting across MUD types.
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