Apex Legend’s new character Valkyrie is canonically lesbian, confirms voice actor
Erika Ishii / Valkyrie
It’s been confirmed that Valkyrie, the new Legend in Apex Legends Legacy, is a lesbian.
Voice actor Erika Ishii and writer Tom Casielo were interviewed by streamer MoonLiteWolf and discussed the development of the character.
In the interview, available on YouTube, they cover the conception of Valkyrie, her moveset as well as behind-the-scenes anecdotes about the recording process.
They also confirmed that Valkyrie is lesbian, in another win for the LGBT+ gaming community.
“Here’s the thing about Valkyrie is that when I read the character breakdown, and from all of our initial callback conversations about her, I was like oh she’s like me, she’s just this hard partying, snack scarfing, mixed Japanese fly-boy who’s a total ladykiller,” explains Ishii.
At the end of her callback, Ishii was asked to record some extra lines, including “I’ll tell your girlfriend I said bye”, to which she immediately responded “is she queer?!”
“Every time somebody complained that we had no lesbian representation on the game, it was like no we do though, we do! She’s coming!” said Casielo. The team have been working on the character for two years, but managed to keep her identity under wraps.
The pair went on to discuss the importance of authentic representation in the game, particularly with Valkyrie who is both lesbian and of mixed Japanese heritage.
“None of it was tokenism, she’s her own thing,” said Ishii. “She’s one of the most real characters I’ve ever had the honour of portraying.”
Said Casielo: “She’s not just our lesbian character or our Japanese character, she’s a human being.
“We try to cast people who are from these backgrounds and were these nationalities and who had stories to tell about their families and any way we can incorporate that into the character we do, they know better than us.”
Ishii summarised: “This is the kind of character I’ve dreamed of seeing my whole life growing up. There’s nobody like Valk.”
Valkyrie was revealed in a short “Stories from the Outlands” video named “Northstar”, in which she’s confirmed to be Viper’s daughter from Respawn’s other game Titanfall 2.
The new season of Apex Legends also brings a new 3 x 3 Arena mode, although the launch was hit with server issues due to high demand.
Valkyrie is just the latest Legend to be confirmed as queer. She joins the likes of Bloodhound, Gibraltar, Fuse and Loba as representing the LGBT+ community in the game.
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