How to write a male character?

[YuRui]

There's nothing wrong with men in stories that's been written by a woman even if you feel that way, I feel like it's a fresh take, since most games/novels I play/read are made by men, but to stay on topic, I'd say as long as the MC isn't a wuss, or isn't wishy washy with what he wants, then he'll be fine.

There's also the thing where you need to consider- is that if that MC is on a harem, or in a normal relationship, I always think as rance as an example, obnoxious at first, but then becomes deep over time, of course my example is pretty extreme, but that's how I'd like MC's to be like most of the time, of course- a toned down version would be nice.

And yeah, I'm talking about game perspectives, humans can be categorized, yes, but over time people change, it's not something that one can write about so casually.

 

[destroyergd]

My guess is that: more than finding balance between manly-ness and not-cliche-ness, you need to choose how much of each you want.
Gender is mostly a social construct, so what it is to be a man changes between different cultures, societys, groups, time and bla-bla-bla. The more famous (and cliche) a trope is, the more relatable a character wil be. At last (as some stated), personality/identity is a bunch of things mixed, not only gender.

If you feel like reading, there's this Psychology book, specifically about men:

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[Oh my]

Gender is mostly a social construct

No it is not.

Masculinity and femininity are physical and spiritual qualities generally exhibited by men and women.
All of which is influenced by sex.
Masculinity and femininity would not exist otherwise.

Sex genes aren't the only thing that exists, so other pressures can influence qualities.
Like exerting social force on men to make them more feminine and women to make them more masculine.

Without subversives leveraging false accusations on others of what they themselves are guilty in order to falsely justify propagandizing people against their nature, men and women would generally exhibit their respective physical and spiritual qualities more clearly.

Left to make their own decisions with no interference, men and women exhibit MORE difference: not less.

All of this depreciating everyone's quality of life for the sake of equality of outcome.

 

[Oh my]

I'm creating a game (with a male protagonist of course) but I find myself stuck sometimes. I feel as if he's not "manly" enough. And I don't mean manly as in some sigma male gigachad, I mean manly, as in a man. Obviously if I were a guy I wouldn't have this issue, but I'm not a guy

So, how do men typically act? Are they self-centered narcissists? Are they closeted gays? Are they neckbeard gamers? The nice guys that finish last? Or... a sigma male gigachad? There are many types of men but I don't want to make the MC's dialogue seem like "This was obviously written by a woman >.>" and actually make an MC that people can relate to. How?

What is a man's interest?

Is this guy interested in soccer?
Cooking, maybe?

Is he interested in teasing his friends to get a laugh?
The way men typically socialize is by teasing their friends for all their imperfections with humour: yet they all hang out with eachother day by day: more aware of their own weaknesses.
This has been the way men socialize forever, since it's useful for when shit hits the fan.

Maybe introvert: strong silent type.
Maybe extrovert: bit of a joker or philosopher.

Is he interested in girls?
It's a porn game, so... you can imagine a sweaty soccer player turning his head away from practice when he sees a girl that draws his attention.
And when his friends call his attention, he waves them away and jogs up to the girl.
And they probably chuckle to themselves or yell something at him to embarrass him to make him blush and rub his head.

Men tend to be more ballsy and make stupid mistakes, making an idiot of themselves around girls especially.
Going the extra mile, in a way: to make them laugh or impress them.

Men tend to have more of a focus on one thing at a time.

You know how people tend to change their tone of voice with kids?
Men tend to behave more gently with women, and then turn into a liability again when they talk to their male friends.


Rough and tumble play of all varieties never really ends with men.
There's a kind of excitement, humour, and practice that comes from finding and honing in on the limits of anything.
Men want to be effective.
And they usually want a wife (who wants to draw the attention of an effective man).


Men tend to be disagreeable.
Women tend to be agreeable.
Men tend to be interested in things.
Women tend to be interested in people.
Men tend to dream of saving the princess.
Women tend to dream of taming the beast.

There's a whole lot that can be said about it, but it's probably best for you to watch men in action.
And then create a male character that you yourself find interesting or compelling.
Someone that turns you on, maybe.

