There’s totally a nonverbal conspiracy where we all post updates together or within a few days of each other! Haha… Nah, not at all.
There has been a lot of controversy regarding Master Neloth’s reference to Indoril Nerevar’s reincarnation being referred to as a “he”. Even over a year later users are still complaining on UESP, on the various fora with a TES section (ours, BethSoft’s, etc) that it was a bug or an oversight that Neloth assigned a gender to the Nerevarine, and it’s gotten to where there have been many edits attempting to call it an error on UESP.
I certainly understand (and want to agree with the fans) the fans’ frustrations at a definitive gender being assigned to the character, depriving the player the possibility of having a female character be Nerevarine. After all, there have been plenty of heroine’s in the TES saga and in other sagas, and most of my own characters as of late have been female. There’s just something so satisfying about the fairer sex rising up to become a grand saviour of the free world, I suppose.
However, we have to look at it this way: Regardless of whether or not the users agree, it’s UESP’s job to document the Elder Scrolls series as-is. It’s not our place to pick and choose what’s lore or not. Maybe it was an oversight, maybe it was deliberate. The point is, until Bethesda confirms the Nerevarine is male (which can make sense, seeing how Indoril Nerevar was a male), or until they confirm it’s an oversight, we have official in-game content stating he’s a male, and that’s lore in my book. Look at the main character of Arena, for example. The in-game manuals, plus some out-of-game sources cite the character as being named “Talin”. There is precedent to Bethesda suggesting certain qualities of a character are set, regardless of the playability of that game.
From the lore side of things, it also makes sense that a gender would be defined. After all, the authors of Tamriel are rather efficient and up-to-date about the happenings of their world, and in my own opinion, there has to be something definite about the characters, since it wouldn’t make sense that such meaningful and important events are mysteriously glossed over when the game is so concise in any other way. In that aspect, there are some aspects and arguments that could be used to make it a necessity that there be some definition of who a character is, regardless of game mechanics.
It’s a tough argument and controversy many Morrowind players are facing with Dragonborn, and we can argue in circles on both sides of the coin, but it’s really all for naught. Whether we like or dislike, it’s not our place to say, it’s Bethesda’s. And, until they confirm one way or the other, we have to accept it for what it is.
