It has long been said that video games’ greatest storytelling strength is that it is an interactive medium. The player gets to shape the narrative and this, when executed well, provides a deeper emotional investment in the story. This has manifested in many different mechanics over the years, from good/evil alignment bars to Telltale-style major narrative choices. I would argue though that the most iconic and impactful of all of these mechanics is the “romance” system: the ability to form a relationship with one or more characters, fundamentally altering the way you interact with that character.
If you are a Gamer™, you’ve no doubt encountered romance mechanics plenty of times. Hell, you’ve probably got some very strong opinions on the characters you chose to romance, why you chose them, and what the “right” pick was, which just goes to show how effective and engaging these systems really are. Sure, they’re just silly, fictional relationships, often with very rudimentary mechanics governing whether you complete enough chores to successfully “win” a character’s love, but you cannot deny the emotional impact that a good romance system leaves on you.
Suffice to say, I’ve played a fair few games with romance systems over the years, and I thought it would be fun to go through them, explain my choices, see what sort of characters I chose to romance, and give some thoughts on each game’s romance system.
It probably goes without saying, but there will be story spoilers, so proceed with caution!
Also, two bits of clarification before we get into this properly. When I’m referring to “romance systems” here, I’m specifically narrowing this down to games where you can choose between two or more characters to form a relationship with. While romance systems can certainly be more nuanced than this, I’m excluding the following types of games:
- I’m looking for games where your actions affect the narrative being told, not games where you’re creating your own narrative whole-cloth. As a result, sandbox games with next to no narrative where you can choose to romance/bang a plethora of characters to your heart’s content (ie, The Sims, Playboy: The Mansion, 7 Sins) are out.
- Similarly, I’m going to ignore games where you’re expected to romance/bang damn-near every character you interact with (ie, Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude).
- Games where there’s a single, optional romance route that you can choose to engage with (ie, Heavy Rain, Indigo Prophecy, Knights of the Old Republic, Vampyr, The Council). These kinds of romances are perfectly fine, but there’s basically nothing to say about them: yeah, I romanced the one character the game presents you, because the game wanted me to. When presented the choice of seeing more story content, or not seeing it, what did you think I’d choose…?
- I’m also not going to cover games which entirely revolve around a romance you pick at the very beginning (ie, Paparazzi, Gal*Gun Returns). You’re not interacting with characters and then choosing who to form a relationship with. Instead, the only choice you make is your “route”, which will then play out in a linear fashion from start to finish. Again, there isn’t that much to say about these kinds of games. You rarely get to have any sort of interactions with these characters prior to choosing your route, so you end up just picking the character that looks most interesting/attractive, and let the game play out from there. Like, that’s literally how my Paparazzi playthrough went down, I picked Riho Futaba because I recognized her, there was literally nothing else to go off of, which makes for some boring commentary.
One last thing: I’m a straight, male dude. As a result, I’m only really interested in pursuing male-female relationships since those are what appeal to me the most. If you have different tastes than I do, then you might be annoyed that I’m ignoring some of the male and/or non-hetero romance options… in which case, fair enough, because I absolutely am. The comments section below is a great place to cover any good romance options that are outside of my own wheelhouse.
Alright, with all that said, let’s get into the first big romance system many of my fellow millennials would have encountered…
Mass Effect 2 & 3
Bioware were the kings of gaming romance systems in the late 90s and 2000s. While there were some games with romance systems in them before this (one of which we’ll get to soon enough), Bioware really codified how these systems would work in nearly every game that followed. Most of Bioware’s games would have some sort of romance option available for the player that they could activate by choosing the right dialogue options when interacting with them. When the relationship reaches a high enough level, character-specific side-quests unlock, which further deepen the relationship when completed. Each subsequent Bioware release iterated upon these systems, eventually culminating in their biggest and most ambitious effort: the Mass Effect trilogy, which would carry over choices and relationships across three whole games. Despite not playing the first chapter (due to Xbox 360 exclusivity), Mass Effect 2 was none-the-less glorious.
As for the romance options, these were expanded significantly compared to Knights of the Old Republic. Instead of one optional romance, you now can now romance up to three different characters in one playthrough, plus a couple optional flings which don’t really go anywhere in Mass Effect 2, but can blossom in Mass Effect 3. Given the game’s overarching narrative of recruiting comrades for a suicide mission in which several characters can (and will) die, this made for some really high-stakes storytelling, with the character you romanced potentially dying in the finale. Oh the drama!
Who Can You Romance?
Romance options in Mass Effect 2 are largely segregated depending on whether you choose to be a male or female Commander Shephard at the start of the game. This was well before gay marriage was legalized in the US, so Bioware/EA were clearly just trying to mitigate any controversy, especially since the romances in the first Mass Effect were the target of sensationalism and lies by Fox News.
I played as Maleshep in my Mass Effect 2 playthrough. As a result, I’m only going to cover the romance options available to him, since I didn’t really get to know much about Femshep’s partners (sorry Garrus stans):
- Miranda Lawson: An officer for Cerberus, the shady organization which resurrects you at the start of the game. She is a biotic (basically a sci-fi mage) who is professional, competent, and literally engineered to be “perfect”, so it’s perhaps no surprise that she has some top-notch… assets.
- Tali’Zorah vas Neema: A Quarian mechanic who worked with Commander Shephard during the events of the original Mass Effect. She is an extremely talented technician who is very sweet, kind, awkward, and openly besmitten with the Commander.
- Jack: Jack is a wild-card. She’s an extremely powerful biotic with a mistrust of authority who ends up on the wrong side of the law. She’s basically a punk girl, if her shaded head, head-to-toe tattoos, revealing outfit, and abrasive personality didn’t make that obvious.
Mass Effect 3 brings back all of these options plus some more but, for reasons I’ll get into soon, I’m not even going to bother mentioning them. My romance route was decided well before I booted up Mass Effect 3.
