I've come late to the female character discussion and maybe the attempt is futile but I'd like to appeal to Brink to prioritize including female characters within the near future. While it is true that in many games there are no female characters I cannot think of any deeply customizable MMOs that do not include women. In fact I cant really think of any MMOs regardless of graphics quality or customization quality that do not have a female option. I'm confused by the claim that including women would have excluded some amount of customization. After all if one of two sixes is entirely excluded then it isn't very customizable for anyone who wants to create a female character. I have read the other comments and questions on this forum regarding this (probably not all of them, but many) and I am also confused by the strong division between the side advocating female representation and the side stoutly defending the choice to axe female characters. Call me an idealist but I am surprised to find a less than welcoming reception to the idea that there should be some female representation in the game. Maybe I am spoiled by my gamer guy-pals who are thankfully very pro-female prowess in the gamerverse. My clan was actually looking at an alternative to APB and my clan leader (a female) was checking out Brink as an option. I cannot say that I am not still interested in the game, but I am very disappointed in the absence of a female option. It is difficult to explain to a widely male creator and consumer base why this would be so disappointing. However, if you imagine Halo, Gears of War, Call of Duty, or any other game awesomeness and then remove the option to be male...you'll get an inkling of why we girl-gamers are disappointed that this cutting edge MMO has chosen not to represent us at all.

Brink is focused very much on the rpg aspect and as said before though female char would be refreshing they are not essential, you wont see yourself during gameplay (the reason most are buying the game!), female chars would essentially double the workload of an admittedly small team of animators and 3d modlers. And a DLC that contained the same kind of customization already in game but for females would break the game because it would cost 30 - 40 american dollars and would not be seen as essential and thus would split the community in those who bought the update and those who did not.
Brink is to close to release, if it is not pushed back, to basically make customization again as all clothes, features, tattos, statures, action animations, voices, and single player would need to be remade.
And Heavy women would look VERY strange if their size was comparable to Heavy males.
Primarily men play games and since video game companies need to make games fast and appeal to a large audience they had to comprimise.
Fallout is the only game I wouldnt play of the above due to its TPS nature. GoW scenery and enimies are epic enough that I never look at my char.

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