According to a report from Bloomberg, Hogwarts Legacy will feature inclusive character customisation options, allowing players to create a cisgendered or transgendered witch or wizards.
Players will have the opportunity to select their character’s body type and voice before choosing whether they identify as a ‘witch’ or a ‘wizard’ which has a subsequent impact on which dormitory they will be accommodated in. As such, the customisation options exclude binding gender or body-type choices, allowing players to create their character more freely.
While this isn’t necessarily innovation in character customisation by any stretch of the imagination, it still serves a poignant role in the development of the highly anticipated Hogwart’s Legacy. This is due to controversial comments made by Harry Potter’s author, J.K. Rowling regarding sex, gender, feminism and the LGBTQI+ community.
We won’t go into too much detail but Rowling’s outspokenness has had a troubling impact on the projects that stem from her original writing, including Hogwarts Legacy. Though Rowling herself is not directly involved in the development of the game, it is apparent that some Hogwarts Legacy developers have had to fight a resistant management team in order to feature inclusive character customisation options in the game.
We would be remiss not to mention that while J.K. Rowling is not directly involved in the development of the game, her body of work still serves as the foundation for any media set in the Wizarding World and she will still benefit financially from sales of this title. Whether you agree with her views or not, it is important to keep in mind that regardless of Rowling and other major figures that have voiced problematic opinions, there is still a team of passionate, nameless developers that are hard at work on Hogwarts Legacy that shouldn’t be demonized for their mere association.
Hogwarts Legacy is scheduled for release in 2022 on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X. It pre-dates the events of the Harry Potter series and is set in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in the 1800s.