Who Did I Romance?
I would have been nineteen when this game came out, so it should probably be no surprise that I was aiming to romance Miranda, for no other reason than that she was fucking hot. I was chatting her up and picking good dialogue options to try to get the relationship started, when suddenly there was an argument between her and Jack. Miranda was being a dick, so I sided with Jack in this interaction… which, it turns out, locks off any potential romance with Miranda from that point forward.
What the fuck, Bioware?
Not only does this lock out Miranda for future romance, but this also gets Jack interested in you. Shortly thereafter, she asked if I was DTF, so of course I said yes. We had a one-night stand, at which point she loses interest in Shephard. I always assumed that this was the extent of this relationship, but in researching for this article, I found out that if you say turn her offer down, you actually get a chance to get to know her first before romancing her properly… which I genuinely didn’t realize was a thing. Usually in a video game if you say “no” to a character, you’re shutting down that entire romance storyline. Mass Effect‘s romance system is weird, y’all.
In retrospect, Jack was definitely more intriguing than Miranda, so this turn of events was a happy accident for nineteen-year-old me. That said, this ended up being a very casual fling, because I was soon approached by Tali’Zorah, who was just an absolute sweetheart and immediately stole my heart. She was my ride-or-die for the remainder of Mass Effect 2 and 3, with no other character getting a glance in from that point onward. She was just so nice, caring, affectionate, and so very clearly smitten with Commander Shephard that I didn’t particularly care that she was some sort of weird alien creature*. When playing Mass Effect 3, I got to the final Quarian/Geth showdown and was unable to broker a peace between the two species. This was because Legion, who’s required in order to broker the peace, was my sole casualty during the Mass Effect 2 suicide mission. Unfortunately, one of the two species was going to destroy the other, but I didn’t really grasp this at the time the choice was presented to me. I felt that the Geth had every right to live, so I sided with them… not realizing that this would lead them to turn on the Quarians and wipe them all out, which in turn caused Tali to commit suicide in despair. I was so devastated by this outcome that I reloaded my previous save, which was more than an hour earlier in the game and replayed the whole mission just to be able to keep Tali alive. Wiping out the Geth still absolutely sucked, but it was a damn sight better than inadvertently getting my ride-or-die killed over a misunderstanding of the situation… and, honestly, I think that this says something for how compelling a well-crafted romance system can be. It’s been nearly fifteen years since I played Mass Effect 2 and 3, and while I’ve forgotten a lot of the finer details of these games, these romance-related plot points still stick with me because I chose how they played out and their emotional impact still resonates to this day.
*Which was definitely a hang-up for me going in: Liara’s often considered the “ideal” romantic partner for a male Shephard amongst the fanbase, but her being an alien species immediately made me not interested. Remember, I was nineteen when I played this game. Even a couple years later I was writing about my insecurity over playing Tomb Raider, because I was worried that people would assume I was doing so just to lust over Lara Croft’s sex appeal status. So, yeah, I was absolutely uncomfortable romancing a non-human character at that time, out of fear of somebody finding it “weird”.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
Things would probably play out differently if I were to replay Mass Effect now adays. The fact that I didn’t have access to the original Mass Effect definitely coloured my choices in 2 and 3, so I didn’t really get much of a chance to care about Liara (if I got over my initial ick with Tali, then I probably could for her too). Hell, I might even choose to play as Femshep if I were to replay the series, and she has entirely different romance options, so it could be a completely fresh experience (I hear Garrus is the best Femshep romance, and considering how much of a bro he was in my playthrough, I’m inclined to believe this). That said, assuming I played as Maleshep again… I might just try to go for Miranda again, just to see what the other side would have been like. No other reasoning behind (ahem) that decision…
Then again, now that I know that you can pursue a deeper relationship with Jack, that route sounds extremely tempting as well…
Final Fantasy VII
I’ve spilled a lot of ink over Final Fantasy VII recently (and will be spilling a lot more in near future), but I find it intriguing that it’s one of the few Final Fantasy games with an optional romance system. The game has a rudimentary “affection” system, where dialogue choices can affect your relationship with various characters. Depending on how high your affection is with a character, they may say or do different things during certain scenes. This culminates most famously at the Golden Saucer, where the character with the most affection up to this point will go on a date with Cloud. In my recent replay I also learned that, if your affection with Tifa is high enough at the end of the game, she and Cloud share an… intimate evening before the final showdown (will be interesting to see if this carries over to Final Fantasy VII Revelation).
FFVII‘s relationship system is neat, although it is subtle and opaque compared to many other games that would follow in its wake. You have very little understanding of the impact your dialogue choices will have, and there’s no way to see what your current affection levels are, so you either need to hope you picked the right choices or follow a strict guide. As a result, when you go on your big Golden Saucer date, the results can feel completely random.
Who Can You Romance?
There are two “main” romance options available to you in FFVII but, if you make your dialogue choices just right, you can take one of four different characters with you on your Golden Saucer date:
- Aerith Gainsborough: A dainty-looking flower seller that Cloud meets in Midgar and your primary healer in the first half of the game. Despite her fragile and gentle demeanour, Aerith has a very confident, direct, fearless, and fierce personality which pulls Cloud out of his misanthropic, self-centered shell.
- Tifa Lockhart: A barkeep in the Midgar slums, Tifa is Cloud’s childhood friend and love interest. She’s a rough-and-tumble fighter in her own right, but has a very kind and gentle personality. She lacks a lot of confidence in herself, especially since Cloud has come back into her life acting very strangely and knowing things which clash with her own recollection of events.
