Andrew Huang wrote:

        As I was mulling over how to continue with my most recent EVA
piece, I realized that I hadn't seen very many fics written in first
person, including most self-inserts. Is that really the way most
pieces
are written, or is it just me?

It's just you.  ^_^

Seriously, writers will write in a method that they feel will bring out
the story as much as possible.  The "default" setting for this (mainly
because most writers have had most to all of their experience with it)
is third-person.  

Good first-person writing requires a different mindset than
third-person.  In choosing it, a writer is limiting him or her self to
one person's POV, but can explore everything within that person, from
sensory input to thoughts and feelings.  To write it well requires an
innate knowledge not only of the character, but also of the self. 
Surprisingly, writers rarely _describe_ what those feelings inside
"feel" like, and as such aren't comfortable with them.  Better to keep
the safety of third-person, rather than go with the more intimate, but
also more risky, first-person.  

I have written two first-person works - "A Man I'll Never Be" and
"Kurobara" - and I can honestly say that they were the most difficult
pieces of writing I've done, not because of any degree of complexity to
the storyline itself, but because, in writing it, I had to get into the
mood of the main character.  The first I wrote in two hours when I was
in a very dark mood, and the second came out after months of
struggling.  By the way, if you had seen me when I was writing either
one, you probably would have called the local mental health authority. 
I looked BAD when writing the first, and I probably appeared to be on
something when I wrote the second.

>From Andrew Huang, brought to you by his computer, Oddzilla

-- Nick