Improving romance in games with rivalry and respect

[ringonoki-ua]

Just saw thatvideo at Gamasutra and thought that you need to see that
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/2391 ... ra+News%29

I guess it maybe so useful in storytelling

[LeonDaydreamer]

There are some really good ideas in there, thanks for posting! :-)

[OokamiKasumi]

I really like his model for building a comedic romantic relationship.
-- It's very different from the typical (boring) stat-building style; by simply saying what the character wants to hear, or outright bribery with dates and gifts.

However, it would be quite challenging to create this, mainly because you'd need a damned clever writer to pull it off. However, the biggest, and most obvious, problem would be how to incorporate a choice of Romantic Interests without ending up with a 100,000 word epic. I suspect that we'd have to follow the speaker's suggestion and use one main script, but let the player choose a character from a 'gallery' at the start then insert 'cosmetic' dialogue differences in the master script.

Code: Select all

    if Char_B:
        $ Char = Tom
        $ gender = male
        $ name = Tom
        $ pronoun_a = his
        $ pronoun_b = him
        $ pronoun_c = he
        image lover smile = "Tom_smile.png"
        image lover frown = "Tom_frown.png"
        image lover wince = "Tom_wince.png"

Or some such... With added dialogue options specific to that character alone.

The only other drawback to such a game is that no matter what you did, the core story itself would not change -- merely the sort of relationship you ended up with. Even so, it would still be one hell of a Romance game!

[RotGtIE]

I wouldn't take any game development advice from the people who told us that gamers are over and don't have to be your audience.