Why “instead”? Isn’t “why would it be female?” on equal grounds with “why would it be male?”? Don’t all characters start as genderless, and then you decide one way or the other?
No, I would definitely hope that they don't start as genderless. Because gender isn't a cosmetic difference, like hair color or (for the most part) skin color.

Everything I've written starts with that as a given; I didn't make it explicit because I'd just assumed anybody who'd be reading this was already at the same point, equality-of-the-sexes-wise. I'd hope that on a nerd's blog in 2010, we don't need to keep asserting that women and men are equally capable of doing 90% of anything. (The rest being childbirth and asking for directions am I right fellas?!)

The sexes are different, and that's a very good thing. If you've spent any time as a guy surrounded by only guys, you understand how much that's a good thing. I've heard the same from women friends after going to bachelorette parties and showers.

And no, the difference isn't the simple and predictable "men are physically fit and strong and men are gentle and caring." But there are physical differences that would be foolish to ignore, and mental differences that would actually make games better if we all were to acknowledge them. Instead of insisting that men and women are interchangeable — that's not progressive, it just brings everybody down to the same stupid lowest-common-denominator action hero level.

Characters in so-called AAA games "default" to male because AAA games are still predominantly adolescent male fantasies. They're made by dudes making games that they believe other dudes will enjoy. That template keeps getting repeated over and over. That's the issue, and swapping female for male isn't going to fix that. I'd rather see a genuine female perspective to a AAA game instead of just putting lipstick on the guy from Gears of War and saying it was progress. I thought No One Lives Forever was great, and everything I saw of Starcraft Ghost seemed like it was headed in the right direction, too. What little I've seen of Mirror's Edge gives me the impression it's enhanced by having a female character.

Actually, it even annoys me when in a game males are melee and females are magic users, for instance. I want the option to be female melee or male caster, too!
Among the games with that kind of class division that I've played, the ones that are that gender-indiscriminate are the ones that have the most shallow character development. It looks like Diablo 3 will let you choose from male or female versions of each class. Diablo 2 said that assassins and sorcerers were always female, barbarians and paladins were always male.

Now, the Diablo games aren't paragons of character development, but I think Diablo 3's method sounds like a step down. The classes in the older game felt like characters, even if they were arbitrary and shallow.