- Yuffie Kisaragi: A youthful ninja from Wutai, Yuffie is one of the “bonus” date options, although the it makes for a bit of an awkward time since she’s a minor…
- Barret Wallace: Barret is the leader of Avalanche, the eco-terrorist group that you work with throughout the course of FFVII. He’s a gruff figure who puts on a stand-offish attitude to mask his own insecurities (fake it ’til you make it, and all that). As a result, this “romance” option is generally considered a joke outcome, especially since it requires some very difficult balancing throughout the game’s first dozen hours just to make it happen, and the resulting scene is extremely awkward for everyone involved.
While FFVII‘s romance system isn’t particularly fleshed out, the choice between Aerith and Tifa is still one of the most iconic and debated choices in all of gaming thanks to the game’s strong writing and characterization, which make either option very satisfying in its own way.
Who Did I Romance?
Simply put: I’m Team Tifa, and always will be. Aerith’s a perfectly valid choice and is a pretty fun character in her own right, but I’ve always gravitated more towards Tifa due to the way I got into Final Fantasy VII. As I’ve mentioned before, I got interested in FFVII long after its legacy had been established. I knew that Aerith was going to die years before I played, so I decided that I wasn’t going to invest in her character since it would end up being a “waste”. Meanwhile, Tifa is one of the first party members you get and I found her to be really useful, so she’s always been a staple of my teams. Plus I really liked her Advent Children design, so I was primed to like her before I’d even started playing the game.
Note: this was at a time when Cloud x Aerith was the more popular ship, and “TIFA HAS BIG BOOBS!” wasn’t a meme within the fandom like it is now (the characters are in a chibi style, so I assumed that the size of her boobs was just an exaggerated, stylistic choice… seriously!). I was absolutely being a hipster when I shunned Aerith, but I stand by it, because Cloud x Tifa is not only canon, but way more true to my heart than Cloud x Aerith. That said, I can appreciate the tragedy a Cloud x Aerith playthrough brings with it.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
This one’s super fucking easy for me to answer, because I replayed Final Fantasy VII last year and I was still unwaveringly Team Tifa, and I’m currently playing through the Remake games and am also Team Tifa there. Hell, if anything, that replay made me even more Team Tifa, because I was able to appreciate the nuances of their relationship far more. I think it’s safe to say that she’s one of my favourite romance options in all of gaming.
Cloud x Tifa is just way more satisfying to me from a narrative perspective. Romancing her shows that the real Cloud is still there beneath the experiments and mental conditioning, that his long-held feelings for Tifa break through the noise and pull him back out. I am absolutely convinced that Tifa and Cloud complement each other perfectly.
That said… getting the Barrett date would be really entertaining, but I don’t know if I’d want to go through the effort it would require to see it play out… especially when I could just romance Tifa for a fourth time!
Alpha Protocol
I was really into spy/espionage thrillers around 2008 when Alpha Protocol was announced in Game Informer. The idea of a Bioware-style spy RPG/shooter sounded incredible and I was totally on board. The idea that I could sneak, shoot, and schmooze my way through my own espionage adventure was an irresistible dream come true.
Unfortunately, the game we got was notoriously unpolished and buggy, and its gameplay was rudimentary at best, but its choice system was super impressive, allowing it to grow into a low-key cult classic. Alpha Protocol allows you to make some really significant choices during your playthrough which dramatically alter the story in ways that put even Mass Effect to shame, with the final level basically being a bunch of interchangeable puzzle pieces that coalesce into a personalized finale, meaning that most players will have wildly different experiences by the time the credits roll.
Who Can You Romance?
Unfortunately, Alpha Protocol‘s romance options don’t end up being anywhere near as transformative as your other narrative choices. There are four romanceable characters that you’ll encounter on your globetrotting adventure, usually just showing up in one of the game’s five missions, with maybe a cameo appearance in the finale.
- Mina Tang: An intelligence analyst working for Alpha Protocol, Mina is your main ally through much of the game, providing you intel and support.
- Scarlet Lake: A no-nonsense photojournalist who’s investigating the conspiracy you find yourself in.
- SIE: An East German mercenary, SIE is your May Day or Xenia Onatopp sort of character, an imposing and domineering woman who can be a particularly challenging obstacle for a womanizing spy.
- Madison Saint James: Madison is a… character in Alpha Protocol. Honestly, I don’t remember anything about her, and even the Alpha Protocol wiki isn’t given me a ton to go off of. I guess she’s kind of this game’s Marie Kreutz or Natalya Simonova character, someone who gets roped into your adventure inadvertently…?
The interesting, and perhaps limiting, thing about Alpha Protocol‘s romance system is that it’s entirely optional. Like, sure, most romance systems are “optional”, but you’re kind of expected to engage in some of it. Alpha Protocol, on the other hand, allows you to play out your spy roleplay fantasy however you’d like, so its romances feel way more throwaway. Do you want to be an Agent 47, nothing more than a cold and focused killer with no time for dalliances on the job? You can do that. Want to be more like Jason Bourne, all-business, but striking up a relationship with the woman you’ve gotten tangled up with during your mission? Go for it. Or do you want to be a James Bond and bang your way through the entire female cast? You absolutely can do that. Given this level of roleplay flexibility, perhaps it’s no surprise that the relationships in this game don’t hit particularly hard, because they can’t really account for all the potential narrative branches.
Who Did I Romance?
According to my trophy stats, I romanced Madison Saint James and Scarlet Lake, but I genuinely don’t remember anything about these characters or what led me to romance them. I was roleplaying a professional, driven, Jason Bourne-style character, so I wasn’t necessarily trying to romance everyone, and I guess that these are the two that I settled on in the end… but the fact that I remember zilch about them should probably say something about the lack of emotional impact this game’s romances hold.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
I don’t fuckin’ know, man, I can’t remember shit about this game’s characters. I have wanted to replay Alpha Protocol for years, and even bought a copy for my PS3 to get a chance to someday. That said, I don’t think the characters in this game are much more than spy movie archetypes who show up for a level or two, so I doubt they’ll leave much of an impression on replay anyway.
