My experience, being that I play a lot of WoW which is probably the game with the most women playing it, is:
1: They're generally no better or worse than any guy at what they do, but the relatively low percentage of female players, particularly raiders, means the ones that perform poorly often create a bad impression of the gender as a whole. There are more 'good' male gamers because there are more male gamers, simple demographics.
2: It's a complete fallacy that they're better at 'carebear' roles like healing or, say support (medic, engineer etc). No, they don't multitask better. This is a commonly held misconception, but the reality is that males react better under strain and can focus on the team's goals rather than solely their own. That said, some of my guild's highest DPSers are women. They are incredibly nitpicky, precise and reliable once they've got something figured out, they seem to enjoy having a routine more and will not deviate from it, whereas guys will try something different if they start getting bored. Men need more discipline to keep them in line.
3: Initially, they're a novelty to have around in a male-dominated area, and might get preferential treatment at first, but when the chips are down and the stakes are high, that changes quite quickly.
4: While, technically, they tend to perform at the same level overall, they can't seem to handle stress, pressure and critique as well as a male, they tend to take things personally and they tend to catalyse and foment emo and drama as a result. I have witnessed, in a prior guild, a female breaking down in tears when chewed out for a failure, which led to her boyfriend who also played throwing his toys out and this resulted in a rift within the guild between two camps that never quite healed. It's not always the case, but generally they need gentler treatment, which is not always possible. Female members of our 'progression' team are therefore rarer - not because we exclude them but because they choose not be - even though we're a lot more laid back than most raiding guilds.
Anyway, here's Skurm's Guide to Being a Girl Gamer:
1: Stop harping on about it. Having a vageen doesn't make you special.
2: See 1.
Originally Posted by sycogrim
Although they usually mess up a lot worse...
