Dating sims, or romance simulation games, are a video game subgenre of simulation games with romantic elements. While dating sims share a similar visual presentation as visual novels, they are distinct genres. Dating sims are largely dependent on statistics, while visual novels focus on telling a branching story. Nevertheless, the term "dating sim" has become a generic term for romance-driven games in the West.
Link is a character and the protagonist of Nintendo's video game franchise The Legend of Zelda. He was created by Japanese video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto. Link was introduced as the hero of the original The Legend of Zelda video game in 1986 and has appeared in a total of 20 entries in the series, as well as a number of spin-offs. Common elements in the series include Link travelling through Hyrule whilst exploring dungeons, battling creatures, and solving puzzles until he eventually defeats the series' primary antagonist, Ganon, and saves Princess Zelda.
Ganon is a character and the primary antagonist of Nintendo's The Legend of Zelda video game series and franchise, as well as the final boss in many Zelda titles. In his humanoid Gerudo form, he is known as Ganondorf. A massive and malevolent pig creature, Ganon first appeared in the original The Legend of Zelda game in 1986, while his alter ego, Ganondorf, was introduced in Ocarina of Time. He has since appeared in the majority of the games in the series in various forms. He is the archenemy of the protagonist Link and Princess Zelda of Hyrule and originally the leader of the Gerudo, a race of humanoid desert nomads before becoming the ruler of his demon army.
A visual novel (VN) is a form of digital interactive fiction. Visual novels are often associated with the medium of video games, but are not always labeled as such themselves. They combine a textual narrative with static or animated illustrations and a varying degree of interactivity. The format is more rarely referred to as novel game, a retranscription of the wasei-eigo term noberu gēmu (ノベルゲーム), which is more often used in Japanese.
Dōkyūsei is an erotic dating sim visual novel. It is the first game in the Dōkyūsei series of adult-themed dating sims by ELF Corporation. It was released in 1992, with a heavily altered Windows version released in 1999.
Sprung is a video game for the Nintendo DS. It was released in North America on December 7, 2004 as one of the launch titles for the system. In Europe, the game was released under the expanded title Sprung: The Dating Game. Sprung puts players in the shoes of either Becky or Brett in a conversation-based visual novel that mostly consists of dialogue. Sprung can be regarded as a dating sim, though the linearity and variety in the game also lend it to being an adventure game. The game was one of the first dating simulation games to have a wide commercial release in North America.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) characters have been depicted in video games since the 1980s. In the history of video games, LGBT characters have been almost nonexistent for a long time, reflecting the overall heteronormativity of the medium. While there has been a trend towards greater representation of LGBT people in video games, they are frequently identified as LGBT in secondary material, such as comics, rather than in the games themselves. In 2018, Sam Greer of Gamesradar+ found only 179 games commercially released games with any LGBT representation, only 83 of which have queer characters who are playable characters, and only 8 of those games feature a main character who is pre-written as queer as opposed to them being queer as an option.
Doujin soft is software created by Japanese hobbyists or hobbyist groups, more for fun than for profit. The term includes digital doujin games (同人ゲーム), which are essentially the Japanese equivalent of independent video games or fangames.
Bigfoot is an alleged ape-like creature said to inhabit North America. Since the mid-20th century, Bigfoot has become increasingly relevant in popular culture and is the subject of film, television, advertising, music, literature and more.
Jurassic Park is a 1993 video game developed by BlueSky Software and published by Sega for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis. It was released as part of the tie-in merchandise to the 1993 film of the same name. The game includes elements from Michael Crichton's 1990 novel, Jurassic Park, on which the film is based.
Maya is a female name in various languages with various meanings. In Sanskrit, for instance, Māyā means "illusion or magic", and is also an alternate name of the Hindu goddess Lakshmi. In the Tupi language, of southern Brazil, it means "mother", while Mayara means "grandmother". In the Māori language, the name means "courage" or "bravery", and is popular for Māori girls in New Zealand. The name may be a variant form of the Greek theonym Maia, the eldest of the Pleiades and the mother of Hermes in Greek and Roman mythology.
