this post was submitted on 16 Feb 2026
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This is Visual Novel erasure! :yells-at-cloud: Good article.
I usually skip romance arcs because they are so painfully cringe to wade through. The exceptions are, for the most part, movies by another name (eg FFX) and can play to a film's strengths in writing and acting.
The major problem is the interactive medium of games itself; how can one build a compelling organic romance when there can be nearly limitless choices? It's like how traditional stories in Open World games cannot have any real tension because it removes the freedom from the player. I think what makes romances in films, plays, and books work is because you are always one step removed in the observer's position. This distance is much blurrier in games because you are directing and making choices for the character, and obliterated when you are the character doing the romancing. Then there's the ugly truth in games that simulating Reality is often not fun. Accurate physics is actually pretty boring and hard. Going through a virtual breakup sounds like a cyberpunk dystopian hell. Then there's the game save which renders any important decision moot. This video talks about how failure/difficulty in games is itself difficult to design because we don't like failure. It touches on romances too.. A big point he makes is how a game cannot take the player aside, gauge their reaction to events, and adjust itself. Without this feedback all we have are dialog trees and stats. Then there is the risk we get what we ask for, and players start legitimately romancing their NPC characters like this MIT study is suggesting happening with current generation chatbots.
I think this is a funny example because while that game does have a fine romance subplot, the parts of it that actually interact with the fact that it's a video game are the worst parts. Like how confused it feels if the player randomly tells Lulu that she's more his type than Yuna, approximately twelve seconds before the definitely-not-a-sex-scene with Yuna. Like obviously Tidus is into Yuna, why is the player even allowed to make him say dumb shit to Lulu?
That's a good point. Xenogears just said "Hi, this is Fei. This is Elly. They're going through some shit right now, maybe it'll work out?"
Actual spoiler that will just be confusing unless you've played Xenogears - it's really not obvious what it means.
Miang.I've encountered the realism of lusting after a straight woman can't return my interest too many times in a video game, and it's made me leery of romance systems. There's a certain wish fulfillment element of playing a game that really sucks when you're denied.
In the typical power fantasy, I can be assured that a game will level me up or let me slowly develop a mastery, but a failed romance is a hard no, and it's just a fucking bummer. On the flip side, if there's no tension then there's no game.
Perhaps this is why so many games give you romance as the reward. You get the wish fulfillment of getting a kiss from Peach AND the power fantasy of defeating Bowser.
Best I can think of for a romance concept is to give the player a fated romance and a Groundhog Day setup that allows the plaher to build knowledge from their failures until they eventually learn what the love interest does and doesn't like. Not that this doesn't come without its own set of issues, like potentially twaching the player that persistence is always rewarded, and not sometimes creepy or downright stalkerish. Or simply making a love interest unlikable because they spend the whole game judging you for fucking up
You mean save scumming every important dialog or as an actual game mechanic?