Nicki Minaj, 21 Savage and Lara Croft are set as playable characters in the upcoming Call of Duty update

Call of Duty, the video game you’re kid has picked up a number of dirty words from while playing online, is set to reveal a large update of new playable characters as part of Modern Warfare 2 and Warzone Season 05, starting from August 2nd 2023. Some of the characters set to be included are, interesting, to say the least.

Hip-hop seems to be a defining feature in Season 05, with the promise of new tracks from the genre to play to, while Nicki Minaj, 21 Savage and Snoop Dogg are added as playable characters as Activision looks to celebrate 50 years of hip-hop with the season update. With her inclusion, Minaj becomes the first-ever self-named female Operator in Call of Duty, sporting her “Roman’s Revenge” era bubblegum pink hair - we hope she’s got some defence buffs against online snipes…

Musicians in video games isn’t a new concept however; retro gamers may remember spending hours playing Def Jam: Vendetta featuring a cast of ‘00s finest hip-hop artists, while more recent Travis Scott - whose new album was released today - performed an entire show within the “Fortnite” world. His appearance saw 12 million users logging in to take part and witness the special Season 2 event.

Retro gamers will also be happy to discover that one of Britain’s most successful video game characters, Lara Croft of the “Tomb Raider” series, will also be a bonus character added to the game. This year would mark 27 years since the character graced Playstations, Sega Saturns and PCs around the world after its success in 1996 and subsequent multi-medium franchise - including two movies starring Angelina Jolie.

Activision looks to be traversing different pop cultural landscapes in an effort to boost more interest in the already massively popular game; earlier this month, the game provided an update which gave users special powers and allowed them to use “skins (costumes/avatars within the game) to play as one of four characters from Amazon Prime Video’s popular series, “The Boys.”