Do Girls Play Elite?

[CMDR Adelind]

A universe with no women would indeed be dead and boring.

Only if you think vaggi's bring a special quality to a person. We've been trying to get rid of the notion of women being special for a female reason. It makes white knights charge out to protect us from barbarians, like it's the internet 50's and we need internet chaperones. The most annoying part about getting into new groups is being condescended or told I'm beautiful in text chat, which is far more frequent and harassing to me than malicious harassment. I generally leave people to assume I'm male so I don't get advice on how to properly set up my controls.

This is my primary concern with incoming avatars.

 

[Tel Prydain]

My partner plays - not as often as I do. But enough that while I was in Colonia she was able to upgrade to an Asp-X and fly out to meet me.
We did some wing-exploration around Colonia before she set off alone to Sag*A.

Spoiler

Really looking forward to multicrew so she can visit the bubble via my SLF, and I can see the sights of the core from her observation deck.

We've been trying to get rid of the notion of women being special for a female reason. It makes white knights charge out to protect us from barbarians.

Surely the idea is that all diversity is valuable in creating a more interesting universe, not just gender diversity. One of the nice things about flying in Elite is meeting diverse people from all over the world, and it's those difference that make open interesting.

 

[Tel Prydain]

Duplicate

 

[akr]

Yes?

And no, they seldom put it on blast that they're women because women have a hell of a time in gaming communities.

Also this, in general.

 

[deathmagnet]

[video=youtube_share;UlnrV06-YDQ]https://youtu.be/UlnrV06-YDQ[/video]

 

[RwD]

Most of them can be found in SDC

 

[Mechanist]

Cmdr Salome is supposed to be woman, right? [big grin]

Spoiler

 

[CMDR Adelind]

Surely the idea is that all diversity is valuable in creating a more interesting universe, not just gender diversity. One of the nice things about flying in Elite is meeting diverse people from all over the world, and it's those difference that make open interesting.

The thing you quoted from me doesn't reference diversity, I said that the idea that women should be singled out as remarkable additions to the universe is old fashioned. Women being weak or precious and in need of being protected, and that society isn't safe for us, is the reason we weren't allowed outside after dark not long ago. It's an idea that I read more often lately in feminist discourse from both genders, just as much as it does the old fashioned. They label it differently though.

 

[Watcher]

Considering that every single answer to this question thus far has been made by a male, is it really that surprising I asked? [uhh]

But you don't know that, it's the internet

 

[[VR] optimal_909]

The thing you quoted from me doesn't reference diversity, I said that the idea that women should be singled out as remarkable additions to the universe is old fashioned. Women being weak or precious and in need of being protected, and that society isn't safe for us, is the reason we weren't allowed outside after dark not long ago. It's an idea that I read more often lately in feminist discourse from both genders, just as much as it does the old fashioned. They label it differently though.

I'm not sure about the goal of your struggle. Women and men are -thankfully- different, therefore a mixed community is more interesting than a men-only.

 

[kmwmtd]

Why do I ask? I'm just curious. A universe with no women would indeed be dead and boring. I've seen some female avatars in the forum, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. I have a couple of female friends who love sci fi & astronomy and might enjoy ED (my wife is not one of them), so I would actually be surprised if there were only a handful playing.

In my experience, hard science games ("hard" as in "realistic" rather than "difficult") don't tend to appeal to women, so I, too, would be surprised to find many playing ED. This is not to say that they don't play FPSs - if you've ever been killed in Red Dead Redemption or Call of Duty, chances are it was by my niece, who has probably killed more people in video games than malaria has in real life - or video games in general - my niece plays 10 times the online games I do.

Also see Women_and_video_games which says that the numbers are roughly equal now.

 

[xondk]

I had read an article recently where girls are forming their own private groups and even private servers in order to escape the harassment, which is really sad. My impression from following this forum and different Elite-specific YouTube channels is that most ED players are of a "higher calibre" (mature, respectful, polite) than what you might find playing more mainstream games. I feel like this is a safe community to recommend to my female friends who may be interested in exploring the galaxy without having to hide the fact they are female. If my wife were to play the game, I know one of her favorite parts would be the character creation of the pilot and the picking of a fun name that reflects her personality (that's one of my favorite parts, too).

