The creativity of authors is astonishing. Wonderful, inspiring and amazing.
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Honestly I was a bit drunk last night so I figured I was having a nightmare when I read about making Neia bisexual and went to sleep lol. Feels like I’m late to the party but gonna add my 2 cents anyway.
I’ve been following the development of The Golden Rose since the early stages, I still remember when Hadrian and Alessa were straight, and as a bisexual woman I was pretty excited when Ana changed them to bisexual instead. Neia was the only lesbian since the beginning, also excited about that.
It’s rare that I see any lesbian ROs in games these days. I remember days (I promise I’m not that old) when I often felt frustrated because I could only play as male character in games. Surprisingly, I still played those games because I genuinely enjoyed them, even though I couldn’t play as female. I romanced Dorian from DAI, just because he’s a sweetheart and I wanted to see his romance arc, even though he’s gay. What I’m trying to say is, the author is catering to everyone’s needs by making her characters all bisexual. There’s nothing wrong with having a character that’s gay or lesbian, or heterosexual or anything else. Actually, I believe it’s a good thing because players will want to play the game more than 1 time and choose different options. Replayability, for me, is very important.
Another thing, personally I’m fine with changing things about characters in early stages, obviously. But, let’s say you’re planning 4 books, and 1 book is already out. Imo it’s a bit late to change stuff about developed characters, especially when that one book is so big that it took a couple years to finish everything and release. And this isn’t me complaining, don’t get me wrong. It just feels a bit strange to me to change a character’s sexuality after years of developing them. Sure, it is the author’s choice, as it should be, but she isn’t catering to the minority by making Neia lesbian. She already WAS a lesbian since the beginning. Ana would be catering to the straight/bisexual men mainly, by making her bisexual. Same goes for the Pirate, it’s just as weird for me. It isn’t the player’s choice, BUT it is inevitable that people will be upset, disappointed or even mad.
Personally, I think we should all just chill because sometimes we can’t have everything. And I know I may sound entitled by saying that, but really, I would be happy to have a heterosexual female RO in the game, or a gay male RO. But that’s not how it works, it would be so much work just to add a new character and somehow fit them into the plot so they actually matter. Still, it’s not the end of the world if you have to play as the opposite gender just to experience a character’s romance arc.
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I dipped out on this argument because it was my birthday, but there’s a misconception that I saw mentioned here several times that I felt was necessary to correct.
A few people claimed that the only way you know Neia is a lesbian is from a couple posts on Tumblr/Patreon. That is not correct. She only flirts with a female Romanus in Book 1. Also, if Ana, in her own words, was saying she would have to go back to Book 1 to edit Neia’s scenes to make her bi instead of a lesbian, doesn’t that directly imply that Neia was established as a lesbian in Book 1?
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This means nothing, though. Alessa and Hadrian only show interest of their own initiative towards Romanus of the opposite gender, and they’re both bi.
She altered the original post so now I can’t check (or maybe I can and don’t know how to), but wasn’t the rewrite part only about Vallen?
I stand corrected, then. 
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But a male Romanus cannot flirt with Neia, and can only even get her attention if she sees you as a worthy opponent.
And no, she had said that rewrites for the content was necessary for the Pirate and Neia as well. I did not take screenshots before the edit, but my friends and I were directly talking about that aspect of the post in our DMs.
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That reminds me, I always assumed that if male Romanus tried flirting with her, it would be the last thing he ever did lol
It’s for his own good, trust me
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As long as we’ll have any ROs for men that approve of my MC acting like a much more stoically inclined Neia, I will endure this loss. (obvious sarcasm is obvious, I just would like to see someone like that for male characters as well, no one seems to like my murderhobo aside from Neia) Alessa already seems to disapprove when she sees Griffith’s sociopathic tendencies, I wonder if she’ll break up with him come Book 2.
No it was for the pirate king and Neia as both have flirt options that can only be done if you are the correct gender. Vallen can already be flirted with regardless of player gender she just doesn’t really acknowledge it. As I understand Vallen just isn’t really interested in flirting with you at that point and her actually becoming interested in the MC won’t happen till later and depends on their actions hence nothing to really change or rewrite.
