South Park: The Fractured But Whole will offer female character option

Players of upcoming South Park RPG The Fractured But Whole will have the choice of playing through the saga as a boy or girl.

In [predecessor] Stick of Truth we got halfway through the game, and we had narratively come up with the big Girls’ Quest halfway through it. [The Girls] were a faction in the fantasy world. And then someone’s like, ‘What if you want to be a girl?’” co-creator Matt Stone told Entertainment Weekly.

Narratively, it didn’t work. We’d have to sh*tcan the whole game. So we just left it the way it was. This time, we obviously wanted to add that.”

However, the choice of gender will change certain things about the experience – something that the creators felt they couldn’t avoid if they wished to stay true to the franchise.

But the boys are little boys, because it’s really a story about little boys running around. So they don’t care about [your character being a girl]? That seems weird,” Stone added. They always seemed to care about it in the show. Are they dumb about it, and they don’t know? So you’re in hiding? Or do they totally care about that, and totally treat you differently? So we ended up doing those things differently for different characters.

It actually turned out to be quite a bit more work. I’m also playing The Division – I’m not just saying that because it’s Ubisoft. I made the character look like my wife, just because I thought that was funny, running around New York shooting people looking like my wife. But the game doesn’t treat you that differently. The guys still shoot you. The game doesn’t really react that much differently.

That’s cool for that kind of game. It’s been a funny journey to go through, introducing something that we thought would just be a cool feature. You’re a girl! But now they’re going to treat you different.”