 

[Oh my]

Men and women are different.

And are COMPLEMENTARY.

Always has been.

 

[destroyergd]

Masculinity and femininity are physical and spiritual qualities generally exhibited by men and women.
All of which is influenced by sex.
Masculinity and femininity would not exist otherwise.

The book I quoted would agree with you in this sense (at least as a possible interpretation).
Yet, while sex it's inherently biological, gender would be it's social counterpart. --> There's a long debate between about it, that stems from essentialism versus culturalism, idealism vs constructivism.

Now, in my views, anything spiritual it's inherently sexless/genderless, because my understanding of "spirit" includes "non-material, spaceless and timeless".

But even if there is this essence within the spirit that gives meaning to gender, and even if there shouldn't be any "social subversion" that jeopardizes it in any level, for the sake of writing a character, one should/could think and write about this social/cultural thing, as it is a part of society.

 

[Oh my]

The book I quoted would agree with you in this sense (at least as a possible interpretation).
Yet, while sex it's inherently biological, gender would be it's social counterpart. --> There's a long debate between about it, that stems from essentialism versus culturalism, idealism vs constructivism.

Now, in my views, anything spiritual it's inherently sexless/genderless, because my understanding of "spirit" includes "non-material, spaceless and timeless".

But even if there is this essence within the spirit that gives meaning to gender, and even if there shouldn't be any "social subversion" that jeopardizes it in any level, for the sake of writing a character, one should/could think and write about this social/cultural thing, as it is a part of society.

Gender (masculinity and femininity if it is anything) is not a social counterpart of sex.
Broad shoulders is masculine because it is a quality exhibited by men.
Broad hips is feminine because it is a quality exhibited by women.
Behavioral differences between men and women are also substantial.
You must consider the differences between men and women to determine what masculinity and femininity are: devoid of external influence.
Otherwise, masculinity and femininity do not exist.
Gender cannot be a social counterpart because masculinity and femininity would not even be defined.

 

[bingbongabcdefgkjfgldfdkg]

When you were 14 years old. How did you think (or wanted to be) when you grow up?

That's why in 99% of all games here with male mc follow these rules:
1. Big, tall, handsome and muscular.
2. Horse cock that never softens.
3. You are rich, or become rich.
4. Your father dies so you can fuck your mom/sister/aunt/landlord etc.
5. Girls are retards and serve only as magnets for your magic dick.
6. You have hot sisters and mother. Everything female is hot and perfect.
7. You are masculine as fuck and your butthole oozes testosteron.
8. You can fight and win anyone and you never show any fear.
9. 50 year old ladies look 20 years old. And 18 years look like 12.
10. You are often a secret agent, cop or something else manly and cool.

If you are russian you slap on open world and fuck things up badly.
If you are asian you create these long and stupid inner monologues about rise cakes and how your life sucks.

Almost everyone goes in for the money. Then dissapears when they don't have the patience to wait and lack skills and work ethics.

Don't do any of these and let me choose my cock size

 

[Sphere42]

Are you looking to create an individual, an actual character? Are you trying to appeal to a specific audience and thus looking for more stereotypical/fast-tracked responses and not a full-fledged personality? Or are you trying to create a self-insert vessel where not actively breaking immersion is the most important aspect?

Basically if this character were a woman, definitely 100% a woman written by a woman, but not close to your own personality, how would you write them? Whatever works there should work perfectly fine for men too unless you need to feature minutiae of biology or realistic introspection on present-day social norms. For example men can get spontaneous erections without thinking or experiencing anything sexual, and those can cause the tip of the penis to rise above the waistband of the underwear which is very awkward and potentially painful. Not to mention how you feel when that happens on a crowded train with an attractive woman sitting next to you. I would not expect a woman to accurately describe that experience. But "do you skip out on your part-time job to join your friends at the beach" is a personality question not a sex/gender question unless you're sampling a large fraction of the population.

 

[Oh my]

1. Big, tall, handsome and muscular.

Haha not in the incest genre.
Only 1 game comes to mind: Wicked Paradise.
20% is normal sized men that even I could beat into the floor, 40% are totally not children, and the other 40% are children.

