It's true: female gamers do exist (the shock!). Just like male gamers who come in different shapes, sizes and flavors, we can come up with a diverse list of girl gamer types. No, Frag Dolls and 6-year-olds fascinated by the Wii don't count. South Korean StarCraft fangirls were tempting to add, but we decided to cut them from the list since we can't tell if they actually play games or just read magazines to drool over the pros.

If you ever need a brief guide on the who and the what of female gamer types, this QuickList is for you. No need to put up those flame spears, because we don't have anything against those who don't fall under our categories. Furthermore, apologies go to our female readers who weren't covered, but right now, here are the more prominent types we've seen of our beloved industry's non-male audience.

Hardcore Gamer - You don't need a pair to kill Altima in Final Fantasy Tactics with one blow or defeat Metatron from Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne without losing your sanity. While the hardcore who would go discuss their "1337" gameplay tactics and strategies on notorious message boards almost never expect to run across girls, it is a fact that the male dominated scene of spending hundreds of hours to kill secret bosses and pull off insane Achievements for bragging rights is not without the presence of the opposite gender.

Female hardcore gamers aren't the ones who scream at the top of their lungs in Halo 3 online; we're talking about the experienced whose knowledge can go back even to the 8-bit era. Many of them agree that Chrono Trigger is one of the best JRPGs ever, while some are skilled Civilization players and classic point-and-click masters.