While I don't disagree with anything, this has interested me as well for a long time. Not attempting to derail the thread, but never had a chance to say some thoughts I have on the matter.In fairness there can be a ton of factors that contribute to this state of things, and males tending towards extremes could play a slight - but obviously very insignificant - role aswell, although I find it hillarious to claim that there's any major relation between IQ and your skill in-game.
To just add a few more points:
1. AoE2 seems to have a weaker female pro-player community than, say, SC2, as in. there are comparatively more visible women in the community but there are fewer who have gotten actually really good at it, although this could potentially be explained by SC2 female players who haven't gotten super good at the game hiding their gender more frequently, due to that community being far more toxic.
2. On the cultural side, it seems that on average female players care less for the competitive aspect of videogames. Even if the average 'potential' between males and females is very similar or equal I'm not sure if, even if the playerbase was split 50/50 between genders, that the ratio among top players would also be equal then purely because of that
3. AoE2 pros are mostly people who had been playing this game for 10+ years, there are very few exceptions to this among top 30-50 players, and the acceptance for women playing videogames in 2010 was much lower compared to now.
I find this subject to be very fascinating personally, so if anybody were to disagree with anything of what I wrote I'd be happy to hear their opinion
One thing that stands out to me is an ego separation between men and women. Us guys have egos and some of ours are way too big. I think a big ego is a requirement to excel, believing somewhere you can always do better even if results don't show that for awhile. Deep down somewhere, I always felt that men have a strong need to feel superior to others in many things, the boss or "alpha male" for instance, and that's a driving factor. Look at twitch chat in some channels tbh, and how terms like chad which somehow come into existence. There's never a term regarding an 'alpha woman', or is there? It's usually something derogatory that I don't want to repeat.
While not all of these apply to every man, but us guys want to be great at sex for instance (obviously first thing to list), we want to be the genius, the funny guy, make the most money, so on. Games and getting good at them can be added somewhere in there. Usually this is in the younger days, all I know is I just cared about playing games for far too long from when I was 10 to late 20's. Spend so much time and desire becoming better and better, it is probably going to happen if one is flexible enough.
Then for a woman? Some women have huge egos for sure, but I think there's two things to consider tbh. There's a woman that is more of a feminine type (If this doesn't sound offensive, I'm sorry if it does to any. I don't know how else to say it atm) and then there's one more of a tomboy. Maybe a feminine woman is more into pursuing guys, trying to connect with someone and find that person to share their life with, they're looking more to be loved, understood, married, start a family so forth. Less about games/being superior in something (or different hobby altogether). But even with that last one, there is a certain dominant-subservient factor in relationships for instance. That kind of woman can still very well be the boss tbh as I used to know of one that wasn't a tomboy but makes it very clear to her husband that she leads the relationship. They were married for a few decades when I used to know of them, don't know now though.
For tomboys, this is just a thought of mine as I can't think of anything else (and have no real data/studies to back it up), but I think girls who become really good at games for instance, must have some similiar trait us men have -- that type of ego. By definition tomboys are more like a man, not necessarily need to be completely like one to do well in games, but just have some kind of driving quality/qualities (usually never one thing, but dunno) and interests that's more common in us guys if that makes sense. Those women are perhaps more likely to crossover into games and spend a lot of time in them, then later on they care about starting a family and so forth. Just a thought.
One girl who immediately comes to my mind being really good at games btw, is called Brea (she's kind of 'retired' now I think). She was called the Queen of DMC (considered #1 and was that good for years), and I believe she even had a hand in shaping the way you're supposed to play the game, inventing the "meta". One of her old, most famous vids to see her skills in action (don't know if any girls get almost 1 mil views for a gaming vid unless they're pokimane maybe, anyone know of others?):
Can't say I've seen many girls play games, but I've seen some. Never seen anything like this though, especially if anyone has played this game. The feat starting at 1:00 is impressive, because the developers made a device you're supposed to use to slow down time to not get hit by the lasers, while she's not even using it and not taking damage by using her skill and iframes (split second invincibility from game mechanics) perfectly. She had a friend who played a game much like Street Fighter that made my jaw drop as she seemed like she was/could become a pro, so there are some seriously skilled girl gamers out there. Curious about their background.
Also for a small fact with AoE as I don't how many know or remember this, but the highest rated player that was a girl was nearly or exactly 2200 back on zone, RoR_Kisz or something like that. No idea why she didn't go further, maybe life took over? I have no clue about the bulk of her story as she was much before my time.
I saw Judit Polgar mentioned before btw, and there's some interesting facts about her to those who may not know. Judit's father was a psychologist. He believed that genius is not born, but made, and trained them rigorously I'm sure. Judit and Susan Polgar have male GM titles, and Sofia is a WGM. They're called the Polgar sisters. Judit happened to become the best of them, but what's interesting about her is she was described as having "killer eyes" not due to beauty, but because of the way she looked at players and felt like a killer at the chessboard. Much like Bobby Fischer who was also said to give piercing looks (believe they've been compared), Mikhail Tal famously scaring a GM so much that he wore sunglasses vs Tal so their eyes wouldn't connect, or Alexander Alekhine who also gave a serious air of intimidation and has been said to look at the player. Just interesting that she has a trait that all 3 of those had, and all those men were world champions btw. May mean nothing, but I think it is something.
And on Hou Yifan as I saw her mentioned too, not only is she a GM but she's a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford (maybe still is or graduated). She's obviously one of the most intelligent women around, but maybe pursuing that is one reason why maybe she isn't the next Judit Polgar or something. Hard to tell. But I'm very sure the Asian work ethic is at work in her for both of those things just to say.
Didn't intend for this to be so long, but I'll stop. Hope I don't seem sexist with some things to others as well, just my honest thoughts on the matter.