I don't think that's close to what we get even with incest excluded.

7. You are masculine as fuck and your butthole oozes testosteron.

Like Danny Devito.

8. You can fight and win anyone and you never show any fear.

Male MC gets his ass handed to him by women 99% of the time.
60% is loss and bail out by women, 10% is hospitalization, and the other 30% is win.

10. You are often a secret agent, cop or something else manly and cool.

Half the time male MC is a dependent loiterer that requires a Walkthrough to maybe have a chance at dodging pussy for whatever reason.
The other half he's a coma victim with magical powers and aliens and shit to explain his 'dependent awesomeness'.


The rest is pretty on point, though.

If men are the majority of Devs, most likely bending themselves into knots to prove that they aren't sexist or some stupid shit, then maybe female Devs can help fix this spineless embarrassment by making actually attractive male MCs in games that aren't bent on emasculation.

 

[destroyergd]

devoid of external influence

That's the point: there isn't, and there's never been, one person alone that was devoid of external influence. Everyone exists within a given context. Development itself, not only behavioral but biological too, it's dependent said influence.
To idealize an essence (gender, conscience, love, etc.) in itself is okay, possibly a good thing to study. But, to believe said essence to be defining of anyone is, frankly (and I apologize for being rude), immature.

An example is that: what defines masculinity - specially in behavior - changes from society to society. Actually, the whole concept of gender changes too, even if the biological remains the same.
--> The Amazon Rain Forest in South America was named after a indigenous tribe where women were warriors (thus considered like the Amazons from greek mithology).

 

[woody554]

short sentences. say only what you have to and nothing more. show opinions by action rather than verbally analysing them. (as in, don't make him ramble about stuff but instead make him do a selfless act without explanation.)

show restraint. while it might not be obvious from surface, we learn from a very young age to restrain our constant flashes of testosterone induced agression. because when we don't, violence happens. women get often shit about being crazy a couple of days a month, but the reality is we men are crazy every single day since puberty. so most of us this constant restraint on, keeping our emotions under a lid. a manly man manages to do that. a weak man lashes out.

***

after reading other comments, there are a couple of things I'd like to comment on.

a lot of comments went straight to sexuality and picking up women, but I think that's a complete waste of time for trying to understand 'manliness'. men are usually fully themselves only in male company or in solitude, and the second there are women involved we tune that shit down for both consideration and manipulation. so looking for 'manliness' from that performative context is just waste of time. it's not there.

the point someone made about responsibility is a good angle. it also works both ways, for a responsible character and maybe even more for the one that's avoiding responsibilities. the internal wound of being a man is often about that, either from the desperate need to shoulder them or the self-loathing and fragility from avoiding them. a lot of the typical fragile male ego bs is connected to that.

a man who murders his family and finally himself does it typically to 'save' them from how he's failed at his responsibility as a man or a husband. it's 100% fucked up and stupid, but it arises directly from the expectation to shoulder responsibilities.

there's also an aspect of deliberate stupidity to being a man. the 'man stuff'. there's really no good way to explain it to a woman, but the thing is it just makes us happy. hitting your best friend in the balls, endangering yourself for laughs in general. there's a part of us that needs it from time to time. might not be very useful for writing, but if you wanna show guys having guy time that's an element that should 100% be there.

 

[Geralt_R]

So, how do men typically act?

There is no "typical" man in my opinion, men are diverse, you can find the self-centered outgoing womanizing extroverted chads... as well as you can find sensitive introverted art lovers who even like the occasional Jane Austen movie (without being gay). Actually, 18% of romance novel readers are apparently (straight) males. So there are is a non trivial number of men who like (kitschy) romance even, which is usually believed to be something only women like.

A good male MC should be a) smart b) not a creep c) not a complete pushover or passive person (there should always be options to avoid any kind of domination/submission from either a love interest or the MC).

Very broadly speaking quite a few men are up for casual adventures with pretty women, but not all of them are controlled by their private parts and jump on anything that moves. So not all men would cheat on a girlfriend/wife just because a stunning woman makes a move on them.