That said… I’d probably just go for the James Bond route and romance ’em all next time. It’s not 2010 anymore. I’m not an evangelical kid. I’m not living in my parents’ basement. I don’t have to pretend to be all cool and serious by roleplaying as Jason Bourne. I can admit that the womanizer is objectively the most fun playstyle for a game like this and have a campy, delightful time. It’s gonna rock, whenever I get around to it.
Fire Emblem Awakening
I’ve loved the Fire Emblem franchise since the Gameboy Advance titles first made their way to the West. I love this franchise so much that I’m considering doing a Love/Hate series for it someday… just don’t expect it any time soon. As of the time of writing, there are sixteen different games I would need to play, and these are fairly long games to boot, so it’d be a long commitment that I am not ready to devote myself to.
Fire Emblem had a rudimentary pseudo-romance system in its early entries with “supports”: if two characters spend a lot of time adjacent to each other in battle, they will have the option to spend their turn on a dialogue sequence, which will raise each character’s support level. Mechanically, this grants the characters some stat bonuses while fighting in close proximity to one another. Narratively, the characters will forge a stronger relationship, becoming close friends or possibly getting married by in the game’s epilogue (assuming both survive the perma-death hellscape of Fire Emblem‘s battles).
Fire Emblem Awakening expanded on this system greatly though, which is why I’m covering it here. Supports with characters of the opposite sex are now explicitly romantic in nature, and once these characters reach S-rank support with each other, they will have a child who, thanks to time-shenanigans, will join your army and inherit traits from each parent. These child units can be wildly overpowered, adding a whole new level of strategy and roleplay that heavily incentivizes you to play matchmaker and pair off the entire cast. Luckily, Awakening also has a custom avatar character, so this makes it very easy to determine who “you” are romancing in the game.
Who Can You Romance?
Like every other game in this franchise, Fire Emblem Awakening has a TON of characters. Awakening sports forty-three recruitable characters, about half of which are romanceable by your player avatar… so, sorry, but I’m not going over every single one in detail. Instead, this is where I am going to bitch about Intelligent Systems creating a “thousand-year-old dragon trapped in the body of a little girl” romance option. Can we fuck off with this pedo shit, Japan?
Who Did I Romance?
In my playthrough, I was initially going to be a basic bitch. One of the very first female characters you meet is a Pegasus knight called Sumia. She was the very definition of basic: pretty, sweet, pleasant, and loyal. I was gunning for her in my initial playthrough because she seemed nice, but I wasn’t really committed by any means.
…and then I met Tharja.
Look, I’ve always had a thing for goth/alt-girls, long before the Internet came along and fetishized it. That was my scene in high school, and I’ve always found that outsider aesthetic alluring. When this dark mage showed up and immediately started hitting on my avatar, I was hooked. Is she crazy? Yes. Do I care? Hell no, that’s half the fun of this sort of wildcard character archetype!
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
Yeah, probably, she’s easily my favourite character in the game (even if some of the things she does are morally-questionable), and her S-rank support bonus allows her to single-handedly annihilate hordes of enemies. The only other Awakening characters I’d even consider romancing over Tharja would be Lucina and Cordelia, but even then… probably not. Without exaggeration, Tharja literally changed the trajectory of my life; her claws are way too deep in me to devote myself to anyone else.
Fire Emblem Fates: Birthright
Intelligent Systems’ big follow-up to Awakening was Fire Emblem Fates, a trilogy of games which diverge at a key decision point, setting you on a different route depending on the version of the game you selected. For Birthright, you side with your biological family and take down the evil empire which kidnapped you as a child.
Who Can You Romance?
Once again, I’m not going through the dozens of romances available for your main character, Corrin… but I will throw shade at Intelligent Systems for catering to weirdos again! For one thing, you can romance your biological siblings, one of which looks and acts like a minor. For another thing, the second-generation characters appear to be significantly younger than they were in Awakening, so having them engage in their own S-rank romances feels even more weird, especially because they can also engage in incest… like, Intelligent Systems, you programmed it this way, why???
Who Did I Romance?
For my Birthright playthrough… I honestly don’t remember who exactly my main character, Corrin, ended up romancing, but it was either Azura (the game’s main female lead) or Rhajat (because she’s literally an alternate universe version of Tharja, so I kind of had to, right?). I’m pretty sure it was Azura though, because she feels like the “intended” pairing for Corrin given the way the narrative plays out, so I would have just defaulted to this.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
Probably not. Azura’s fine, but she’s nowhere near interesting enough for me to stick with her forever. Similarly, Rhajat is nowhere near as interesting as Tharja, she’s literally just a pale imitation of the real thing. If/when I replay Birthright, I’ll probably aim to S-rank my support with Kagero or Orochi, but I have no strong feelings about any of the romance options in Birthright.
Fire Emblem Fates: Conquest
The second route in Fates sees you siding with the family that kidnapped you as a child and have raised you as one of them for the past couple decades. They are now at war with your birth nation, and you dutifully follow orders as you attempt to change them from the inside. This makes for a far more interesting and conflicted narrative compared to Birthright which, combined with its more elaborate and difficult level designs, makes Conquest the most enjoyable entry in the Fates trilogy.
Who Can You Romance?
Again, I’m not going over every romance option in a Fire Emblem game, but Conquest lowers the bar even further than Birthright, because not only can you marry your (adopted) siblings, one of whom appears to be a minor (again), but there’s also a romanceable “woman trapped in the body of a child, so it’s okay to fuck her”. Jesus fucking Christ, Intelligent Systems!
Who Did I Romance?
From a romancing perspective, we’ve got plenty of interesting options. The most popular female character in the game is Camilla, a big-booby, flirty psycho with an axe who the camera eye-fucks during her introduction. However… she is your goddamn adopted sister, so no. I don’t care how weirdly affectionate she is towards you, I’m not hitting that.
