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3 March 2021 11:53 AM

Harry Potter video game will allow trans characters, according to report

Players will reportedly be able to 'customise characters’ voice, body type and gender placement for school dormitories'

By Jamie Tabberer

Words: Jamie Tabberer; picture: Warner Bros. Pictures

An upcoming Harry Potter video game will allow trans characters, according to a new report.

Hogwarts Legacy is due for release in 2022 from Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment Inc. and developer Avalanche Software.

Bloomberg reports that players will be able to ‘customise their characters’ voice, body type and gender placement for school dormitories.’

Anonymous sources unauthorised to speak to the press also told the outlet that players will get to select how they are addressed by others in the game.

The news follows several public statements by Harry Potter creator JK Rowling that have been criticised as transphobic. 

According to Bloomberg sources, members of the game’s development team were ‘rattled’ by the comments, and despite initial resistance from management, responded by pushing to make the game as inclusive as possible.

“If sex isn’t real, there’s no same-sex attraction”

In a tweet last June, Rowling said of language inclusive of trans men who menstruate: “People who menstruate.’ I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?”

Following criticism, she later tweeted: “If sex isn’t real, there’s no same-sex attraction. If sex isn’t real, the lived reality of women globally is erased. I know and love trans people, but erasing the concept of sex removes the ability of many to meaningfully discuss their lives. It isn’t hate to speak the truth.”

She doubled down on her views in a subsequent essay on her website. 

Addressing people who “detransition” or express regret at their gender transition, she said: “I’m concerned about the huge explosion in young women wishing to transition and also about the increasing numbers who seem to be detransitioning (returning to their original sex), because they regret taking steps that have, in some cases, altered their bodies irrevocably, and taken away their fertility.”

Stonewall research has shown that of the 3,398 trans patients who had appointments at an NHS Gender Identity Service the UK between 2016 and 2017, less than one per cent said in those appointments that they had experienced transitioned-related regret, or had detransitioned.

Attitude has approached a representative for Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment Inc. for comment.

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