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Call Of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Will Let You Play As A Gender Neutral Character

Call Of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Will Let You Play As A Gender Neutral Character

The game's creative director didn't want to 'exclude anyone' when creating the game

Stewart Perrie

Stewart Perrie

Developers have released details about the character features in the upcoming and highly-anticipated Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War.

Gamers will be able to select the gender of the main character, with male, female and 'classified' on offer. Classified is for people who want to identify as gender neutral in the game and, if they choose that option, they will have they/them pronouns.

Creative director Dan Vondrak said the move was designed to ensure that everyone around the world could see themselves as the protagonist.

"We didn't want to exclude anybody. The option to leave [information] classified was super important because there are only so many backgrounds or places of birth we can have listed in the game," he said, via Gamespot.

"If we don't find something somebody wants, then let's let them leave it classified so they can be that mysterious, shadowy Black Ops character they want to be.

"When it came to gender, that same idea was thrown in: Why can't we leave it classified? There's no reason we can't do that. We were already going to make [the game] change to he/she [for male/female options] so it was easy enough for us to use different pronouns [they/them]."

Activision

The decision to choose your gender won't have an impact on the way the story arc flows.

The character won't have any dialogue, in keeping with the 'silent protagonist' attitude in Call of Duty, however you will be presented with dialogue options for other characters that will alter the game.

Regardless of the gender or lack thereof that the gamer chooses, the main character will be referred to as Bell.

But that's not the only customisable feature in the game. In addition to gender, you'll also be able to skin tone, gender, place of birth, military background, and psychological profile. The latter option will help change the way your character plays in the game and can affect your speed, bullet damage and sprint time.

The game is set for release later this year however it has already sparked outrage in China due to the trailer.

Activision has removed footage of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre from the teaser even though the clip in question lasted less than a second.

Since then, the gaming giant has now replaced the whole trailer with the edited version worldwide.

The original teaser (which is still available on YouTube) ran for two minutes, and featured a lengthier version of a 1984 interview with former Soviet KGB informant and defector Yuri Bezmenov.

On an old school looking TV screen, he discusses a Soviet strategy to end US dominance with four stages - demoralisation, destabilisation, crisis and normalisation.

The new version is just one minute long, cutting a fair chunk of Bezmenov's speech as well as the Tiananmen clip.

Featured Image Credit: Activision

Topics: GAMING, Entertainment