As a result, I ended up gravitating towards “Selena”, aka Severa, one of the second-generation characters from Awakening who finds herself transported across multiple universes into the world of Fates. Honestly, I’m really glad I went this way, because I really liked Severa as a character. She’s a tsundere, a character archetype I hadn’t really gone for before this point. I was always more into sweet and affectionate characters, so romancing someone who was more abrasive up-front was a change. However, seeing the relationship deepen and having her become more vulnerable over time was very satisfying and made her the canon romance option for Fire Emblem Fates in my heart.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
Absolutely. When/if I replay Fire Emblem Fates, I’ll definitely be going for Severa again… it’s just a question of whether I take that route in Conquest, in Relevation, or in both games!
Oh, speaking of Fire Emblem Fates: Revelation… I never finished it. I don’t remember if I S-ranked my support level with anybody, so… yeah, I’ve got nothing to say about it. I guess one more reason for me to do that Fire Emblem Love/Hate someday.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
After years of cult acclaim with the first two Witcher games, CD Projekt RED finally managed to hit it out of the park with The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. The Bethesda-style open world RPG was growing a bit stale thanks their reliance on filler side quests and narratives where your choices didn’t really matter. The Witcher 3‘s compelling writing made even basic side-quests feel exciting, and the game’s choice system felt truly impactful. And, unlike Alpha Protocol, the romances felt as important and impactful as any other major choice you could make… like, this is another one of those big “who did you romance?” games for a reason. Most people liked it quite a bit.
Who Can You Romance?
Like its predecessors (one of which lets you collect post-coital images of your sexual conquests, lol), The Witcher 3 allows Geralt to be a shameless slut. All romances are optional, but two of the characters have pre-existing relationships with Geralt, and you have to decide where those relationships stand during your playthrough:
- Yennefer of Vengerberg: A very powerful and driven sorceress, she always has an agenda of her own that she’s pursuing. Geralt used a djinn to wish for his destiny be tied to Yennefer’s, and so the couple have grown to love one another throughout a tumultuous relationship over the past couple decades (including adopting Ciri together).
- Triss Merigold: A sorceress peer of Yennefer’s, Triss took on the role of Geralt’s primary love interest in the first two Witcher games after Geralt was stricken with amnesia. She is fearless and determined, often putting herself in harm’s way to protect others… which actually happens quite frequently for her, as she and her fellow mages are being put to death by fanatics from the Church of the Eternal Fire.
While you have to choose where you stand with these two characters, there are several more minor romances which are completely optional. Some of these are just quick flings, while others are just part of their own interesting, enjoyable, and fleshed-out side-stories:
- Keira Metz: Another sorceress peer, Keira is charming, opportunistic, and pampered. She’s the first real romance Geralt can encounter in your playthrough.
- Jutta an Dimun: A Skellige (read: viking) warrior woman whose entire plotline exists purely to give Geralt somebody to romance.
- Sasha: A Nilfgaardian spy who you encounter in the Gwent tournament side quest. If you play your cards right, she’ll take you to bed.
- Shani: One of Geralt’s old flings, Shani is a medic who you can reunite with and romance in the Heart of Stone story expansion.
- Syanna: The romance option available in the Blood & Wine expansion… I don’t really know much about this character, because I never got that far, so I have no idea what her deal was. Apparently her romance is strange and worth beholding… someday, perhaps.
- A Literal Brothel Full of Wenches: Yeah, if that wasn’t enough, you can also fuck not one but TWO entire brothels full of women, because Geralt is more of a sex addict than Tiger Woods.
Also, if you don’t choose between Yennefer or Triss and instead try to have the best of both worlds, CD Projekt RED punish you severely. A scene will start up where it seems like Geralt’s about to have a threesome with both girls, but then they handcuff him to the bed and leave… meaning you end up with neither of them. It’s a brutal punishment, especially if you don’t really know enough to commit to one or the other before playing.
Who Did I Romance?
Despite two attempts, I didn’t actually finish The Witcher 3. As a result, I didn’t see every romance option available to you, so I can’t comment on a lot of the optional romance options. However, I did play enough to be able to weigh in on the Triss vs Yennefer debate. For both playthroughs, I ended up romancing Yennefer for three reasons:
- She is the “canon” romance for Geralt throughout the bulk of the series, so I wanted to stick to that.
- I had heard that romancing Triss ends up being less-satisfying from a narrative standpoint, so I wanted to get the “best” version of this long-ass game’s story that I could.
- Unlike most of the games we’ve looked at for this list, Geralt isn’t a blank slate. He has his own defined personality and history beyond what the player imagines for them. With that in mind and given their history, I feel like Geralt would choose Yennefer.
That said… if we’re talking pure attractiveness, I find Triss so much more appealing than Yennefer. Like, don’t get me wrong, they’re both smokeshows, but Triss comes out on top for me, personally.
With all that said, I did complete a couple of the secondary romances in my playthroughs. I romanced Keira Metz both times (like I’ve said, if you dangle a strings-free romance option in front of me, I’m not going to say no), and I am like 90% certain that I completed Jutta an Dimun’s questline to romance her in my second playthrough.
That said, despite my reputation as a slut, I don’t think I even bothered with the brothel. Like, the option is there if you want it, but you don’t get anything for your effort aside from some reused sex animations. It’s just pretend sex with no real purpose or narrative satisfaction. It’s a waste of time and money, there for little more than some novelty. So I guess I have some standards, at least.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
At this point, I don’t know if I have it in me to try to attempt to replay The Witcher 3 for a third time. If we go with the pure hypothetical option though, I’d probably stick with Yennefer again since I still have not actually gotten to the end of the game. If I did that, and then started a fourth playthrough, I’d definitely give Triss a shot… but I might as well start speculating about how I’d spend my lottery winnings too if we’re going to talk about things that are never going to happen.