Of course, I've been hopelessly optimistic about Elite from the start, so maybe this is just another example of that..

I call it the surface layer of the internet, surface scum, and the layer is most definitely thinner in Elite, but like everywhere said layer is very loud and obnoxious, so it might seem like it covers everything, but once you get below it, into the game, it really is rare to meet them unless you go to certain hub points, there the chance is greater.

There are lots of females playing Elite everyday. For a start the Goddess of Minions is like a Queen Bee sitting on her hive of drones and as we all know, most bees are female. Another way you can tell that a lot of the NPCs are female, is the time it takes them to leave the Star-ports. Any honest male in a relationship will know that the females take much longer to leave the house etc., which explains why so many NPC ships get blown up by the stations.

Eh, female drivers are slow, male drivers are reckless, if you want to go stereotypes, and I see plenty of evidence for both, that said this 'joke' is just old, yeah, if going to a social situation it takes a woman longer, to get ready, but it is also expected in the social setting of her, but there are plenty of women that just toss on a jacket and go, the stereo type exists. But it really is just that, a stereotype.

Btw those 60/40 numbers don't account for genre. Yeah there's plenty of girls in your average mmo nowadays. But I'd say most my other female friends trend toward places like the Sims, Second Life, FFXIV, etc. From my personal experiences in those games I'd say the amount of female players is an order of magnitude higher than a lot of others.

Well naturally different genre's attract different people, but that doesn't make them any less gamers, but I know plenty in action games too, so while it may vary, I doubt the number is 'that' much off.

 

[Bran Tse Mallory]

My wife plays video games as much as I do but sadly she's not into Elite. She started playing games not long after we met and over those 30 years she's encountered every type of low life degenerate male that you could think of to the point where she now does not join any guilds, talks to no one in games and only groups up with me in any MMO type game.

Many years ago while playing DDO she got a rather nice loot item from a raid, it was not quite right for the Cleric she was playing but she saw the fun value in having the item. Right away one of the other players started to complain. Claiming that she had no right to the loot as it would stop her healing when he needed it. He got really angry and continued to harass her even after she left the group. As soon as I found out I invited the guy to my group which she was now in. He accepted, not knowing I was her husband. As soon as he joined he started on her again... In front of me and my guild. Obviously I called him out on this and told him that his time in this game was over. I had been recording him since he joined our group and so I told him I would put the transcription onto the forums for all to see. Now this is where he finally backed off, he was a well known player with a big reputation and this could destroy him. I did what I said and he got what he deserved, the whole community jumped on his back for acting like such a Richard.

The point is in video gaming there should not be any concern over the other players race, sex, age or anything else, we are all gamer's looking to have some fun.

 

[s00zster]

I'm female, been playing since release in 2014. If you check Twitch you'll catch a few female streamers playing Elite.

On the issue of the way female gamers are treated in online gaming, a peculiar thing happened to me years back during my time in Eve Online.

Joined a corp, made some friends, and then over the space of a few days the corp leader somehow got it into his head that I wasn't female but a gay man pretending to be female. He was so utterly convinced and offended with what his bigoted brain had managed to come up with that he confronted me in corp chat about it. Of course, I was completely baffled as to why that would be an issue anyway. Nobody else seemed bothered about it, but he kicked me out and ordered me to be kill-on-sight in that area. I'm guessing he'd been previously embarrassed by being daft enough to chat up a female avatar, only to find it was a guy on the other end.

I'd also previously had another guy aggressively stalk me in Eve Online for a short time after I spurned his misplaced advances. Had zero interest in him, not once had I given him any hint that I was interested, he'd just conjured this fantasy up in his head. You just don't know who you're dealing with and what issues they have.

The great thing about Elite is there is a Solo mode to run to if you're feeling threatened, although I've mainly played Solo anyway due to being brought up on Frontier: Elite II in the mid-90s. I've only recently made the jump into open, but with the introduction of the Holo Me feature (assuming that it's forced and not optional), I'm in two minds as to whether I should wipe my save and create a male character, because it's only with the introduction of avatars that things can start getting complicated. You are immediately labeled as that person with that face and that body, and unfortunately (as I've found in the past) you start getting unwanted advances based on this.