So it entirely depends on what kind of story you want to tell. You can literally write any man you, as a woman, would like. If you aim to create an MC that men will like I would assume that an assertive, smart, good looking character (but please, for the love of god, no horse appendage...) with a sense of humor that won't be pushed around by others will do the trick. Without being a creep or asshole. There are those of course who prefer nasty and mean characters who demean women and control them, but I assume (hope) that a smart, nice (nice to the LI) and yet assertive guy is generally preferred. And please no night time visits... peeking in the shower... that is something 13-year-olds may think of.

 

[junkanon]

Stories are often about archetypes, hence why structures like the Hero's Journey exist. Young person lives a normal life, is found by a wise mentor, refuses training/traveling, is forced to go, is trained, travels, master saves them and dies, hero finds his courage, faces the enemy, wins, everyone is happy, but the hero has forever changed.

Is this The Lord of the Rings? Star Wars: A New Hope? Epic of Gilgamesh? Star Wars: Rebels? The Major Arcana from Tarot ordered? It's all of them.

So saying "there's no such thing as a regular man" is true, but it's useless in this context. Good stories about people change them. The most common stories have the person showing a character failure, which is shown to be repeatedly bad for them (in male protagonist games it's usually being afraid of girls. in NTR games it's usually wanting their gf to fuck other men but never acting on it. In corruption female games it's usually naivety). The story, then, challenges the main character in ways to fix that character flaw. If the character persists on the flaw, they're punished. If they start acting to fix it, their life improves.

This kind of structure is very well known and it feels right when you use it. Then we get to pacing, figuring out what the character wants, supporting cast, how many jokes and 4th wall breakings can you fit in one scene, etc, etc.

 

[khumak]

There's nothing wrong with men in stories that's been written by a woman even if you feel that way, I feel like it's a fresh take, since most games/novels I play/read are made by men, but to stay on topic, I'd say as long as the MC isn't a wuss, or isn't wishy washy with what he wants, then he'll be fine.

There's also the thing where you need to consider- is that if that MC is on a harem, or in a normal relationship, I always think as rance as an example, obnoxious at first, but then becomes deep over time, of course my example is pretty extreme, but that's how I'd like MC's to be like most of the time, of course- a toned down version would be nice.

And yeah, I'm talking about game perspectives, humans can be categorized, yes, but over time people change, it's not something that one can write about so casually.

I would say the simplest way to put it is that generally women use sex to get what they want. For men, sex IS what we want so we use everything else to get sex. And yes, women may want sex too, but it's guaranteed that they can get that when they want it. So it's more often used as a tool to get the other things they want.

 

[Diconica]

I'm creating a game (with a male protagonist of course) but I find myself stuck sometimes. I feel as if he's not "manly" enough. And I don't mean manly as in some sigma male gigachad, I mean manly, as in a man. Obviously if I were a guy I wouldn't have this issue, but I'm not a guy

So, how do men typically act? Are they self-centered narcissists? Are they closeted gays? Are they neckbeard gamers? The nice guys that finish last? Or... a sigma male gigachad? There are many types of men but I don't want to make the MC's dialogue seem like "This was obviously written by a woman >.>" and actually make an MC that people can relate to. How?

The best advice I can give you is ask several males how they would respond to the situation. That or find one male that most closely resembles the character type you are trying to create and ask them. That's what I do for women and I know a number of authors that do the same-thing. Some of us keep track of those list of things we ask. So that we can use them ask characer types in multiple stories. It saves on asking each and every time.

Here is why that's the best advice:
Well the way men act has change a lot especially in the US and Europe. I'm 50+ Most the men between 18 and 30 today would be considered sissies by the generation I grew up with.
Back then guys used to walk on the side of the curb when escorting a woman along a road way. That way if water splashes you can provide some protect, same for other debris. General common courtesy women a car door, pulling back a chair, standing to give a woman your seat ...
Men's colors were Red,yellow, orange,green,blue brown, white and black and grey or silver. We don't generally use collars like mauve or peach or apricot or whatever colors. We'd use blueish green before using turquoise. If we did use turquoise it was in reference to the stone / mineral not the color.
We in general had shop and wood working in school. So most of us knew how engines work and how to do the basics of car maintenance if not quite a bit more. In my case a hell of a lot more.
You in general were supposed to know what you were talking about or keep the mouth shut. We in general don't like being corrected because we stuck our foot in our mouth or showed our ignorance on a topic. Can't say the same about the current last generation. It seems to be a hobby of their to do the opposite.