Venus Vacation Prism: Dead or Alive Xtreme
For my 400th blog post celebration I reviewed Venus Vacation Prism, a Dead or Alive Xtreme photography/dating sim/visual novel spin-off which was, to my great surprise, actually a pretty enjoyable experience (and easily the best DOAX game by a wide margin). It plays out like any other dating sim/visual novel, with you choosing to spend time with certain characters and successfully making dialogue choices to improve your relationship. Some bonus affection can also be earned by taking good photographs of each girl. It’s nothing revolutionary, but it’s fun, and it was a lot more tasteful and respectful than I was expecting from an Xtreme game.
Who Can You Romance?
Venus Vacation Prism allows you to meet and get to know six of the most popular girls from DOAX Venus Vacation as you attempt to attract beautiful women to Zack Island for an upcoming festival:
- Misaki: Your young, shy, bashful secretary. She clearly has a crush on you, but she’s too insecure and inexperienced to say it. B85 W54 H89 cm
- Honoka: The only girl appearing here from the mainline Dead or Alive games (and even then, she’s only been here since Dead or Alive 5: Last Round), Honoka is a fun-loving airhead. B99 W58 H91 cm
- Tamaki: An older (by DOA standards… so, like, 22 years old), more mature woman, Tamaki is a fashion designer with confidence and personality to go around. She’s very social, up-front with her feelings, and loves to tease and flirt. However, some of this is a front to mask insecurity, because you can catch her off-guard, which really embarrasses and disarms her. B84 W54 H87 cm
- Fiona: Fiona is a yandere (a character who is unhealthily obsessed with you). She’s also a princess who has run away from her homeland just to be with you… she seems really sweet, but her devotion to you is so insane that I can’t trust a word she says, and it feels like I’m exploiting a mentally ill person every time she’s around. B88 W55 H84 cm
- Nanami: A normal girl… like, legitimately, that is her entire character archetype. She’s a fellow photography enthusiast who’s very down-to-earth and just wandering through life looking for purpose. She’s meant to be “achievable”, just a girl-next-door sort of character. B88 W54 H87 cm
- Elise: A supervisor sent by your boss to assess your performance in getting Zack Island ready for the Venus Festival. She has a very stern and serious demeanour, to the point of being completely obtuse about social norms. Over the course of the game, you teach her to be a bit more personable and spontaneous, which invites her to be a bit more vulnerable with you. B94 W58 H90 cm
Who Did I Romance?
In my review, I went over the various romance options available to the player, so you should probably check that out if you want a more comprehensive look at my thought process. The long and short of it though is that I went with Tamaki, because she is far and away the best girl in the game.
Like I said in my review: I’m in my thirties now. If I played this game when I was a teenager, I might have found Misaki’s shyness cute, but her inability to just say how she fucking feels is infuriating. Tamaki, on the other hand, is very up-front with her feelings, likes to tease and flirt just to gauge your reaction, and seems like she would be an incredibly fun partner. She’s got by far the best personality of the bunch, so she’s the no-brainer pick in Venus Vacation Prism.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
Actually, I have been wanting to replay VVP specifically so I can romance Elise. After Tamaki, she’s the only other character I had any interest in, and her route seems like it could be quite narratively satisfying (and also the most challenging, because she isn’t even available to romance until halfway through the game). I definitely will be doing this sometime in the next year or two!
Baldur’s Gate 3
Baldur’s Gate 3 is the modern-day pinnacle of the CRPG genre, a game with so much true choice and consequence packed into it that you cannot realistic expect another developer to top it, let alone match up. You can kill off key quest-givers and full-on party members, and the game just keeps going on undeterred! The sheer amount of effort packed into every corner of this game, stuff that only a handful of players will ever experience, is insane. Baldur’s Gate 3 is the most impressive game of this generation, and nothing else has come close.
Who Can You Romance?
So, much like Geralt of Rivia, there are several characters that you can have flings with during your Baldur’s Gate 3 adventure, enough that I’m not going to go over them all. That said, the characters that you can romance are largely your fellow party members. This being Baldur’s Gate 3, you can commit to a single romance route, or go after multiple characters at once… although most characters are not okay with you cheating on them, so this will often result in messy and awkward break-up scenes. Again, the effort that has gone into this game’s various narrative branches is insane.
Worth noting: this is the first game on our list where all characters are pansexual and can be romanced by characters of any gender… progress!
- Shadowheart: An elf cleric of the goddess of darkness, Shar. She has a gentle heart, but is searching for the strength to deepen her devotion to her deity… or perhaps find the strength to renounce Shar once and for all.
- Lae’zel: An abrasive and devout githyanki warrior on a mission to reunite with her clan, purify herself of the mindflayer parasite, and defeat the illithids once and for all.
- Gale: An arrogant and ambitious human wizard who is troubled by a curse of his own making which makes him exceptionally powerful and dangerous.
- Astarion: A selfish, opportunistic, elf-vampire spawn, Astarion finds himself wrapped up in your adventure out self-preservation and haunted by his past.
- Wyll: Poor Wyll. He’s a human folk hero with a dark secret, but he’s kind of notorious within the Baldur’s Gate 3 community for being a sad sack without much of a personality.
- Karlach: Mama K! You initially hear tales from Wyll about this horrible, murderous, runaway tiefling who he needs to kill, but as soon as you meet Karlach you realize that this is slander, because Karlach has a heart of gold. An imposing barbarian warrior, Karlach is a gentle, caring softy at heart with a dark and tragic past (this is a DND game, of course she does).
