Romance: Destination vs Journey
Without any intent for it to be this way, the end of March was a pirate-y time for me. Delaney and I finished (and thoroughly enjoyed) the first season of Our Flag Means Death. I also started my first playthrough of Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire which I picked up because I was in the mood for a CRPG and it went on a good sale.
There are a lot of go-to themes when it comes to pirates like exploration through sailing, a quirky crew on a vessel home, and general debauchery. They’re not what I’m interested in. What I’m interested in looking at is romance, and how a viewer/player experiences it.
In experiencing these stories side by side, the difference in how they tackled romance was stark. That led me to revisit a problem I’ve had with many games I’ve played and how they treat romance. How intimacy is reduced to a system of saying what a character wants to hear, gifting them, and finally unlocking a cutscene or fade to black moment that means yup, you’ve had sex and you’re now in love, mission accomplished.
Playing Deadfire, that’s pretty much been my experience.
Then I started OFMD that I thought was going to be about pirate shenanigans and suddenly I’m deep in blossoming relationships and all the trials they come with.
Happily Ever After?
In Deadfire the romance sort of just happened. Not in a natural way of my avatar and them just hit it off. It was more like “oh, I guess I can pursue that. Yeah, they seem fine. Curious to see where this goes. Oh, that’s nice.” There’s this feeling like there could be something cool to explore so I might as well. So I go about the tried and true methods of earning their favor.
When the character confided in me I was nice to them and validated their feelings. The way I was playing my character as a typical altruist meant there wasn’t much to object to and our preferences for resolutions aligned more often than not. Pretty early on I was given options to be nice and flirty and I took them. Soon enough, the character confessed their feelings and asked how I felt and my options were basically:
“Same.”
“How about friends?”
“Eww.”
I went with A. I think we had sex then? I’m not really sure. We were in a jungle and a crazy fight just ended when the conversation happened. It was kind of implied but not clear.
Anyways, that’s pretty much been it. I’m not done with the game so there could be more to encounter but I’ve done a lot since then (about eighty hours in) and there hasn’t been any real change to my experience.
Like a lot of games, it kind of feels like romance is just another grind you’re on till you earn a sex scene and that’s it. The content was the courting and now that you’re in a relationship, the heavy lifting is behind you. It’s a fairy tale notion that the conflict and drama are only up to the moment you declare love for each other and then on its smooth sailing.
So, being a blog about narrative design and experience, I wanted to look at how the experience of romance has been presented in games, how it has evolved, and where it could go.
What About Romance Games?
Aside from Florence* (shoutout to fellow alumni of The Narrative Department for the recommendation) I can’t say I’ve played other games in the dating sim/romance genre and so I want to make it clear that I’m not criticizing the advancements in that field.
Florence was incredibly thoughtful and well designed as a romantic experience, covering the life span of a relationship in ways that hit true. Playing through the game captured the experience of a relationship and its undoing that I genuinely felt through clever design and a narrative carefully interwoven with gameplay.
What I’m specifically looking at are the video games where romance is included but not explicitly the promise of a game’s experience. This awkward space where time was clearly put into it but it isn’t a key feature of the game.
(Editor’s Note: I’d be remiss to not mention stories of abuse by the studio’s creative director that have come to light. In mentioning the game and its brilliance here, I do so as recognition of the hard work the many developers put into making a meaningful experience.)
Romance as a Goal
I started with thinking back to my first romance in a game. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was the earliest I could remember. Unsurprisingly, BioWare games made up a good chunk of my list. Starting out, their relationships were mechanically and narratively tertiary. Kind of like the finale of a side quest or series of them with one additional option being you profess your love for each other.
Preteen me may have been blown away by romancing Bastila but by the time I was twenty and playing Star Wars: The Old Republic, the system lost its allure. The flirty options felt kind of, I don’t know, weird? Like when I was taking them I didn’t actually feel like I was experiencing anything. I just took the romance option because it was there and I was curious to see if it went anywhere.
After romancing a companion they’ll send you messages in game with goods and trinkets along with sweet messages to you. I guess that’s something but it felt hollow. It didn’t really change anything about my experience in the game. It basically just felt like I raised my reputation with them to a point where I unlocked the intimate cut scene and we were set. They did raise concerns over me flirting with other people and so we declared ourselves exclusive. That was it. Achievement unlocked.
I think romance as a goal carried over from pop culture, especially media portraying the “hero’s journey” kind of stuff. Heroes get an attractive companion as icing on the cake for their victory. Compatibility and shared interests aren’t really a concern when you’re a badass who saved the world I guess.