 

[Han_Zen]

My wife plays video games as much as I do but sadly she's not into Elite. She started playing games not long after we met and over those 30 years she's encountered every type of low life degenerate male that you could think of to the point where she now does not join any guilds, talks to no one in games and only groups up with me in any MMO type game.

Many years ago while playing DDO she got a rather nice loot item from a raid, it was not quite right for the Cleric she was playing but she saw the fun value in having the item. Right away one of the other players started to complain. Claiming that she had no right to the loot as it would stop her healing when he needed it. He got really angry and continued to harass her even after she left the group. As soon as I found out I invited the guy to my group which she was now in. He accepted, not knowing I was her husband. As soon as he joined he started on her again... In front of me and my guild. Obviously I called him out on this and told him that his time in this game was over. I had been recording him since he joined our group and so I told him I would put the transcription onto the forums for all to see. Now this is where he finally backed off, he was a well known player with a big reputation and this could destroy him. I did what I said and he got what he deserved, the whole community jumped on his back for acting like such a Richard.

The point is in video gaming there should not be any concern over the other players race, sex, age or anything else, we are all gamer's looking to have some fun.

And this is why more advanced species like Thargoids have disposed of males, all together. Nature is harch. When you no longer serve a function in the survival of your species, you better be dam qute if you want to survive.

 

[CMDR Adelind]

I'm not sure about the goal of your struggle. Women and men are -thankfully- different, therefore a mixed community is more interesting than a men-only.

That's because I didn't talk about a struggle in there, I talked about a shift in rhetoric over time.

 

[Siobhan]

I'm female, been playing since release in 2014. If you check Twitch you'll catch a few female streamers playing Elite.

On the issue of the way female gamers are treated in online gaming, a peculiar thing happened to me years back during my time in Eve Online.

Joined a corp, made some friends, and then over the space of a few days the corp leader somehow got it into his head that I wasn't female but a gay man pretending to be female. He was so utterly convinced and offended with what his bigoted brain had managed to come up with that he confronted me in corp chat about it. Of course, I was completely baffled as to why that would be an issue anyway. Nobody else seemed bothered about it, but he kicked me out and ordered me to be kill-on-sight in that area. I'm guessing he'd been previously embarrassed by being daft enough to chat up a female avatar, only to find it was a guy on the other end.

I'd also previously had another guy aggressively stalk me in Eve Online for a short time after I spurned his misplaced advances. Had zero interest in him, not once had I given him any hint that I was interested, he'd just conjured this fantasy up in his head. You just don't know who you're dealing with and what issues they have.

The great thing about Elite is there is a Solo mode to run to if you're feeling threatened, although I've mainly played Solo anyway due to being brought up on Frontier: Elite II in the mid-90s. I've only recently made the jump into open, but with the introduction of the Holo Me feature (assuming that it's forced and not optional), I'm in two minds as to whether I should wipe my save and create a male character, because it's only with the introduction of avatars that things can start getting complicated. You are immediately labeled as that person with that face and that body, and unfortunately (as I've found in the past) you start getting unwanted advances based on this.

There are always private groups. Some are more grown up than others, and I suppose you can always make your own and invite only those you trust to behave.

 

[Spaceburger]

Humm, buying gf.

 

[Pyrotiger]

I'm looking forward to flying round with a female holo-me. I don't know why.

I can gurantee I'll get absolute no annoying creepy weird behaviour.

From the NPCs in Solo

What's being forgot here is that in many ways men are different to other men and women are different to other women. Hell, even identical twins have many differences.

 

[[VR] optimal_909]

That's because I didn't talk about a struggle in there, I talked about a shift in rhetoric over time.

Okay, I read your earlier post and do get that unwanted reactions about looks and macho stuff like that are more than annoying - and also that it appears unavoidable. Fortunately, I haven’t seen/experienced anything like that though the only MMO I’ve ever played is Elite, and GTA (edit: though the latter isn't MMO). But saying that female players (even if they don't reveal their identity) don’t bring anything to the chemistry of the player group is simply not true, in my opinion.