That said we had different types of men back then as well. We still had nerds plenty of them. By this time most of them had lost the packet protectors of the 1950s. Even though they were nerds most of them were probably more manly than 80% of the men we have today in the US and Europe.

As for neckbeards there are two types of those. The educated ones and the less successful variety of guy with little education.
You can look in tech news and see quite a few of them. You can also look in retail stores and police blotters and see the other.

Then there are a hole slew of x-military that fall in between stuff. Some times I don't shave for months and then I do. I have 4 science backgrounds including CS. So I hit the nerd side of shit pretty hard but I also rock climbs, ski, sky dive, martial arts, I like the out doors shooting, hunting camping ... I've even been on the back of a bull in a rodeo. I've built house, I cook, rebuilt cars engines, body works... There was a point at one time I held over 40 different licenses all in my name. I just like learning new shit all the time. I haven't stopped been that way my hole life. I know several other people like me.

The truth of the matter is men can be anything skill wise it just depend on their ambition, drive, desires. In general if someone isn't interested in something they won't learn it. My son keeps telling himself math is hard he has no interest in it. So he sucks at math. Which is the opposite of myself. There is a limiting factor in skills though and that is how smart they are IQ. A person with a 70 IQ is never going to be a rocket scientist, nuclear engineer, doctor, or brain surgeon.

They call a lot of things/people men these days.
Personally being a man requires two primary things the Y chromosome and the right state of mind.
If I was to say it in legal terms, "It requires the Y Chromosome and the right state of mind but is not limited to just those two aspects."

The state of mind.
The way men and women make choices is fundamentally different many cases. There are people that break the norm but even in those people you can still find the primary rule still in place.
There is a reason for it we were built with two different purposes. Our physiology is different. We average different amounts of body mass, fat and so on. Different nutrients are better for one vs the other. Estrogen vs Testosterone. Our body chemistries differ. We have different types and amounts of nerves in our bodies. The spinal cord differs because of that. Which has different connection to the brain stem. While our brains are quite similar in appear an overall operation the fine details of the two would be like comparing M1 CPU to an Intel CPU.

Men over millions of years were the primary hunter and protector and the responsiveness needed for that role is demonstrated in our reaction speeds and brains. It effects us in a number of ways such as what we find funny, enjoyable many other aspects.

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"The authors found that men were significantly more often reported as having higher responses to positive stimuli in the left amygdala (amongst other structures), while women were reported as being more responsive to negative stimuli in the same region." We are in some ways wired backwards from one another.

 

[Jaike]

Honestly this letter sounds like someone in denial.

One of the things the person is complaining about is that "inclusion of experiments assessing nonheterosexual subjects may add noise in sexual preference-encoding regions, further impairing sensitivity for true differences. " Sounds like they are fishing very hard.

And even then, the two 90s studies only mentioned a small difference. But as always media turns the smallest snowball into an avalance and people eat it as if it was "absolute truth".

So in this case regardless of whom is right they are still squabbling over pebbles. The only thing we know for certain is that those that believe the difference to be "massive or absolute" are just incorrect because no study ever claimed that to begin with.

Maybe, can't really tell how good their methodological objections are but it looks like the supposed effects are very small. I guess even sexologists get cranky when people shit on their favourites kinks and pet theories. Seems these guys really like sexual dimorphism, maybe they're furries?

Stories are often about archetypes, hence why structures like the Hero's Journey exist. Young person lives a normal life, is found by a wise mentor, refuses training/traveling, is forced to go, is trained, travels, master saves them and dies, hero finds his courage, faces the enemy, wins, everyone is happy, but the hero has forever changed.

Is this The Lord of the Rings? Star Wars: A New Hope? Epic of Gilgamesh? Star Wars: Rebels? The Major Arcana from Tarot ordered? It's all of them.