- Halsin: A huge, imposing, wood elf druid, Halsin is the biggest slut of the entire party… and that’s about all I know about him, because I didn’t successfully complete his questline, so I didn’t really get to know him on my playthrough. He’s got a “free love” philosophy, being cool with you cheating on him with other characters, inviting you to threesomes, and of course there’s the infamous scene where he can fuck you while wildshaped as a bear. Halsin’s there for all the freaks among us.
- Minthara: Minthara is one of those party members that a lot of players never even realize is recruitable, let alone romanceable, for one simple reason: she requires you to be evil*. She just appears to be another enemy NPC you encounter during your adventure, so most players are just going to kill her right away and be done with it. However, if you sell out the druids and tieflings to her in Act 1, she gets randy, initiating the most graphic romance scene in the entire game. Thus begins a very messy, complicated, and oddly compelling romance for characters willing to indulge their dark side.
- The Emperor: Okay, he may not be a fully-fledged party member, but this is the one other romanceable character that truly feels like a romance. You have the mystery of the Dream Visitor teased to you early on in the game, to the point where most players will probably feel like they’re their “true” love. Then it is revealed that they were an illusion of The Emperor, an renegade illithid. A large part of the third act revolves around whether or not you choose to trust him, so the romance route feels incredibly well-considered as an option.
*Well, you can be a good character and still recruit her by defeating her non-lethally at the goblin camp, but most players are not going to do this without knowing about it ahead of time.
Who Did I Romance?
Baldur’s Gate 3 is another one of those big “who did you romance?” games, with some pretty passionate opinions. I romanced Shadowheart in my playthrough… which, honestly, makes me feel like a bit of a basic bitch. She’s generally considered the “default” female romance option since she’s the most human-looking and most conventionally-attractive of the bunch. Her dark and conflicted past feeds into her very compelling storyline, and she’s voiced by Jennifer English, so you get to listen to her mesmerizing British accent all the time if you’re choosing to romance Shadowheart. The cast of Baldur’s Gate 3 are notoriously horny, so when Shadowheart started hitting on me in the early game, even my notorious anti-elf racism wasn’t enough to keep me away.
…however, as has been well-established now, I’m a fucking slut in these games. Every time the game said “hey, do you want to have a strings-free fling?”, I said “hell yeah”. Fuck the Emperor in their dream visitor form? Sure thing. Mizora wants to have some kinky demon sex? Okay. Raphael’s sex slave invites me to fuck? Sure, it’s necessary to advance the plot! Oh, what’s this? I can have a foursome with Shadowheart and two drow in Baldur’s Gate? Larian, I don’t know where you’re coming up with these ideas, but you should know by now I’m not going to say no. I didn’t have any bear sex in my playthrough, but the fact that you can at all is just insane.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
I definitely would not, but not because Shadowheart is lacking by any means. When/if I replay Baldur’s Gate 3, I’m planning on going for a more evil playthrough just so I can recruit and romance Minthara. My favourite Magic the Gathering EDH deck is helmed by Minthara (which I had built long before I even played Baldur’s Gate 3), so I feel like I owe it to her to give her a shot eventually. She didn’t survive my first playthrough, but by most accounts she makes for a fantastic companion and compelling romance option, so I’m really looking forward to the day I can get that second playthrough in.
With that said, I actually think that Karlach is the best female character in the game, but she felt more like my Tav’s best friend rather than a romantic partner, so that’s how I played our interactions. If you think that Karlach’s the best romance option in the game, I’d have a hard time denying you.
Also… poor Wyll. Dude’s out here inviting me to dance and I say “sure, why not”, but when he starts hinting that this should go further, I straight-up rejected him, making him even more of a sad sack. Like… sorry my dude, I just wanted to dance, that’s on you for expecting more.
Doki-Doki Literature Club!
One of the first games I played on my Steam Deck was Doki-Doki Literature Club!, a notorious game that I had heard a lot about and knew that I had to check out someday. I knew that the visual novel/dating sim aspects were just a front for a darker story, but I didn’t really know the extent of that beyond that it had some dark and horrific themes. These went so much deeper than I ever expected them to, to the point where Doki-Doki Literature Club! is straight-up one of my all-time favourite games. Seriously, if you haven’t played it, it’s free on Steam, fuckin’ do it!
Who Can You Romance?
Doki-Doki Literature Club! has three actively romanceable characters:
- Yuri: A shy, contemplative, goth-lite girl with a love for dark, artsy prose and metaphor.
- Natsuki: A tsundere, she’s younger and more immature than the rest of the cast, preferring simple prose and straight-forward verses.
- Sayori: Your childhood best friend, neighbour, and the one who invites you to the literature club. Sayori has a bubbly personality which masks an inner darkness eating away at her.
Who Did I Romance?
Given what we’ve already established about my tastes, perhaps it’s no surprise that I immediately gravitated towards Yuri. I wasn’t heavily invested in any of the characters, but the writing was solid enough that I found her romance storyline to be quite engaging and satisfying… of course, then the game twists the knife (so to say) and everything explodes, but for a while there I was really enjoying my cute little romance story.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
Given that I know where this story goes and that I’m not heavily invested in any of the romanceable characters, I would certainly consider a Natsuki run just for the novelty of it to see how that would… end. A “save ’em all” playthrough is also very tempting!
That said, while she’s not “romanceable” in a traditional sense, I’m very tempted to write up an article in the near future about why my heart will forever be with Monika. Just Monika.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 become an indie smash-hit by taking heavy inspiration from classic JRPGs (the overworld of classic Final Fantasy, the narrative structure of Final Fantasy X, the real-time mechanics of Super Mario RPG, etc), mixed in some Dark Souls, and added some unique twists on the formula, backed up by some truly gut-wrenching writing. It’s a generational masterpiece, I implore you to play it if you have any interest in video games.
Who Can You Romance?