Koihime Musō: Doki Otome Darake no Sangokushi Engi is a series of Japanese adult visual novels and strategy video games primarily developed and published by BaseSon for the Windows and is based on the classic 14th century Chinese novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong. The first game was developed by BaseSon, and was first released on January 26, 2007, for Windows as two DVD-ROMs, followed by a re-release on April 11, 2008, containing an extra CD-ROM.
Archaon, also known as Archaon the Everchosen, is a fictional character in the Warhammer franchise, leader of the forces of Chaos, and one of the primary antagonists in multiple settings and mediums owned by Games Workshop. He is considered one of the most powerful characters in the Warhammer multiverse, having brought about the fabled End Times, and is a major antagonist in Warhammer Fantasy Battle, Warhammer Age of Sigmar, Total War: Warhammer, and Total War: Warhammer II.
Dream Daddy: A Dad Dating Simulator is a visual novel video game released on July 20, 2017 for Microsoft Windows and macOS, and on September 22, 2017 for Linux. The game was developed and published by Game Grumps and written by Vernon Shaw and Leighton Gray. The expanded Dadrector's Cut was released for the PlayStation 4, along with an update for the PC version, on October 30, 2018. It was released on Nintendo Switch on July 2, 2019.
Doki Doki Literature Club! (DDLC) is a 2017 freeware visual novel developed by American independent game studio Team Salvato for Linux, macOS, and Windows. The game was initially distributed through itch.io, and later became available on Steam. The story is told from the perspective of a high school student who reluctantly joins the school's literature club on the insistence of his childhood best friend, and is given the option to romantically pursue three of its four female members. Doki Doki Literature Club! features a non-traditional plot structure with multiple endings and unlockable cutscenes with each of the main characters. Although the game initially appears to be a lighthearted dating simulator, it is in fact a metafictional psychological horror game that extensively breaks the fourth wall.
Boyfriend Dungeon is a dungeon crawler-dating sim developed and published by Kitfox Games. Taking place in an urban fantasy setting, the player character must fight through dungeons with the help of a human partner who can transform into a sentient weapon. Outside of dungeons, the player can date their partner in visual novel-style sequences that increase their power in combat. It was released for the Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Microsoft Windows on August 11, 2021, followed by a PlayStation 5 version on February 14, 2023.
Lego Jurassic World is a Lego theme based on the Jurassic World media franchise created by Michael Crichton and centered on a disastrous attempt to create a theme park of cloned dinosaurs. It is licensed from Universal Studios and Amblin Entertainment. The theme was introduced in June 2015, with the release of toy sets and the video game Lego Jurassic World, both to promote the film Jurassic World. Subsequent sets were released in 2018, alongside the next film, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. Various animated projects have also been made, including the 2018 television special Lego Jurassic World: The Secret Exhibit, and the 2019 miniseries Lego Jurassic World: Legend of Isla Nublar.
Doomed Love is a point-and-click visual novel released on Itch.io on June 11, 2021, that serves as an unofficial adaptation of the 1993 video game Doom as a dating sim. It was programmed, illustrated, and composed by Scottish cartoonist David B. Cooper, with an updated version releasing June 18. The game was designed in response to a Tweet received by Cooper in response to "cute" fan art he had drawn of Doom's demon characters, deriding the original Doom series as "too violent" by comparison to the fan art. Recurring The Simpsons character Lenny Leonard is also included in the game, in reference to "Sad Springfield" fan art of Cooper's which had gone viral earlier that year. The fangame has received positive critical reception, with Doom co-creator John Romero praising the game and his own inclusion in it.
Unmatched is a tabletop game published by Restoration Games and formally Mondo Tees in which two to four players use a combination of miniatures and cards to compete in a skirmish-style battle. Playable characters are drawn from mythology and pop-culture, with fighters ranging from Robin Hood to Bigfoot, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Sherlock Holmes, and others. The game was originally released in 2019.
ValiDate: Struggling Singles in Your Area is a romance visual novel and dating simulator developed and published by Veritable Joy Studios. The game follows 13 characters as they navigate love, friendship and adulthood in Jercy City. ValiDate is the debut title of developer Veritable Joy Studios.