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There are hints that Vallen will be one now
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Yeah, considering what makes the mark grow, being a fan of it is, uhhh…
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My mark grew for surprisingly little reasons. Yes, my character killed and enjoyed it, but it’s weird that each time he said that he enjoyed murder the text said his mark grew.
actually there’s a lot of lesbians characters in IF’s. Gay males that there’s none. Female characters get a lot less love than male ones, making them a lesbian make even worse. I’m impressed that a lot people doesn’t think.
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Trying to figure out if you’re insulting me haha.
Lesbian characters or lesbian love interests? There are seemingly more lesbian ROs than gay ones, sure. I haven’t seen all that many lesbian ROs though, even less gay ones. Usually most ROs are bisexual though.
From the top of my head, I can think of only one IF where there was one gay LI and one lesbian.
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Non-bisexual romanceable characters tend to be more common in gender- or sexuality-locked games (Heart’s Choice has quite a few) though there are some that can be found in other games.
The main relevant point though is that Ana has decided to keep this character lesbian, while also adding another romanceable female character who can be romanced by male and female PCs. I anticipate that both will be a lot of fun to play!
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I’m not insulting you, I just really baffled that people don’t realize what it means to have a lesbian ro, they’II literally have even less attention than they already don’t have, people romance female character are the minority(mostly lesbian and men), the rest are completely obsessed with male ro’s. So yeah I’m disappointed, I’ve seen a lot people preach lesbian ro’s here but they don’t even romnce them. I’m not even a fan of m/m but I just know the reason why we don’t have none. I know this won’t change anything, why would it.
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I don’t think it’s true that female love interests are always overlooked compared to male ones, but even if it was - that isn’t a reason not to include them. Similarly, I adore bisexual characters but just because gay/straight love interests are romantically available for a smaller proportion of MC genders, it doesn’t follow that every romanceable character should be bisexual. It’s up to authors to make whatever decisions feel right for the character, for whatever reasons suit them.
Besides - no one character/romance will be popular with every MC and player, and trying to make that happen will only result in a flat character.
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There’s like two gay ROs in the Infinity series alone. Only a Sith deals in absolutes.
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I know how you mean this but I just can‘t help but point out something that that bugs me everytime I see this (maybe call it a pet-peeve of mine):
I would say that most ROs are player-sexual, not bisexual. I hate it when these terms are used interchangeably and I see it all the time (please do not read this as a personal attack of you, though. Again, I understand perfectly what you wanted to say.)
If you call player-sexual characters bisexual you are basically erasing any identity and inherent queerness of bi people beyond their ability to be romanceable by all genders. It strengthens the old trope of bi/pan people only being queer when in visibly queer relationships. If your „bi“ romance feels like a straight romance with genderswapped pronouns — it‘s playersexual. If your „bi“ characters makes absolutely no mention of any kind of emotion/situation/etc relating to their queerness aside from maybe being in a same-sex relationship with the MC (which again will not be acknowledged in game since most If-games -for better or worse- make no mention of your gender) — it‘s playersexual.
Similar to how one can call something queer rep all they want — as long as it feels like one is pushed into heteronormative gender-roles during a romance it‘s not queer, it‘s a genderswapped straight romance.
But the other way around is true as well. If you call clearly bisexual characters (like the bisexual ones in this book) playersexual you are again denying bisexuality as an identity worth having, like only straight and gay/lesbian identities are valid and everything else just game mechanics. ‚You want bisexual representation? — well all these characters are player-sexual what more could you want?‘
Again, please don‘t take this as personal criticism. I just see this all the time and since we are already talking about representation I just want to point out that bisexual representation is not simply done by having them be open to romance for everyone (same as lesbian/gay representation is not done by having playersexual, potentially even genderswappable ROs, or non-binary rep by being able to select a RO as possibly non-binary).
On a different note: I‘m glad all the lesbian fans of this book could keep their representation, even though I‘m (irrationally!) disappointed it came at the cost of a bi Pirate King. Maybe it‘s just because I didn‘t know he was supposed to be straight when I first met him in game but I got so major bi vibes from him that I just couldn‘t wrap my head around the fact he wasn‘t when I found out later. Oh well.
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From what i understand unless I miss something he is still being made bi
Edit:Never mind
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Yes, the update only mentions Neia’s change to be reversed. So presumably for the Pirate King it’ll stick?
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