Eat, Drink, and be Mary!

King has worked as a bartender and a bouncer, but her true passion has always been street fighting. (Also: wine. She loves wine). She earned fame in the fighting world by defeating a well-known Muay Thai champ, but she felt the need to portray herself as a man in order to be taken seriously as a fighter. (To this day, it’s considered bad luck for women to step into a Muay Thai ring.) When she made her debut in Art of Fighting, her gender was kept hidden from players and the arcade flyer even used male pronouns to describe her. Although she continues to dress sharply in more recent games, her appearance has become less masculine with time. She’ll happily wear a dress when the situation calls for it and she’s a recurring member on the Women Fighter’s Team in the King of Fighters series.

Naoto Shirogane was orphaned at a young age and raised by her grandfather. She spent her formative years reading detective novels and assisting her grandfather with his cases, and she tried to emulate her role models when she got older. Naoto built a favorable reputation for herself and was even labeled as the “Detective Prince” in the media, but she was concerned that she wouldn’t be taken seriously by police officials. The sexism she had experienced in in a male-dominated profession made her self-conscious of being female, so the androgynous high school student passed herself off as a boy and went out of her way to mask her feminine traits. Eventually, Naoto decided to get in touch with her feminine side after she came to realized that she didn’t need to change who she was to suit the world.

Akira is introduced as the younger brother of gang leader Daigo Kazama and is referred to as a male throughout the first Rival Schools game. While investigating her brother’s disappearance, Akira concealed herself with an awesome motorcycle helmet and leather riding gear. Her brother attended an all-male school for delinquents, so it was necessary for Akira to hide her true gender in order to be admitted. Akira is normally a mild-mannered girl who keeps her thoughts to herself, but she has a commanding presence when she is undercover and is considerably more assertive. After Akira’s true identity is revealed at the end of the game, she becomes playable without her helmet. She was transferred to an all-girls school in Project Justice, but her motorcycle outfit was available as an unlockable bonus.

A determined princess with a strong sense of justice, Lucina bravely decided to venture to the past after realizing that her world was beyond saving. After arriving from the future, Lucina wore a mask and took up the namesake of her ancestor, Marth, in order to hide her identity. The Hero-King Marth was a legendary figure in her time, so Lucina decided to use his identity as a means of boosting the morale of her army. Lucina arms herself with the same sword that Marth used and even alters her hair in his likeness. Lucina saw the Hero-King as a symbol of hope and prayed for a small part of his strength, but she eventually found strength insider herself and was able to drop the secret identity. Fittingly, Marth and Lucina have similar playstyles and movesets in the Super Smash Bros. series.

Sypha Belnades is a young sorceress with powerful magic spells at her disposal. She was first introduced in Castlevania III, but there was a great deal of confusion surrounding her character from the very beginning. The instruction booklet described her as a mystic warlord and the game itself used male pronouns in reference to her, but the ending revealed that she was actually a woman. As it turns out, Sypha concealed her identity because her parents and sister witches were killed during the great witch trials. After meeting a vampire hunter named Trevor Belmont, Sypha was finally able to let her guard down. Her dopplegänger in Symphony of the Night was unmistakably female and her feminine traits were further accentuated in Castlevania: Judgment and the third Pachislot Castlevania game.

One of the most memorable segments in Final Fantasy VII required Cloud Strife to infiltrate the mansion of a shady crime lord named Don Corneo in order to save his friend Tifa. Cloud was initially denied entry to the abode, but he devised a plan to dress up like a woman after he learned that Corneo was looking for candidates to be his “bride” for the night. By running various errands around the red light district, Cloud could obtain a custom-made dress, a wig, perfume, and make-up. He could even get sexy lingerie from the district’s members-only adult club! His gal pal Aeris was enthusiastic and supportive through the process, and she seemed to enjoy playing dress-up with “Miss Cloud.” In the end, Cloud’s disguise gained him a few admirers and was convincing enough to earn an audience with Corneo himself.

Sheik is Princess Zelda’s alter-ego in Ocarina of Time, and she aids the fabled Hero of Time on his journey. There is some debate about Sheik’s gender since characters in the game refer to her as a man. My interpretation is that the Sheik persona was merely an elaborate disguise to hide her true identity from Ganondorf. By muffling her voice and concealing her face, she is essentially unrecognizable as Zelda. Thanks to her magic abilities, she was even able to change her skin tone, hair length, and eye color. Upon revealing her true identity to Link, Zelda apologizes for meeting him “in disguise” and explains that she passed herself off as a Sheika in order to hide from the King of Evil. Cross-dressing is a recurring theme in the Zelda franchise, but Sheik is the most famous example.

Faris Scherwiz is a princess who was lost at sea as a young child before being rescued and raised by a group of pirates. Afraid that she wouldn’t be taken seriously by the other pirates if they knew she was a girl, Faris decided to masquerade as a man. The ruse apparently worked, as Faris eventually became a respected pirate who captained her own ship and ran her own crew. Most of her friends and crew members think she’s a man, so the fact that they find themselves physically attracted to her causes a great deal of confusion. It’s not until she changes her clothes after being shipwrecked that others find out about her secret. When it comes right down to it, Faris is a tomboy at heart. When she discovers that she’s rightfully a princess, she makes it very clear that she prefers her life of pirating.

Despite being one of Charlemagne’s legendary paladin’s, Astolfo isn’t much of a fighter. He also has trouble keeping his mouth shut, and he acts like a total ditz. At the same time, it’s hard not to be taken in by his cheerful personality and incomparable beauty. Put simply, Astolfo is gaming’s quintessential femboy. His slender build and pink hair are undeniably feminine, and he wears short skirts and pantyhose to further accentuate his girliness. Most of the characters on this list cross-dress to conceal their identities. In the case of Astolfo, he chooses to dress like a girl simply because he likes cute things. There’s little indication that he’s a boy – even his voice actor is a woman – and this makes him the most effective cross-dresser in gaming. He was completely overlooked on the first iteration of this list on account of him being so convincing as a girl!

Bridget’s name, clothing, voice, mannerisms, and personality could all be described as effeminate, and this is largely because of the environment he was brought up in. As the second of twin boys born in a village where twins of the same gender are said to bring bad luck, Bridget was raised as a girl and developed several feminine qualities as a result. The audience knows his “secret” from the very beginning and widespread Internet memes celebrated the fact that everyone was apparently gay for him. Although he never intentionally misleads anyone, many of the characters in the Guilty Gear universe assume he’s a girl because of how he looks and acts. Bridget doesn’t go out of his way to correct everyone, but he does find work as a bounty hunter to demonstrate his manliness and to prove that he isn’t bad luck.