Given Clair Obscur‘s inspirations, it’s perhaps no surprise that the game has a romance system, although it is pretty subtle and limited… to the point where I didn’t even fuckin’ realize that the game had one. In act two, your main player character is Verso, who joins your group and can strike up a romance relationship with two of your party members:
- Lune: A very logical and driven member of Expedition 33, Lune has dedicated her life to defeating the Paintress and, failing that, setting up the generation that follows for success. She’s a true believer of the cause.
- Sciel: A happy-go-lucky member of Expedition 33, Sciel is optimistic, but realistic, taking on the challenges of Expedition 33’s brutal life as they come to her.
Who Did I Romance?
Given that I didn’t even realize that this game had a romance system, I accidentally stumbled into romancing Sciel… but, honestly, I’m really glad that I did. If I had to pick between the two, I would have gone for Lune, since you get more time with her early on and she seems more like a character I’d be interested in at first blush.
Of all the characters in the game, Sciel is by far the most under-served in the narrative, so the additional dialogue and narrative sequences that her romance with Verso reveals do wonders to endear you to her character. As she opens up and becomes more vulnerable, you get to learn that she has a very sad and dark past. However, she is also very pragmatic and wise, to the point where I think that she may low-key be the smartest and most capable member of Expedition 33.
At the end of the game, after an agonizing five minute silent debate, I chose the Verso ending, and Sciel’s silent stare absolutely ruined me with the additional context that our romance had brought with it. Expedition 33‘s romance system is pretty bare-bones, but goddamn does its writing hit just as hard as anything else in this masterpiece of a game.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
Well, now that I know that there is a romance system… I’m honestly kind of tempted to see how things would play out differently if I romanced Lune instead. It would suck to not get to see all of Sciel’s additional scenes again though, so I’m really torn on this. My main party throughout E33 was Maelle + Gustave/Verso + Lune, so maybe I’d swap Lune for Sciel and then relegate Lune to be the benchwarmer romantic partner, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.
Go! Go! Nippon!: My First Trip to Japan
I was gifted this visual novel by a mutual on Bluesky and decided to check it out to provide a quick, breezy breather between other games. It’s basically a game by weebs for weebs, promoting Japanese tourism and living out the fantasy of romancing a cute Japanese girl you became friends with online. All told: it’s fine. It’s a lot of factoids and history, with a bit of standard romantic drama to spice things up a little bit.
Who Can You Romance?
While on vacation in Japan, you end up rooming with two friends you met online who, through a series of misunderstandings, you had thought were both boys, but turn out to be girls… and both of them are clearly into you. Don’t you hate it when that happens?
- Makoto: The older sister, she’s more mature, gentle, nurturing, and caring (literally a “big sister” archetype).
- Akira: The younger sister, she’s more immature, brash, and tomboyish.
Oh, did I say that the romantic drama is pretty standard? Well, it is, except that it’s also very Japanese, so of course you end up accidentally walking in on each character while they’re naked during the course of your playthrough. You get a whole splash screen with barely-covered nudity and everything (truly the developers of this game knew exactly the kind of experiences their players were hoping to have in their Japanese vacation fantasy).
Who Did I Romance?
Of the two characters, I found Makoto more interesting. She’s older, more mature (in more ways than one), and sweet, definitely fitting into the “big sister” archetype that we’ve seen throughout this article. She was nice, but honestly, the main reason I picked her was because I didn’t have much of a choice. Her sister, Akira, is younger (apparently she’s nineteen, but I definitely thought she was younger than that), more stand-offish and more of a tsundere type character. Look, I like a tsundere, but why do these games always make them uncomfortably young? As a result, Makoto was the only real option I had.
Would I Make the Same Choices on a Replay?
Honestly, I don’t think I’ll ever replay this game, because there just isn’t much to it, nor did I really care about the characters that much. That said, I probably would go for Makoto again, because I do not find Akira alluring in the slightest. Grow up, kid, and then we can talk.
Results
So what have we learned today about how I approach in-game romances and the sorts of characters I gravitate towards?
Sweet/Loyal/Kind Characters
This is a pretty “basic” takeaway, but if a nice girl starts showing interest in me, it’s hard for me to turn them down. Tali’Zorah, Tifa, Shadowheart, Sumia, Makoto, even Tamaki to some degree: they’re pleasant, easy to get along with, and relatively up-front with their feelings, which makes romancing them feel like a “natural”, albeit somewhat vanilla, choice. That said, there’s lots of depth and nuance behind characters like Tifa and Shadowheart, so good writing can really elevate such characters to make them all-timer romance options.
Abrasive Characters
While I do tend to gravitate towards nice girls, I’ll stand firm in the opinion that a well-written tsundere/abrasive girl is easily the most satisfying romance choice in gaming. Severa, Yennefer, Elise… these are characters who are intimidating and off-putting at first glance, and probably will scare off many players (especially the younger, more inexperienced amongst us). However, that’s part of the front they’re putting on, to weed people out and protect their vulnerabilities. Once you get to know them, you can coax them out of their shell and discover their softer side, because they truly love and trust you… if only more games didn’t relegate the tsundere to their immature/dubiously-of-age characters, otherwise I’d probably have way more tsundere representation.
Goth/Alt Girls
So this is more of a trend rather than a full-on character type (especially since they can run the gamut of character archetypes), but I definitely find myself drawn to goth/punk/alt-girls whenever I get the chance. Jack, Shadowheart, Tharja, Yuri… I just love this aesthetic, always have and always will.
I’m A Huge Slut
If there’s one true consistent throughout this article, it’s that I’ll have casual sex with any character if given the opportunity, if it won’t affect my main romances, and as long as there’s some narrative satisfaction to be garnered from it. What, did you expect me to say “no” when I’m offered a once-in-a-lifetime chance to fuck a horny demon…? I’m probably only playing this game once, so I want to see everything there is to offer!
I don’t normally ask for comments, but I legitimately wanna hear what y’all have to say and who you romanced!
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