Set Character or Blank Slate for Dating Sims

[ehcs]

When it comes to the main character of a dating simulation game, would you rather they be a character of their own or a blank slate that the player can manipulate?

I've seen a lot of dating sims where the MC has a set personality type but I can't say I've seen many where the player is completely in charge of the main character's personality. Is it because it's not a well liked option? Do people prefer their MCs with a set mold? Would it be a turn off for the game to have the same MC development as, say, Dragon Age: Origins or Elder Scrolls: Skyrim?

Thoughts?

[Asceai]

"Blank slate" is often interpreted as "no personality" when it comes to these games, which is why I gather it's not very well liked. Obviously anything that's done well is fine, it's just much harder to do that sort of thing well.

Basically, in terms of creating the interactions between the protagonist and other characters, if the protagonist has a set characterisation, you need to do script all these interactions once. If the protagonist has two potential personalities, you need to script them all twice. If the protagonist has infinite personalities, you need to script them all an infinite number of times. That's what I mean when I say it's harder to do. A shortcut is to leave the protagonist's personality undefined to an extent, but that very quickly starts to seem like "no personality."

Besides, there's a lot of games out there. I can just pick one with a protagonist I like, rather than needing a protagonist I can define to my exact specifications.

[Juneberry]

I'm mixed on the idea of a 'blank slate' MC. While I like the idea of making its personality develop to my personal preferences, it can have a serious impact on the game and would probably be hard to manage in a dating sim. After all, your personality changes in real life naturally affect your relationships with people in your life, and it'd be unrealistic and awkward if that wasn't how it worked in the game- thus it might be a bit weird and hard to maintain the dating sim feel. But, if it's done right and such, I can see it being a pretty interesting way to go about it.

[Katta]

I always thought "the blank slate MC" referred not to the games, where player fully defines the MC's character (because it'd be really too difficult since all interactions and thoughts and reactions would be different), but to the many games that have some general character without any distinctive features - the typical Japanese heroine - at least I hope that Japanese girls can relate to that image more often, then people from other cultures.
Rpg games may be different here, since they don't have as much narration as VNs and also many things players do not through narration and choices but through gameplay (like destroying everything you see), so it may be easier to write different personality options, but still I don't think I've seen that done (I've played Skyrim and haven't noticed much of MC personality there). Evil vs good characters are done often.
Anyway I think both options can be enjoyable in a dating sim.

[trooper6]

Magical Diary was a blank slate MC. That was fun.

I enjoy both blank slate MCs and set character MCs.

[papillon]

Writing a true blank slate is extremely hard, and you often end up in a muddle that's neither strongly characterised nor really open. I'd say that HorsePC tries to leave a lot open for interpretation and allow the player to shape her in different directions, but she's not a blank slate. A lot of her backstory and personality is fixed, though not all of it.

IIRC we considered having more detailed character generation at the beginning where along with the looks you could set various other minor details about the character, but I was afraid it would slow down the start of the game too much.

A lot of romance games attempt to make the character a blank slate but end up strongly enforcing the writer's opinions of what's appropriate or normal rather than what the player might have wanted to do. I've played a few bishoujo games where, say, the girl I most wanted to pursue was someone that the protagonist KEPT complaining was dull and depressing to hang out with every time I chose options to pay attention to her, and it was a constant disconnect for me. The game was doing the thing of keeping the protagonist invisible at all times so I could "be him" but he was nothing like me.

With Magical Diary I tried to lump in all the fixed bits early on in the game. HorsePC is sporty, not a big geek or fantasy reader, not terribly musical, likes to run, lived in New Hampshire with her mother and father and has a positive family relationship with them. Even then, though, LPers are often thrown when those details are mentioned again later in the game.

I do think it really helps with flexible PCs if you can customise them (name at the very least, visuals if possible) because the player will then do a lot of the mental work of making different iterations feel different and allowing the characterisation to be more flexible.

[Katta]

I think I heard Cinders tried to make something like that, when your first choices define your personality a bit and then you get choice options more suitable for your personality but the review later showed that it went unnoticed by players. Haven't played the game myself so idk.