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“Battlefield 1” will take palyers back to the beginning of one of the greatest wars in history, World War 1. As a first-person shooter and multiplayer staple in modern gaming, Battlefield has always stressed realism, excellent graphics, and fantastic military hardware for players to use. In recent games, Battlefield has allowed players to play either gender for an avatar. However,”Battlefield” 1 will not.

Well, we all know how that went…

According to PC Gamesn, former Dice coder Amandine Coget revealed on Twitter that the original plan for the game was “Screw realism, we’re adding female soldiers, because we’re way overdue.” This would have added them to a time era where real-world events would have broken off from fantasy, which is fine. However, the decision was later rescinded. And the main reason behind that was largely due to the fear and concern that DICE would face a backlash from younger male gamers. Gamers who believed that female multi-player characters shouldn’t be included in a realistic setting where they didn’t exist (such as in World War 1, for example. Which is understandable).

Wow, that sure went fast. So, realism it is then?

World War 1 was one of the moisture important global historical events, and although there weren’t any women on the battlefield in America and other countries at the time. However, they served in other ways (for example, at hospitals and Naval corps). And some women even served as undercover agents to their countries for information. Here’s the ironic part of the debate, the game still has ONE female character that is playable and is a part of the storyline. Furthermore, this one-sided outcry doesn’t account for other countries troops as women on the Russian side of the war did, in fact, provide ground support.

Well, since EA loves DLC´s a whole lot. Then “maybe” they could release some female soldiers via DLC?

Whatever your thoughts on this debate, we have to understand DICE’s stance on this issue. It’s the same issue with Link not being gender swapped in “Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild”. It’s not conducive to their business strategy. The gaming industry is very fluid and flexible in a lot of different ways, including having female avatars, but this may not be one of them.

Realistically, having women in multiplayer vs story mode isn’t viable either. Here´s the hard truth though, it all boils down to either having them or not. And the only conclusion where both sides will be happy is if Dice decides to change “Battlefield 1” to be fantasy war kind of game (or flip between past and present combat).

***Second opinion by Robin Ek***

I have zero to none problems with having playable (or NPC) female characters in the world of games. I never had, and I never will. As I´m not the kind of person that focuses on gender in games (or the real world of that matter). However, it´s a somewhat “different” story in the case with DICE and EA´s “Battlefield 1”. As BF1´s WW1 setting is a pretty slippery road to walk down. Because there did indeed exist female soldiers in WW1 (and the women who weren’t on the battlefield, they did what they could in factories, hospitals and so on), but most of them had a military support role (as in “none combat” roles).

So it´s a 50/50 kind of case with “BF1” (EA could have included female soldiers to the multiplayer part of the game, but they didn´t). And I don´t know if it´s true that EA chose to not have any female soldiers in BF1´s online mode due to the lack of realism, or if it´s like the former Dice coder Amandine Coget said (that EA skipped the female soldiers in BF1´s multiplayer mode, as EA thought that it´s more important to focus on their male core adience).

Then again, even “if” EA had tossed in some female soldiers into multiplayer battlefield of BF1. Then I bet that they would have received messages, articles and tweets about misogyny instead (there is still a risk for that though, as BF1 will feature a female protagonist in the female campaign). Even so, EA could always try to add some female WW1 soldiers via DLC? And see how that works. I mean, if people really like the female soldiers in the multiplayer mode of BF1. Then EA can see for themselves what people think about having female soldiers in BF1.

With that said, what´s your take on this matter? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section down below!

Credit:
Robin Ek – Editor and Co-writer

Source:
Vgpwn
Screenrant