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The World of Warcraft Dragonflight alpha is underway, and a tiny character creation change has turned out to be one of the expansion’s most notable updates – your character is no longer gendered at character creation.
You would previously choose either ‘male’ or ‘female’ when you make a new character in WoW. As of the Dragonflight alpha, you now simply choose between ‘body 1’ and ‘body 2’. As Wowhead (opens in new tab) notes, this is similar to how games like Halo Infinite and Elden Ring have handled gender selection in their character creators.
The two body types are still very traditionally masculine and feminine – big muscles on one, and apparent breasts and hips on the other. Still, in a game where your gender doesn’t really matter, it’s good to see Blizzard backing away ever so slightly from narrowly defining your character by their body type.
Wowhead additionally notes that in some versions of the Dragonflight alpha build, though not the current one, strings referencing a pronoun selection option exist, hinting that you may eventually be able to choose whether your character is referred to as he/him, she/her, or they/them. It is worth noting, however, that even older WoW content typically refers to your character in ambiguous, gender-neutral ways, so a pronoun selection option may show only limited benefits in-game.
Despite the expansion’s late announcement, Blizzard says Dragonflight is still on track to launch this year. Its early promises have been intriguing to lapsed WoW fans, though time will tell if Blizzard can make good with the expansion’s release.
Activision Blizzard is still facing the ramifications of a sexual discrimination lawsuit.
