At the very start of Assassin's Creed Valhalla, players will be given a choice of three options for Eivor's gender, male, female, or let the Animus choose. While in most video games, this ends up being a significant choice that players are stuck with for the rest of the game, Valhalla allows the player to switch Eivor's gender at will with relative ease.
Coming off the back of serious controversy surrounding Ubisoft's usage of female characters and treatment of female staff, Assassin's Creed Valhalla takes the unique approach of allowing players to play as either male or female Eivor at any given point. There's even an option to let the Animus choose their gender, switching it back and forth at certain key interactions in the game.
In many MMO type games, changing gender requires purchasing an item with real money, often allowing the player to change their race and other attributes as well. Thankfully, that isn't required here, and players can instead make the switch as many times as they want without any negative repercussions whatsoever. The only potential drawback to this system is that Eivor's gender isn't a part of their identity, but that could be viewed as a positive aspect as well.
To change genders, players simply need to enter the pause menu while playing the game. While in the menu, pressing up on the D-Pad will present the player with the same three options they were given at the start of the game. In this manner, the player can switch back and forth between male and female Eivor manually with just the press of a button. This doesn't have any sort of impact on the story for the most part, so players should feel free to choose whichever gender they feel like playing as at the time.
Since there are no stat or gameplay differences between genders, the choice truly comes down to player preference and aesthetics. The ability to change back and forth allows players to test both options to pick one they like as well rather than getting locked in with a choice made at the start of the game.
Unlike Assassin's Creed Odyssey, the other gender doesn't serve as an antagonist of the story like Alexios and Kassandra did, so there's no need to worry about any break in immersion in that regard. Some players may find the ability to shift back and forth distracting, but thankfully the feature is entirely optional.
Assassin's Creed Valhalla is available now on PC, PS4, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X, and releases on November 12th for PS5.