In regards to this, 99% of the time, even when the story isn’t about romance, there is some form of romancable option as including romance to some degree has become a staple of CoG/Hosted Games.
In these cases, the player’s sexuality is asked to set the genders of gender variable characters that its possible to romance AND/OR determine which characters (if any) will respond romantically to the player.
On the first case, this is usually done so the player can have as many romanceable options as possible to help them feel more immersed in the story.
The second case is a bit more complicated, as I believe it solves multiple possible issues. The first issue is that of making players feel uncomfortable from being hit on by a character they may not be interested in (I’ve seen people mention it being possibly uncomfortable of all genders/sexualities). The second issue it solves is reducing the possibility of the player accidentally getting locked into a romance they’re not interested in, by removing them as an option all together.
TLDR: From what I know, the purpose of including sexual orientation questions is to set the genders of gender variable characters and as an easy way to remove characters the player would not be interested in (on the basis of their sexuality) from the possible romance pool.
Yeah, in regards to romance in zombie survival games, etc. I think it’s more of a marketing/community decision than it is a philosophical or political agenda.
Spend enough time on the forums and you’ll see a large portion of CoG superfans (or at least a large portion of their most vocal superfans) want romance, and as many ROs as possible. Think you included enough, as the author? I’ll put good money on people still requesting ROs (sexual or asexual) for more characters: the old prospector, the delivery person, the Zombie queen, the ship’s computer, whatever ya got. Man, do CoG fans love romance. And it’s nice to be able to fulfill fans requests within reason.
So, even though most every CoG (and even Heart’s Choice!) game I’ve seen allows the player to easily decline any romantic escapades without harming the story, or pursue them asexually, if even the prospect of the potential for romance turns you off, I’m afraid you’re in the minority. There might be a few games that don’t involve any romance at all, which is the author’s choice, but if you want more people to be excited about your game and tell all their friends, it behooves you to include some.
Ascertaining the player character’s orientation IS part of a philosophical and political agenda, as @HarrisPS says, and it’s a good one. The agenda is that CoG games should be as inclusive as possible, especially in terms of sexual orientations and gender identities. If that’s a turn-off for you, then CoG games are probably not for you.
THIS one of the reason why i love CoG/HG in general. Many IFs out there usually had pre-set main character with appearance, gender and sexual orientation.
Call me picky or weird whatever, but i have a gender dysphoria when playing other than as my own gender, I’m also a bisexual.
CoG/HG’s games check-off all of the things that makes me interested.
There is also GB’s patch games’ VN with Our life series. But it’s neither here nor there.
Precisely. As someone who RPs rather than self-inserts, I start getting annoyed when my character makes choices believing they mean one thing only to find out they negatively impacted their stats in some way or another (changing their personality to something it isn’t or failing to bump their preferred skill). I give games one chance at that before I code dive–the first time I see a choice doesn’t work the way I or my character believed it would, I code dive through the entire game to get the stats my character should have.
For me, it’s a combination of time (I have a certain amount of free time and I don’t want to waste it having to replay to get the result my character would get or is aiming for), ADHD (this is why I code dive instead of reading guides–guides are boring, plus I like reading the branching paths myself to see which is best for my character), and anxiety about the unknown. With regards to the latter, I read the end of books before I ever start them–if the ending sucks or is depressing, I don’t bother. IF is somewhat of a problem for me where that is concerned, since authors refuse to give spoilers, which is why, once I see choices may not be interpreted by the author the way I interpret them, I code dive the whole damned work to see what happens.
If I don’t see a way to a good ending, I don’t play it. In code diving, I’ve learned to despise implicit flow control, because it’s sometimes less clear than your typical “goto scene” method. There have been a couple of games where the author’s way of coding pissed me off so much that I didn’t bother playing them, lol.
Add to this that different people have different definitions for “engaging.” There’s no one-size-fits-all for that. Some people are entirely character driven (raises hand) while others are there for the story and the characters are just pawns that move the story where the author wants. Others are in these games for stat-raising. It just goes back to the old advice to write what you love–if you write it and hate it, the reader likely will, too.
I’ll assume this isn’t a troll post, even if i think otherwise.
Most CoG have branching paths of various complexities and achievement for achieving specific goals. Some people don’t want to replay games 100s of time to get them all.
Stop being elitist and let people play as they want. You are no one to dictate what is right or wrong way to play.
A game needs a character for you to control. CoG titles aren’t “normal” books, they are interactive fiction and need a protagonist of some sort that player can relate to. While i am not against pre set MC, people don’t really like those.
While romance isn’t mandatory, many people seem to like it, so it’s a good way to attract audience to the book.
Honestly i rarely see any big bugs here. While they happen, major issues are patches rather fast.
Yes, you sounded like that, by trying to make issue out of a nonissue.
