After more than a decade of fan pressure, Nintendo is finally allowing players of Tomodachi Life to choose the sexual orientation and gender identity of the characters they control — a long-requested change for the popular social simulation game.
First introduced in 2009, Tomodachi Life lets players create customizable human characters, known as “Miis,” who explore virtual worlds, play mini-games, and form social relationships. Until now, however, the social simulation game only allowed Miis to be heterosexual and cisgender.
In a January 29 presentation previewing the latest iteration of the game, Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream, Nintendo of America confirmed that players will be able to select each Mii’s “dating preferences,” allowing them to date or marry people of multiple genders.
Players will also be able to select from three gender options: male, female, or nonbinary.
As reported by Kotaku, offering a third gender option marks a significant shift for Nintendo, which has previously sidestepped explicit discussions of gender identity in games likeAnimal Crossing: New Horizons by allowing players to choose from two gender-coded “styles.” In the 2014 version of Tomodachi Life, some players worked around the game’s heterosexual and binary constraints by assigning Miis a different gender and ignoring the game’s pronouns.
Nintendo previously clashed with fans in 2014, after players petitioned the company to allow Miis to engage in same-sex relationships and marry characters of the same gender. At the time, the company responded by saying it “never intended to make any form of social commentary with the launch of Tomodachi Life.”
“The relationship options in the game represent a playful alternate world rather than a real-life simulation,” Nintendo said in a statement at the time. “The ability for same-sex relationships to occur in the game was not part of the original game that launched in Japan, and that game is made up of the same code that was used to localize it for other regions outside of Japan.”
After receiving significant online backlash from gamers, the company issued an apology.
“At Nintendo, dedication has always meant going beyond the games to promote a sense of community, and to share a spirit of fun and joy,” the company said in a statement. “We pledge that if we create a next installment in the Tomodachi series, we will strive to design a game-play experience from the ground up that is more inclusive and better represents all players.”
Fans of the game quickly celebrated Nintendo’s announcement, praising the new features in posts on a Reddit forum dedicated to the series.
“The game looks SO GOOD from start to finish. It really seems like the people who made it, and even the people who made the trailer, know what fans of the series want!!! I’m just glad that they let you pick rather than making it random and untouchable. That way everyone gets what they want,” wrote one fan.
“I was so surprised they just used the word nonbinary just plain and simple. But seriously this is all that I ever wanted when it comes to choosing gender/sexuality in the game because not only can we have nonbinary miis, we can also choose their sexuality AND they also added aro/ace [aromantic/asexual] miis which is something else I really wanted,” wrote another fan.
“WOKE MIIS. WE ARE SO BACK,” wrote a third.
Other fans mocked what they predicted would be the response from right-wing critics.
Wrote one: “The most annoying people on the planet are going to complain about this… and I’m going to enjoy every second of their suffering.”
GLAAD has released new data showing that 1,042 anti-LGBTQ incidents were reported across 47 states and the District of Columbia in 2025 -- a 5% increase over the previous year, according to the organization’s ALERT Desk Anti-LGBTQ Extremism Reporting Tracker.
Anti-LGBTQ incidents were defined as "an act of harassment, threat(s), vandalism, and/or assault against an individual, group, and/or organization," with explicit evidence of anti-LGBTQ bias as a motivating factor.
The incidents included 128 acts of hateful vandalism, 76 violent assaults, 22 threats of mass violence, and 15 arson attempts.
A 47-year-old Colorado man has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for attempting to run over a lesbian couple with his vehicle and ramming their truck as they tried to escape.
As reported by CBS News, Vitalie Oprea took his parents' vehicle without permission on February 19, 2023, and was driving near the intersection of East Arapahoe Road and South Liverpool Street in Aurora when he spotted two women kissing.
Witnesses told police that Oprea became enraged, yelling at the couple and making obscene gestures before making a U-turn into oncoming traffic and driving toward them.
After years of playing while closeted, Jesse Kortuem says the HBO series Heated Rivalry helped him finally reconcile his identity with the sport he loves.
Jesse Kortuem, a hockey player who has competed in several adult leagues but never at the professional level, says he was inspired to come out after watching HBO's Heated Rivalry, a romance centered on closeted gay hockey players.
In a Facebook post, Kortuem recalled growing up in Minnesota as the youngest of four boys and playing hockey from a young age, while struggling to reconcile his love for the sport with his sexuality.
"To any hockey player, the sounds of the rink and the feel of cold air are unmistakable. The slapshots, the pucks hitting the boards, the skates carving fresh ice, and the high-pitched clang of a puck hitting the post bring immense comfort," Kortuem wrote. "For a long time, however, the rink did not feel like a place where I could be all of me. I felt I had to hide parts of myself for far too long."
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