How I Became The Gamer Chick
If it weren't for my
high-school crush I would never have become a gamer. I had always hung out with geeky guys, so it was no surprise when
in the middle of my sophomore year I fell head over heels in love with one of
them. He was a rabid Magic player, and
during lunch I would always watch him spiel with his friends. Thinking it would bring us closer, I begged
him to teach me, and at the beginning of junior year he finally agreed. I was thrilled. Ah, the wonders of unrequited teenage love.
Then I became the world's
worst Magic player.
I'll be completely honest
about this. I was this horrible,
stereotypical, Magic player girlfriend who sits around oohing and aahing at the
pretty pictures and asking "What does this card do?" in an innocent
voice. The first deck I made had no
real theme other than that I liked the flavor text. Magic led to real roleplaying; I started out on World of Darkess
and loved it, then moved on to D&D and the like. Later that year I ditched the boyfriend but kept the gaming
habit. The rest is history.
At the moment, my very
favorite RPG is Mage: The Ascension. Like
everything else White Wolf publishes, the combat and character creation systems
are so beautifully streamlined, and really allow you to get your mind off of
piddly details and onto creating a good character and telling an interesting
story. But the magic system is what
really blows me away...it's easily the coolest, most imaginative, most flexible
(yet practically munchkin-less) one I've come across. The concept is astonishing, the setting is cool...I could go on
for pages raving about this, but I won't!
(And yes, it used to be Shadowrun, but not playing that game for a long
time has caused me to rethink my tastes a little bit!)
My other favorite games
are the other World of Darkness settings, especially Werewolf and Vampire
(which I finally got to like after spending most of my gaming career making fun
of it). As mentioned before, I also
adore Shadowrun. And of course I like
D&D (3rd ed is the best yet if you ask me!), Star Wars, GURPS...heck,
they're all pretty good if you ask me!
I'll tell you what I don't
like about gaming, though. I'm sick of
the same old, standard "hack and slash" dungeon crawl that's all
combat and dice chucking and dullness.
When I role-play I want to do just that: build an interesting character
and be that person for awhile. So far
my experience has been too much "roll-playing" and not enough
"role-playing." I've been
lucky enough to get involved with two campaigns, one Mage and one GURPS, in
which the GMs and players think the same way I do, and let me tell you, life is
good!
And once again, I'll be
honest: I'm proud to be a gamer chick.
I'm a rare bird in the gaming community, and I think I have a unique
perspective on gaming to express. I'm
not the stereotypical nerdy AV club gamer boy, and I'm not going to pretend
that I am. (I'm a gamer, and I'm pretty
nerdy, but I was never in AV Club...*G*)
In these essays I'm going to talk frankly about women in gaming and the
problems and issues we may face. I'm
not a rabid feminist; I believe in equality for the sexes, not the superiority
of women, and the last thing I want this page to be is a thinly disguised
male-bashing venue. After all, 80% of
my friends are male; I'd better be tactful or I might suddenly find myself a
very unpopular person!
But that's enough about
me...let's talk about gaming!
Copyright (c) 2000 by Beth
Kinderman. This is my original work, so
please respect it.