Same here. One romance option only, if well done, can be good. But I’m not interested in playng as a male character at all.
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Well, a romance is between two people (even if polyamorous the romances are separate), but often in romance stories which two people is an open question for at least a good chunk. In most cases the viewpoint character is only interested in one person but there’s at least one plausible other candidate for that person’s affections.
I think what @Eric_Knight said sums it up pretty well. It’s your story, write it however you want.
I’ll admit that, if you decide to gender-lock the protagonist to male then I probably won’t read it. I’ve tried A Study in Steampunk because it got so much praise on the forum but I just couldn’t get into it - no matter how well-written, I couldn’t play as male.
But I would never demand you change your vision nor, I think, should anyone else. Whether it’s the gender-lock issue or the limited RO option, do what you want to do.
I’m sure there will always be people interested in your game for what it is.
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This is not what you originally asked but I’m curious about what’s so difficult about writing a “female perspective”?
What do you expect to change from the perspective of a man and of a woman?
Do you have any female NPCs in your game? Because you’re going dictate their perspective, thoughts and actions when you write them.
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I definitely like this idea. If you have planned a good RO, go for it! Don’t switch that out with several half-bad ones or some blank-slate RO.
Good luck with the game, I’m looking forward to it!
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Personally there are some games like I feel had some horrible RO’s because we had limited scenes with them, and I’m always interested into a new idea that probably haven’t been done in a HG story before. Having only one RO sounds just fine to me as long as the interactions we have with them would feel natural.
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lets say I planned from the start for the protagonist to be male. Its hard to change everything now.
Maybe I’ll post the demo tmr when I finished the prologue. Like I said, prolly just one RO for now. And plus I can say that I will not entirely focused on romance.
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Could you tell us more about the RO. I personally probably wont play a single RO game because it feels railroaded to me but we never know. If the RO is more interesting that I thought and we’re not forced to be with them then yeah it might be something I’d still enjoy but using that other COG that had a railroaded romance as an example, if we are forced to be with them from the start with little options as to how it even happenend ofc I’l drop out. Being forced with someone you dont feel much for isnt gonna make an interesting story to me cause all I’l be looking for is a way to get out of the relationship I never wanted. I didnt see the development that led to my character being with that person and even if I do I wont connect with the story as much on account that its decisions I had no control over for something I never wanted. Even if I can control how it began it wont change that I didnt want it in the first place.
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I prefer having options, but one of my favorite games, Aloners, has only one choice. But the thing with that game is that you can choose to only be friends instead, and the game is still good. So maybe just keep in mind to develop the character so that they are a full person without the romance status, and you’ll get more people willing to play it even though you have it gender-locked. As you can see, some people don’t like the idea of a forced romance, so I hope you are considering that as you write.
Same as well. I’ve played enough male only protags in my life, and while I do still play them on occasion, I prefer to play female when I have the option.
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In my opinion, one RO and genderlocked can be fine, but you will lose some readers.
However, the most important thing is what you feel is best for your story, and while the forum can be very helpful, I also feel that it can sometimes drive novice authors to just give up on their story because people say it will be hated.
Go with your heart. Maybe you’ll find new RO’s along the way, and maybe you’ll find that the ‘female’ perspective is not so different. That’s not important. What’s important is that you feel connected enough to your story to actually finish it.
If it’s well written, people will buy it.
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Oh, I didn’t know that. I’ve heard much praise about it so I might play it now. Is the protag female in that game or do they not mention pronouns?
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You play as a female, is actually a important part to the plot later on.
Also, I agree with something that has been said a lot already. I don’t mind having a single RO, in fact I really like it as it gives more opportunity to develop the relationship way deeper, but I don’t like playing a game in which the genders of either the MC or the RO are genderlocked.
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Go for it bro. There’s plenty of great genderlocked CoG’s out there ( both male and female ), the Infinity Saga and the WIP “Bright Eyes, Black Blood” being two notable examples.
I would prefer no RO at all.
I mean, if one exists but it isn’t forced upon you, does it ultimately matter?
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I chose this option in the poll because it’s the closest to how I feel, but it’s not exactly how I would put it either. I could, after all, turn out to really like the RO in a one-RO game; it’s hard to predict, and depends entirely on what this RO turns out to be like. But I’d certainly be more likely to be interested in the romance in a game with more than one available, since it’ll increase the chance that at least one of them would appeal to me.
Generally, I would be likely to go for a game with more ROs before one with fewer, but it’s not a dealbreaker. There’s also the caveat that it only counts if they’re developed and have actual personalities; if they’re little more than decoration, they’re not really adding much.
Here’s where we do get to a possible dealbreaker, though: if you’re restricting the main character to male, and also only allowing a single romance option, does this romance have a set gender? And if so, is this character always female? Because a game which contains romance, but does not include romance for a guy who’s interested in guys is not a game for me.
I would also really question you about what you mean in terms of a “female perspective.” There’s usually not going to be very much you’d need to change in a choice-based game if you want to allow the main character’s gender to vary, aside from pronouns and other gendered words, unless it’s specifically set in a highly sexist society. When someone’s playing a game, they get to supply a lot of the main character’s perspective anyway; they can choose what they consider to be in character for themselves. Just putting the swap in there is unlikely to seem as off as you might think it would.
I’d also second all the people who say, if there is only one RO, make sure you at least have the option to romance or not to romance them.
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Depend. If I can choose her gender, ethnie, haircolour and some other things like sandbox friend I am totally fine if the game is now really showing us an intensive love story. Because one RO is only excused with an intensive love that is unrantabel with one Girl for everyone.
I’m fine with it as long as I know upfront. I feel very much like there should be a lot of different “styles” of games available, even ones that aren’t going to appeal to everyone. Just because I wouldn’t personally play something, doesn’t mean the author is wrong to make it or that their game would be “better”. I sometimes feel like people get angry at a game even existing because it doesn’t have enough options but I personally would like to see more variety in game styles.
(Only commenting here on the one RO thing, genderlocked is a bigger can of worms that gets talked about extensively.)
One RO would work totally great for me if that was the central point of the story. So if it was like, “Robin Hood and Maid Marian” or something, and the whole idea was how the romance plays out. People who don’t want to play that game, will just say “nope, this is not my kind of game” and move on. I’d be OK with that. I wouldn’t like it as much if it wasn’t upfront stated, and if the romance/love story wasn’t “the point” I’d find it kind of odd, like why tack on ONE love interest but not multiple? But if someone wrote a story that was largely about one specific romance, yeah I’d try it.
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I’m okay with having one RO games. On the gender locked male protag. It’s your story does whatever the heck you want. You’ll lose some you’ll get some readers/players but the important thing is for you as the writer to actually want to write the story you want and not be forced to write it else what is the point of continuing to write something you’ll eventually not like.
Hell, I posted at the interest thread to test the waters and see if the community was on board with a female gender locked game. Boy… the funny comments rolled around (When I say roll around I mean like the comments and argument ain’t no deferent with the whole locking the game to a male gendered game. I just took all the comments on a “Okay” attitude. Is it changing what I’m going to write about? Meh…)
In this case write whatever the heck you’ll want to write and just make sure you’re going to enjoy writing it.
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