Eleven years after its release, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is still consistently one of the most-played titles on Steam, with tens of thousands of players still logging on daily to explore Bethesda’s epic world. This longevity is primarily due to the bustling modding scene, with over 125,000 mods published on Nexus Mods across both the original game and the Special Edition, which released in 2016. Today’s spotlight, the ‘Pronouns’ mod, is an essential addition to any mod list looking to strive towards the perfect roleplaying experience.
First released in December 2020, mod author JakeAlaimo’s ‘Pronouns’ mod does exactly what it suggests. When the player begins a new adventure, they are given the opportunity to specify their character’s pronouns, with the game then addressing the player as such in dialogue. The mod author’s intention was to avoid the player “being misgendered for the sake of aesthetics”. ‘Pronouns’ goes deeper than one might expect, with the player able to select from a combination of any pronoun, as opposed to simply He/Him, She/Her and They/Them. It’s a brilliant system, with the player also able to define the frequency of each pronoun used in a host of configurable settings.
The mod comes with a warning for users intending to play with They/Them pronouns. With some of the quests having unavoidable gender-specific dialogue prompts, this mod leaves them unavailable to finish straight out of the box. To face the problem, JakeAlaimo has produced the ‘Pronouns Patcher’, allowing the player to set fall-back pronouns to ensure these quests are able to be completed. If you’re a player that boasts a huge mod list, you may be wondering how the mod will fit in with your current set-up. Great news! The author boasts “total compatibility”, with the mod being enforced at the engine level and supporting mods that add new races, body types and gendered dialogue.
Upon release, the mod, unfortunately, received criticism from an unpleasant segment of Skyrim’s mod community. It’s sad that this could be seen as inevitable, but don’t let this put you off. It’s a fair assumption that this mod won’t fit every mod list, and if it doesn’t, that’s okay! But if it does fit, ‘Pronouns’ is a roleplayer’s dream, an essential tool that adds important transgender and nonbinary inclusivity for those that want it for their Dragonborn.
Daniel has been an avid gamer for as long as he could hold a controller, and an equally avid writer for as long as he could hold a pen. A creative writing graduate from Liverpool, Daniel spends more time than he’d ever care to admit losing himself in open-world RPGs
