This discourse was going around twitter today apparently and im curious takes from here.
Which is it for you?
For me i prefer playersexuality. I want to be able to romance any romance option regardless of my charachters gender. I dont want to be stuck with only Arcade Gannon if i want to do m/m
I agree that sexuality can be important to a charachter. But if you wanna do that, seems like the charachter can just not be a romance option.
That said. In RPGs devs can do what they want. You want a charachter to be monosexual and a romance option, have at it. (Unless theyre all straight, then fuck you).
I do kinda hate what The Sims did by adding monosexuality. Felt like such a virtue signal that made the game less fun. All Sims being pansexual was always more fun for me. Especially since i usually play that game as a pansexual slut. Unless i decide my player Sim is mono, but thats on the player’s end.
Monosexual townies in the Sims should at least be optional (is it? Idk havent played Sims 4 since this update).
In games where PC has a well defined personality and is distinct from the player it makes sense to have their sexuality fixed as part of the story, but in open ended RPGs that try to give the player as much choice as possible and blur the distinction between the player and the character, a set sexuality just comes across as lazy writing. I can set myself up as a fire-breathing lizard person with the highest cheekbones in history but the male characters are totally claws-off? That’s dumb.
I don’t understand your reasoning here. Are you arguing that the player character should be flexible if it’s an RPG? If so I agree. But if you’re arguing that all NPCs should be flexible just because you get to be a flexible, fantastical character, I don’t understand that logic. The character is YOU, other characters should have their own preferences. I don’t see how it’s lazy to add restrictions to other characters instead of letting everyone be potentially attracted to you
I largely don’t care about which design is present, but I find the arguments against fixed sexualities to be unconvincing.
Tali was cute and gating her romance path behind the inferior male Shepard was not okay.
No romance options because romance in games is cringe
I think it’s honestly better to view it through the lens of it being a game design tool moreso than a philosophical debate. If you want to emphasize player choice and freedom, playersexual. If you want to emphasize characterization and worldbuilding, set sexuality.
If you’re going to incorporate dating sim components into your game, it’s generally better to lean towards playersexual. Otherwise, you run into a sort of zugzwang where you can
a) lock romance options to het (e.g. Persona) and alienate queer people, even worse when you don’t have a gender option which also alienates 50% of said hets, or
b) have set sexuality and allow some queer relationships with certain characters (e.g. Fire Emblem: Three Houses) but have people annoyed about the arbitrariness of it, especially when there are no characters that cannot be romanced in a heterosexual way but limited queer options.
I think there’s space for set sexuality, especially in linear, narrative-driven RPGs (e.g. Final Fantasy, Undertale, Zelda). Set sexuality really works when you want to emphasize relationships between characters that the protagonist/player character is not party to (e.g. ) Furthermore, set sexuality, when there is a romance mechanic, best works when you establish a boundary between player and character.
Ultimately, it’s a choice of what you want to grant to the player, as well as the distance between the player and the protagonist. If you want to let the player choose between characters to romance in the game, and that’s an aspect that is a design component within the game, you’re usually better off sticking to playersexual, unless you want to take a hyperrealistic angle to it. If you don’t want to incorporate that aspect into your game, there’s genuinely no need, stick to set sexuality. If you want to establish the protagonist as a character that exists outside of the player embodying them, lean towards set sexuality.
I honestly am just tired of romance being attached as a weird afterthought to certain RPGs. It’s sterile when it’s not handled with a modicum of care, and it definitely cements the whole unease-inducing ‘escapist power fantasy’ vibe you get in RPGs that take this approach alongside emphasizing openness. If you’re gonna let me date, let me date. If not, why bother?
I would say that if the game’s writing is going to do something with it, then having distinct sexualities for all of the NPCs can be a cool idea that really fleshes things out. Like if LGBT rights are a thing in your game world that the characters care about, and different societies have different views on the subject that get explored during the game, then that would be a situation where giving all of the relevant characters a specific sexuality makes sense.
But if you don’t have something specific you’re trying to do, then playersexuality makes the most sense. Games have a lot of acceptable breaks from reality in the name of player freedom already, so why not this? That said I’m kind of a basic bitch when it comes to this, since I always play a female PC who romances the “default” female love interest when that’s an option and nobody when it’s not.
