If a character is generlocked then theyre genderlocked, you can still admire the character. Being able to choose the gender of a RO is just a bonus. But, i know that im no way entitled to it, as i didnt write the story; and they arent my characters.
But, i also when i play the games generally come up with some concept of what i want my MC to be; and change it up witch each playthrough. So, generally who ever i choose as the RO is influenced on that; and not so much on personal preference.
Might simply saying the PC can’t tell whether the voice is male or female work? Or avoid it and instead use strong and commanding (or as the Blackadder Wellington put it, “There’s only one way to win a campaign: shout, shout and shout again”), then have a bit of flavour text later saying you didn’t expect a female NPC because of the deep voice.
I am currently writing the scene neutrally but when the darkness disappears I will give a choice to be surprised to her be a woman. Just dont expect a nice response from the pissed vampire.
Thanks everyone for the responses all have been really useful
What if you play into the stereotype? Make that a scene all to its own. Have the MC think that the character is a man. Then have it corrected later and maybe have them reflect back on it. This could be a learning opportunity for the character about stereotypes, more so if the character goes into the scene thinking they don’t fall for them. The MC could learn how the character reacts to being mistaken in gender.
It could turn into a plot point if there is a mystery.
It really depends on the story youre writing.
For wayhaven it works to have all the ROs be the players choice. their gender doesnt really change anything but their name, appearance, and choice of clothing, though with how the story plays out they all seem generally male coded (using the protective male love interest trope to great effect). Romancing adam as ava always seemed wrong, but seeing F as a woman or a man never really made much difference.
But for say, i the forgotten one, the ROs genders all matter a lot to their character. You cant have obren be a woman because hes very clearly written as a gay man in a setting where thats tabboo. You cant have lada be a man because her being a straight woman is integral to how she interacts with both the player, and to how she interacts with her job in universe.
Personally, i prefer at least some of the characters to be gender locked with a few who can be swapped to the players preferences (such as if that character can be an Ex of the protagonist. in such a case it might be out of place for the player to be playing a gay man whos ex is a gender locked woman).
I think playing with Ava is more interesting, her backstory on book 3 about how she pretended being a male knight to fight a duel is more intriguing than Adam’s backstory.
I agree that it’s more interesting – but it also shows the story’s hand that Adam was always the intended A, not Ava. The “I fought a duel to defend my sister’s hand” was written like it was conceptualized with Adam in mind, and then adding the Mulan element in order to make Ava fit into it. A feels extremely in line with typical heterosexual angsty male romance leads so “Ava feels off while Adam does not” and “Ava is a more interesting character because she subverts this role” aren’t mutually exclusive.
its more interesting to some, but it also shows that Adam was clearly the intended version over ava, because the backstory had to be justified around the fact that youre playing with A as female to keep the backstory the same.
Learning more about the other 3 aswell also shows that they “default” is clearly male for all but f, who you cant really tell either way.
You can also tell by the naming conventions, with N having the same first name and same last name as 2 separate dracula characters (specifically 2 of lucys 3 love interests), but only when Nate, not as Nat. Its clearly an intended reference, and the female version was designed around the male version, which would likely be how i would design the ROs whos genders are selectable aswell, switching between the “main” gender based on the character.
I don’t think it was ever a secret that ROs in TWC were originally male and the MC was female. All the previous games of the author were made for heterosexual female players, and TWC was originally intended to be a novel with the same demographic in mind.
Personally, I would rather the author makes changes like this to add different genders even if it’s obvious that certain genders weren’t the original ones, than for the game to have gender-locked MC and ROs, so I have no problem with that.
Whilst I am certain that this is indeed true I have played exclusively as a straight male character in the games with female versions of the characters and not once have I felt like any of the four ROs feel too male, all to me have levels of femininity that work fine for their individual characters. Whether that is just me reading the game in my very specific way I leave for others to decide. 
Honestly, if you ignore how male-skewed the tropes for A, N, and M are (F can easily pass for manic pixie dream girl), it feels way more obvious to me that the Detective was originally female, because no dude cocks their hips that much.
Regardless, certain instances of mannerisms aside, Wayhaven works well as a story for either gender. There’s a non-zero (and mounting) number of things that I would immediately and unhesitatingly change about Wayhaven had I the chance, but none of them are related to gender.
Depends. If it’s a setting where a gay relationship is considered taboo, then a gender locked character works well enough and is likely written with that scenario in mind. Generally I don’t like gender locks though, because there are times where my favorite character happens to be only interested in women which means I just don’t romance anyone at all- Shery from Shepherds of Haven being only for female MCs actually made me drop the whole book since I was smitten with her and only found out by reading comments that she wasn’t an option for men.
The Shepherds of Haven OP actually has a full list of who is romanceable by whom.
You missing out on 4 other female ROs, especially Briony, I wouldn’t drop the whole book over that.
I hadn’t checked it in advance, which is my fault. Still, the other girls didn’t catch my interest.
In the game? Otherwise, expecting players to go to a forum to discover who can be romanced by what gender is asking too much.
No, in the CoG forum. The same post that has the game link.
I would love for game descriptions to have some of the information available on the forums. As an example, I really thought I could romance Steel in Fallen Hero, until someone on the forum offhandedly mentioned he was gay. And I had already gotten my hopes up, because Ortega was the only other RO I was really interested in. (To be fair, I haven’t verified this yet, but my point still stands. There’s no way to know other than checking the forums).
I been taking notes.
Couple WIPs have been adding gender flip NPC, non ROs in.
If not a romance, i honestly dont care and want author to fill in on their own.
Wouldnt this become disruptive? I know it confused enough people in one WIP before to fill in RO tab.
Not sure if i already wrote this here or not.
I very much prefer gender locked RO, due to usually being more fleshed out.
I have no problem with flippable RO if they have so work put into them and have reactivity depending on gender, instead of just swapping out pronouns to the opposite and calling it done.