Quote Originally Posted by Eldevern View Post
I get the point. The fact is my character is... just some kind of puppet and I am the puppeteer, even if I were playing a male character it wouldn't change. Or maybe by instinct I play a female character to keep the distance.
I'm sure there's some element of association. I have alts of both genders and I do feel less protective about what the male characters wear in terms of personally representing me - though still overall conservative (except occasionally more open shirts when it works for the outfit, and only on certain characters) and I'm more strongly "this is how the character would dress" and job gear is very rarely the answer for any of them. I wouldn't want to dress "silly" on any of them because I hate being silly.


On the issue of identifying with a character though, perhaps there are different types of that too. I think the "social identity" of characters-as-avatars works in a different way to the "emotional identity" of character-as-story-protagonist, because I've never had any trouble identifying with characters of any physical appearance - the emotion of the story is key and identifying with them comes from, I think, being made to feel the same emotion that the character would be feeling at a particular moment.

The most standout moments in gaming for me have been where that "player feeling the character's emotions" builds to a point - perhaps combined with established gameplay cues - that when it momentarily tricks your brain into thinking as that character, in that space, making an urgent decision with no thought of it being a game. The character's choice is your choice and you feel like you own the consequences. It's only happened twice, and neither of those characters were anything like me, but I felt how they were feeling.

But this is quite a digression.