Wrong, that sequence isn't true for the Epic of Gilgamesh and The Lord of the Rings. And that demonstrates the weakness of those schemes of "universal archetypes", it's more bout cramming stories into a frame than really analysing them.

 

[Diconica]

Pretty sure this was already

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.

Some men are like that and some women are also like that. But not all.

Debunked no. People trying to cast shade on it because they don't like the implication it has? Yes.
To disprove it they would need to show that they got different result performing the same experiment or that there was a flaw in the experiments method.

Doing something different and getting different results doesn't disprove the first experiments validity.
Lets make this simple: Research A uses a set of stimuli {e,f,g}, Research B uses a set of stimuli {j,k,l} they get different results.
The only thing proven by it is that different stimuli create different results.

That being the case if A's results showed men and women were different then that would still hold true regardless what B's result is. All B proved is that some things men and women respond similarly on. That's something we already know.

One good way to look and see if a research is worth a shit see where funding comes from. Also read the purpose of the research. If the results are incidental to the research then it is more likely to be correct. So if you specifically find someone trying to do research on the similarities and differences of male and females that is less likely to be accurate than the guy trying to cure some illness or figure out why they are having different results with something or another.

Just remember 85% of research papers are shit! It's probably higher than that. The reason is a failed system of peer review.
Everyone wants to be the person that discovered or proved something but not so much the person that validates others work.

There is a big reason they are trying to disprove anything that shows differences in male and female brains workings. It would mean it isn't possible for a female to be in a male or vice versa. All those psychologist and psychiatrist would be called out for preying on the LGBT community. Then you have the plastic surgeons who are making a killing off it also. So you have a large part of the medical industry that has made a large amount of money off of convincing or going along with the idea a mind can be in the wrong body. 2019 $267,000,000 just in sex reassignment surgery in the US. 2018 globally it was nearly 1 billion USD. That doesn't include counseling, hormones and other drugs. $50 - $200 per session for counseling average between 40K and 50K per year per person.

Then you have the political aspect of it. It's been made into a fairly polarizing issue. So there are political backers involved in the issues. Yep, money makes it into research for political reasons. I wish there was a way to prevent it but there really isn't.

 

[Diconica]

Write him as a woman, but then add in logic and reason.

(Sorry had to do the reverse 'As Good as it Gets' Jack Nicholson line there.)

Seriously. Men past their 20's usually hide their emotions, as showing emotion isn't manly. Sad but true. Also, showing emotions leads to discussion, and we don't want that. We want to come home from work, grab a beer, have dinner, and not think. We like sports, or games, or tv shows, as we can do those without thinking, just relaxing.

Also, every woman we see is judged on how hot she is. After that, we worry about personality. But first reaction is always on looks, be it face or body, or both.

A heterosexual man also gets the job, the car, the clothes, for one reason. To get women. At least in the teens and 20's. After that it starts to change a little bit

I agree. Men do that.
Not sure what to think about these individuals that close themselves off in their parents basements and spend their money on games and manga and so on. Can't exactly call them men. They don't have the mentality.
It's like someone forgot to add a spine, ambition and a willingness to fight for something better.

 

[Deleted member 229118]

Not sure what to think about these individuals that close themselves off in their parents basements and spend their money on games and manga and so on. Can't exactly call them men. They don't have the mentality.
It's like someone forgot to add a spine, ambition and a willingness to fight for something better.

Usally psyhological damage.
At least in my case as i was a guy who drown his misery in video games.
It tooks decade's(And i am still nowhere nearly fixed) to undo the damage of being bullied did to my ability to trust and feel confident(I am according to the books in the second of the 3 phases. Arrogance.
The phases seem to be: Self-loathing, Arrogance, Acceptance)

I find that most people(regardless of gender) that dont function in sociaty tent to either have:
A server mental illness, a very bad childhood or as in my case: both.

It is my first believe that sociaty refuseall to acknowledge criminals as problems and instead blame the victem is a major cause of the weaking of the male gender.
Fighting back is being seen as wrong.
And i am going to tell anyone who believe fighting back is wrong to die in a pirana pool.