Well, this seems appropriate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e52EpgiI3gk

Both, either, I don't care. It depends on which one I'd rather look at/listen to.

In WoW I tend to play males more often because a lot of the female characters annoy me. Too-sexy death screams, too-skimpy 'armour', etc.

In City of Heroes I have a female hero because she's a me-avatar and totally not annoying -- there are huge options for faces, makeup, clothing or lack thereof, and body type, so I can make her the way I want. And I have a male villain because he's hot as hell.

I usually take the time to look at stats and such as well. Although in Skyrim I will admit the first character I made was a female because her face was gorgeous (I am male, don't everybody gasp at my name now...) But then after I played a male second time round' I found out very quickly that the males took less damage...Idk why...I had the same armor and everything on, same weapons, took the same damage in hits...blah blah blah.
But I will ordinarly choose male because in a lot of games their health always seems to be better...

I am male. I usually play as male if it's a first-person game and you can't ever see the character because I feel as though I'm playing as myself, and I'm male.

However, I usually play as female if it's 3rd person and you can see the character. I have a few reasons (yeah, I've actually thought about this before, I'm nerdy like that):
1. I am pervy. I like boobs. Even pixel boobs. Between the choice of being able to see boobs or not see boobs, I will always choose to see boobs.
2. I like dainty, pretty faces too.
3. I like a female hero. I like women who are smart, strong, and kick ass. I'm attracted to this in real life, and I like it in my game too.
4. I like underdogs. Women have to fight harder for promotions, equal pay, etc. Sexism is still rampant in our culture, so I see a female hero as an underdog.
5. In a 3rd person game, I just see my character as a character in a story and not as myself, so I don't feel like I want the character to be male like me.

Most of the time i play a female character. I'm a guy myself, but for somehow i like to play females, especially in rpg's such as TES. One of the reasons is that you have more options. The female characters in Sacred 2 Fallen Angel have the options to my liking, as i like to play with magic. The magic character in SA2 is a high elf and a seraphim can use some divine magic. As for TES, that has to do with mods. And sometimes a game only has a female protagonist, like BloodRayne and Venetica, so you have no other choice. But sometimes i play a male character too, like in The Witcher, King's Bounty: The Legend, Risen, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Two Worlds II. Here you can only play with a male one, which is not a big deal.

I no longer play MMOs. But I don't mind admitting Ioften play female characters in third person games so I can have a prettier in-game avatar to stare at for x hours.

In my defense, that's not always the case. Take Saints Row the Third, in which I play a rough and tumble, three-piece-suit-wearing English gangster using the sliders from Hugh Laurie in SR2.

On the other hand, in Skyrim, I'm playing a female character. Sometimes, game content can make the difference--voice actors in Mass Effect games, for example, pretty much require I pick the female option.

I understand why some people would find oversexualized female player characters distasteful. For me it's less of an obstacle--I'm much more embarrassed for the obscene, over-the-top levels of violence we usually get in third person games. Though I guess I wouldn't have it any other way?

For a game like Mass Effect 1 with the female voice set of Jennifer Hale ( I think that's her name ) it makes me play the game as a serious no-nonsense badass, picking most of the badass dialogue except for the rare cases of twist your mustache evil. But in a game like Fallout 3 / Fallout: New Vegas that has no voice actress and hardly any difference in the game for what sex you choose, I'd rather just be blank-male-representation of what hero I wish I could be. There would have to be something substantial to make me pick a female character, and a minor change in stats wouldn't cover it. However, I imagine for a game like TERA which wouldn't have good female dialogue or acting, I would probably try a female because, look at the clothes they made. Clothes that show skin, or even look good covered up, color customization, hair, tattoos, etc.

I generally play each gender, with a preference for playing female characters, and I am female. If it has no effect on the gameplay, I admit to being fairly shallow about how my character looks. The first character I make is usually female - probably to act as a sort of author avatar - and then, if I can make an attractive male character, I often will. If I think either gender has ugly character models, I'll usually avoid it. For instance, I think most of the male characters in WoW are pretty ugly-looking (hyper-masculinity isn't very attractive to me - I like masculinity, but looking like a bodybuilder and that awkward slouch aren't very attractive), so I have no male WoW characters. In Dragon Age II, on the other hand, my favorite of my characters was male. If the gameplay is affected by gender, like in Diablo II, for example, I'll choose character type over gender. The druid is my favorite class, so I play a male character most of the time in D2.

I honestly like girls better, though it doesn't bother me to play a guy.

I prefer playing as a girl since I'm a girl. I feel more connected to my character that way and it's more personal... If that makes any sense. I hardly ever see the appeal of playing as a guy really. I don't know why, I just don't like it and I'm usually put off by a game if I don't get to chose my gender, and will only play it if I really... REALLY like the game.

Off-topic, but I like your avatar KKiryu. We sort of match. :P