Still, I’ll have to reserve judgement until I see the first black Disney princess.

Ab Normal: I’ve always had a fondness for Dark Haven figurines… there’s a lot of variety and I can usually find a fig that closely matches the PC I’m interested in at the time. God I miss painting figs, I had an awesome collection (my fav was a fem dark elf rogue, who had two potions on her hip - I painted one red and one blue - in honor of Diablo…) … but I can’t afford to buy all the paints, figs, carrycase, brushes, primers all over again… sigh.

Moira: I’m more of a Basch fan to tell the truth… the whole tortured, rugged, knight stichk, sigh… and he’s the only one with a decent ass to look at, IMO.

“3) For the love of hell people, don’t have those main characters fit only into the steryotypical healer, mage, the dangerous looking pseudo-fem-fatale, or any character that shouldn’t be expected to actually do damage when they attack an enemy physically (because if I’ve got limited MP the last thing I want is to waste it and I hate having to choose between MP and attacking for piddling damage). And please please please no more Yordas.”

That’s what I love about FF12, you get to specialize the crap out of the characters. Like you could have all the guys be support if you wanted and all the girls with swords and shields or what ever. I prefer an even mix of swords, range and magic personally, but that’s the beauty of the system - you get to choose. AND the fact that there are an EVEN number of males and females. It has ALWAYS irked me that there were always more guy characters than female and that the females always seemed to be weaker physically but more magically inclined than the males… granted their evasion skills were usually kick ass, but then again they have to be since all the monsters seem to want to pick on the females anyways! Grrr.

“In pen and pencil D&D, every single time I have had a male GM, my character has been raped. Do with that what you will. That’s why I’m the GM now.

Jesus Christ, what?! I’m trying to imagine any of my DMs (all men, three different groups, although some overlap between who is there) doing that and I can’t. I don’t think it would even cross their minds as something to be done.”

Yeah, I agree with Sojfn. Granted I’ve never gamed without my father, brother or boyfriend (now ex), so maybe that’s why. Though my first character was in my dad’s campaign and he did the typical “damsel in distress” stitck which irked the hell out me (I wanted a super kewl entrance that was empowering but dad couldn’t have that… I guess he’s the only one allowed to be a power-gamer in the family, meh! … I mean, who wants to be the dumb noble chick would got kidnapped by a bunch of giant spiders in the anciet temple? At least I wasn’t the dumb warrior guy who touched the statue guardians and woke them up!!! *ROTFLH from the memory*

My dad has a tool box and a gazillion old tools - most of which are either rusted or lost in the void - It’s not organized and it’s impossible to find a screw driver when you need it and even if you do it’s usually not the right screw driver or the right size. I don’t even know what he keeps those tools for, sigh… to feel macho I guess *dur look, I have a tool box with actual tools that I never ever use* Meanwhile whenever he’s trying to do something he inevitably asks me for my hammer/screwdriver thing, cause it’s NOT lost, NOT rusted and actually fairly useful… though the purple floral pattern does tend to through him off at first.

I really only bought the damn thing cause I was at the checkout and I remembered that I needed screwdrivers and a hammer for the project I was working on and there it was. I do miss my old tool kit though… the screw drivers were magnitized so that the screws didn’t keep fall off and getting lost.

The tool itself is very useful, why they thought they had to put the frilly floral patterns on it is beyond me.

No, they didn’t cadge their boyfriend’s PSP. It is theirs. You can tell it’s theirs because it is fucking pink.

Ok, so, not a gamer - but when it comes to my computer stuff, I’ve found that Strawberry Shortcake stickers, Princess Leia wallpapers and other references to girlhood in the 80’s does the trick just as well.

One little 3.5-yr old girl friend of my son flatly refused to play with Lego until her mum found a set that included pinks and purples.

Now, I’m not saying raising feminist children isn’t hard, but the Lego enthusiast in me would like to argue that if you get them Lego Quatros before they reach 6 months, then any refusal to play Legos at age 3.5 will probably be extremely short lived, if it happens at all. My neice is 3 and sooooooo into princesses and I cannot imagine her ever refusing to play with Legos - ever. It would be like refusing to go the the park because the slide isn’t pink.

Just get rid of the things we play your games *in spite of*.

As someone who might be a gamer if it was easier to find games that didn’t take me out of my fun zone by annoying me beyond belief - WORD.

I just hosted a game night at my library (it went beautifully, btw) and you have no idea how happy I was to be able to say “Nothing rated older than T allowed for TEEN game night!” simply because it meant 1) I would be a lot less tempted to throw something heavy at the screen and 2) that I wouldn’t have to worry as much about girls feeling even less welcome and boys feeling like it’s ok to sexist.

I just bought a new tool from the craft store which punches holes and sets eyelets and snaps…it has a deep rose-pink handle…I wonder if the company that made it was afraid that women wouldn’t but it if it didn’t look “girlyâ€? enough.

See, now that I find kinda funny.

As a scrapbooker, I know that the eyelet setter put out by the Crate and Barrel of the industry (having a hard time coming up with good analogies, sorry) - Making Memories - is just plain silver like any normal tool - such as the exacto knife it resembles. It’s meant for a variety of eyelet sizes, so the top screws on and off - similar to bits on a drill. Plus, you need a hammer to use it.

So, yeah, We R Memory Keepers probably thought the normal way of setting eyelets would sound scary to a lot of women and so they came up with a new design that was non-threatening in a variety of ways.

So, I guess I mostly find it funny because it lets me be a geeky snob about my own tools.

Yes, I am shallow.

Jesus Christ, what?! I’m trying to imagine any of my DMs (all men, three different groups, although some overlap between who is there) doing that and I can’t. I don’t think it would even cross their minds as something to be done.

The guys I game with are all awesome, though. So are all the women. Much love to my groups.

Vossler was way hotter than Vaan. I was pissed when I figured out he was going to sell me out. Bah!

What do you expect? This is a Final Fantasy game, there’s almost an unwritten rule that the cutest guy has to be evil (or maybe that’s just me).

And Sephiroth’s the cutest. But I agree, Balthier’s hot.