Romance as a Pursuit
This is where I turn to the romance genre. Even the cheesy stuff serves as a good indicator of what people who love the genre are drawn to in romance stories: the pursuit. The happy ending gets the credits rolling but the content lies in the obstacles, internal and external, to a couple’s love being realized. Overtime, BioWare started to move away from romance just being a goal and more into the experience of it unfolding.
My experiences as a Grey Warden in Dragon Age: Origins were among the best. While the game was guilty of the gifting system being a cheap way to flirt, I appreciated that your romantic relationships changed the way the story unfolded. Romancing Morrigan provided an opportunity that significantly impacted the game’s finale. There were a lot of subtle changes too. Barks while exploring the world about how our characters cared for each other. Those touches made it feel like the choice to romance the character meant an intimacy between them that was more than an awkward sex scene that fades to black.
Dragon Age: Inquisition was a natural progression for the studio. Characters felt distinct and not everyone in your party was desperate to sleep with you just because you did favors for them (except for Iron Bull but, ya know, it’s Iron Bull).
Stardew Valley, while also guilty of a romance system heavily driven by gifts, at least makes a point of trying to do more with the process of romancing a character. You’re getting to know them and seeing if you have chemistry through shared interests/decisions.
This is all pretty good but it still presents a problem for me. There’s this reliance on a system of gifting and talking to drive the relationships forward. It’s grindy which means the process starts to feel transactional. I do the right thing enough to unlock the next cutscene and so on until the final one where we probably have sex and then we’re back at the problem of romance as a goal. Games have come a long way with the maturity of these systems and with representation of different partnerships which I don’t want to understate. I just want something more. I also think games that are played by kids and teenagers could do some good by considering what their systems teach about pursuing romance in the real world.
The Obstacle
Budgetary concerns are clear. How many extra lines need to be written and voiced? Especially for a system that players may not engage with. Not every game can or needs to have a relationship dramatically alter the ending of the story.
I couldn’t agree more. I will counter however that if you’re going to put romance into your game, you could take a different approach that does not require more content. Rather, you shift the content from representing the pursuit of romance to the reason for it.
Romance as a Relationship
The image above is from a cutscene in Enslaved: Odyssey to the West (timestamped if you want to check it out). When I picked up the game I was expecting a fun action adventure experience in a post-apocalyptic setting. What I got was an existential ride and a tender relationship between the main characters Monkey and Trip. It tonally matched the mood of the game and enhanced that feeling of tragedy and how relationships are just as much about navigating the turmoil as they are enjoying the wonders. I could feel their care for each other and how their story didn’t start with flirting and gifts but shared experience and empathy for one another.
Another great example of romance as a relationship is Life is Strange. It provided an authentic experience with the option for Max and Chloe’s friendship to grow into a more intimate relationship based on their chemistry and shared experiences. Their relationship develops as the story does and it makes certain decisions that much harder for the player to make. It fundamentally alters your experience of the game while offering a realistic portrayal of a budding romance.
An experience that sticks out to me is from my friend Cutler who shared that one of his favorite romances in a game was Jack from Mass Effect II. He told me about a memorable moment pretty early on before you’ve even unlocked her loyalty mission.
While asking about her she calls you out and asks why you want to know so much about her and if it's just to sleep with her. You can choose yes and then congrats you get a clunky fade to black sex scene and that is the last time she’ll talk to you on ship.
If you actually express care for her you get a meaningful experience that is paced out for Jack to find her feelings and learn that she can trust you. If you betray that trust at any point, she’s out. There’s a process that distinguishes romancing Jack compared to other companions.
In each of these examples, the experience of romance is the experience of a relationship. It’s not about exploring some side quest that gains you enough reputation to win them over. It’s about learning who they are and how you work together. About how you can celebrate together and how you handle the lows of conflict.
Only the Beginning
I first drafted this entry on April 1st. It’s now April 11th and I’ll probably let this sit for a night before I return to it tomorrow for a final look over. While I’m happy with the current shape of this entry, I feel there’s more to be said. I’d like to get into the narrative design elements that facilitate the portrayal of a relationship in games.
What did my Mass Effect 2, Life is Strange, and Enslaved: Odyssey to the West get right?
How do you work with current systems of reputation and relationship tracking to make them feel more authentic?
Does a relationship need to dramatically alter the main story to matter?
These are questions I hope to tackle in the next entry. In the meantime, if you have a memorable experience from a game romance, positive or negative, I’d love for you to share it below.