Can We Kiss? A New Age of Gender and Sexuality in Video Games
Can we kiss?
In a role-playing game, the strongest points of writing are usually the characters. The characters in this new world you've found yourself in can easily be the most memorable part of your experience, and if you're someone who often plays games with developed characters, you probably can't even list all of the pixels you've felt a genuine connection to. Getting the player to really be interested in and care about the people they interact with is one of the strongest points of immersion a game can give a player. Helping strangers, knowing that your companions are by your side, discovering backstory as your compatriot slowly opens up to you — all connecting the player to the world in a personal way. These bonds, of course, lead to the question on everyone's minds: “OK, but can we date them?”
Depending on the game you're playing, this question can have a wide variety of answers. “Yes, but only if you take a certain route”; “Yes, but only if you're playing a male character”; “Yes, but only if you're a female elf character”; or just simply, “No.” Some of these conditions lead to players only being allowed to be in heterosexual relationships such as games like Persona 5 or The Witcher 3. A lot of earlier RPGs may have the option to be a male or female player character, but the game will typically lock you into an opposite-sex romance only. One of the first developers to consistently break this trend, however, is BioWare. BioWare was pioneering queer representation as early as 2003(!) in Star Wars: Knights of the Republic, where one of the romance options is a female companion who only dates female players. Mass Effect and Dragon Age continued to give players queer romance options, although they were skewed more towards lesbian relationships than relationships between men in Mass Effect.
However, the general formula of giving players conditionals based on character creation options like gender as prerequisites to romance is becoming a thing of the past in more modern games. “Can you date them?” Hell yeah, you can! Welcome to the age of companions being “playersexual”.
What does "playersexual" mean?
The simplest definition of "playersexual" is a character in a game not having a defined sexuality: they are simply into whatever gender the player character is. Of course, you may need to win over said playersexual character with gifts or correct dialogue options, but they will always have the potential to get with the player character regardless of gender. Stardew Valley is one such example of the playersexual principle for characters. All of the bachelors and bachelorettes in Pelican Town will date the farmer if you just give them enough of their favorite things and then present them with a bouquet of flowers. Generally, the people of Pelican Town don't really make any comments about queer relationships, except Alex, who apparently had to work through some internalized homophobia before dating a male farmer.
Abigail also mentions that the player character is the first person of the same gender that she's ever had feelings for, if you're playing as a female farmer. These comments, though, are few and far between, as everyone is pretty understanding that the farmer is hot regardless of gender or something.
Leah is a character whose story takes the concept of playersexual to heart: in her ten-heart cutscene, which takes place when the player is in a relationship with her, her ex Kel will crash your picnic date. Kel actually has two different looks depending on the gender of the player character. Kel will be a woman if your farmer is also a woman, and a man if your farmer is a man. Kel's gender matching the player's is an interesting addition, but it also means that we get a situation where if the player character is a male Leah's queerness is not able to be discovered at all. Thus, Stardew Valley doesn't really have much going for queer representation unless the player themselves is queer: the bachelors and bachelorettes are all paired up with each other in heterosexual "will they/won't they" relationships until the farmer decides to swoop in and give someone a bouquet.
This is not to say that Stardew Valley's approach to the concept of “playersexuality” is bad"; it does quite a bit more for queer players than many of the Harvest Moon games and other farming sims that came before it, where players could only be in heterosexual relationships. There are some broader issues I have with the label 'playersexual', though, mainly because it seems to ignore that bi/pan people exist entirely, and this leads to misuse of the term by players.
No, Baldur's Gate 3 companions are not playersexual.
OK, they might technically be “playersexual” in the fact that anyone can romance them, but they all have canonical sexualities: they're pansexual. I wouldn't fault a player for not knowing that, though, as the main companions' queerness is not explored to the extent that it is in Dragon Age: Inquisition, for example, a game with more "defined" sexualities and some heartbreakingly real explorations of homophobia in Dorian's personal quest. Shadowheart is also another explicitly queer character, as she appears to be enamored by Karlach when you first recruit her, and later in Act 3, you can meet an NPC who knew Shadowheart, and the two seem to have some romantic history together. Nocturne, Shadowheart's potential past flame, is also a trans woman! Wyll and Lae'zel, from what I could find, don't mention any specific genders of their past flings.
Perhaps the first instance of a companion being explicitly queer in Baldur's Gate 3 is Astarion, who uses masculine adjectives to describe a theoretical partner, and mentions fantasizing about marrying a prince when he was a child. He will also try to flirt with other companions, notably Shadowheart and Wyll. Astarion also expresses having felt romantic attraction to a man in Baldur's Gate later in the game.
He also received the most complaints by weirdos on the Steam community tab for being "woke" (those forums were a dark, dark place in August), so that's how you really know you have a queer character in a video game on your hands.
Baldur's Gate 3 also has several NPCs who are queer: notably Dame Alyin and Isobel as major side characters who are in an established relationship, as well as a few minor NPCs in the Underdark who are two men in a romantic relationship. Everyone in-universe is pretty chill with queer people; it's normal (and arguably even the norm) considering how almost everyone in your camp is under the bi umbrella.
The only instance where this approach to queer representation and "playersexuality" (even though they're actually just bi/pan) falls short for me is in terms of the reception that I've seen to these characters. Some people just seem to not understand that the romanceable companions attracted to all genders (regardless of if you, the player, chooses to romance them or not). Gale's ex may be a goddess, but just because there is no mention of any men in his dating history that doesn't mean that he isn't bisexual. And you can kiss them all just in time for Valentine's Day, especially since Larian Studios announced another patch coming very soon with even more kiss animations!
The best way to do dating?
While there are several approaches to how characters' sexualities can work when romancing them, there isn't necessarily a "best way.” I find that Baldur's Gate 3 and other games that follow a similar "everyone is bisexual and that's totally cool" philosophy often include better queer representation than games that take a strictly "playersexual" approach, like Stardew Valley. There's also the BioWare route of having characters with strictly defined sexualities, which I've actually found that I prefer, just because it often adds a layer of realism as well as lesbian and gay representation that is usually not seen in other games. Take Dorian from Dragon Age: Inquisition, for example, who was briefly mentioned earlier. He's explicitly gay; he will only date male player characters, and his personal quest revolves around the reason why he ran away from his home nation. And not all of the queer characters in Inquisition have a past with homophobia: Sera, a lesbian, simply says she's not into men if a male character tries to flirt with her, and that's that. There are also several bisexual characters, as well as straight characters. While I enjoy the realism and representation of this approach, it is very limiting for the player, and could be very frustrating. Morrigan from Dragon Age: Origins is straight, so I can't romance her when playing as a female warden, which is sad, but just an aspect of the game's approach to relationships.
Simply put, there is no best way (though some games have more queer representation than others). They all have their upsides and downsides, and it's ultimately a player's personal preference that makes the difference. Go forth and romance to your heart's content!
