Romance in Games that you thought was Well Executed

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

Having just looked up the plot, I have to say that it disgusts me on a very deep level, and frankly I'm appalled that the writers got away with it without criticism.

It's rather disturbing at best and flatout Stockholm Syndrome at worst.

OT: To be honest I can't really think of any good examples. Ico was decent, but I'm not sure that's really romance.

I think you have to play it to get it... Monkey is in no way psychologically tied due to his captivity... and nearly attacks Trip on release... but realises that he also needs help as she did originally... he also realised that she did it due to being vulnerable, and that, due to the events that unfold in the game, he now feels a bit of responsibility towards her! A bit different to the Stockholm Syndrome effect!

Perhaps I do, but my initial concern upon reading it is that the game presumably portrays Trip as a protaganist, and a protaganist that goes around enslaving people is not a protaganist at all.

Having not played it I can only speculate, but my main query is how the game tries to justify that initial event, if at all. And also whether that act actually gets called out for what it is.

The opening scene is where both Monkey and Trip are captured on a Slavers ship (Trip isn't a slaver, they are the bad guys in the game)

Trip, in her desperation and fear to escape steals the last escape pod, which Monkey jumps on to the outside of to also escape. There is a mild misunderstanding from this.

Monkey gets knocked unconscious from the pods crash and awakes to find the slavers electrocuting collar around his neck, which is used to punish the slaves. Trip had put it there because she knew that she needed Monkey's help to get back to her family (who are holed up away from the city, and may need her help) and she didn't know whether he was good or bad...

Does that help?

 

[HellbirdIV]

Gonna be cliché and say FemShep x Liara. Because lesbians (also because believable voice acting, characterization, hopeless operatic romanticism and excellent music. But mostly because lesbians).

Mind, most games with decent romance in them are RPGs and I play very little of those (Mass Effect franchise being the big exception) so I don't really have a large selection to choose from.

Captcha: "come clean"

Well I-... I... OKAY FINE, I also loved how Cortana and Master Chief interacted in Halo 4. DON'T JUDGE ME, CAPTCHA! DON'T JUDGE MEEE!

 

[Reincarnatedwolfgod]

I can't think of a game that I played that has done romance well but think I have something. I could not find a thread about it outside the game section of the escapist thread despite the fact I would not call it a "game". Since people consider it enough of a "game" to put it in that section of the tread I will mention it here.

katawa shoujo; it's a virtual novel and not a game. it was the first virtual novels i tried and i liked it. It was quite touching and made me cry 2 times.
I made a thread [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.398445-I-highly-recommend-Katawa-Shoujo] about it recently so I will not waste time typing much about it here.

 

[kyogen]

Triss and Geralt in The Witcher games. The romance has a lot of context because the games are story-driven rpgs, it's kind of sweet, and just like things often are in real life, it's also kind of messy.

 

[Mr Cwtchy]

The opening scene is where both Monkey and Trip are captured on a Slavers ship (Trip isn't a slaver, they are the bad guys in the game)

Trip, in her desperation and fear to escape steals the last escape pod, which Monkey jumps on to the outside of to also escape. There is a mild misunderstanding from this.

Monkey gets knocked unconscious from the pods crash and awakes to find the slavers electrocuting collar around his neck, which is used to punish the slaves. Trip had put it there because she knew that she needed Monkey's help to get back to her family (who are holed up away from the city, and may need her help) and she didn't know whether he was good or bad...

Does that help?

It helps, but it doesn't really change my opinion of Trip from "Wow, she's a *****."

Being desperate does not justify slavery, not even close.

 

[Lord Garnaat]

Shadow of the Colossus had a beautiful romance running throughout the plot. Heck, the main love interest never says a word and spends most of the game dead, and it's still really touching!

Also, I'm not sure if anyone here has played Super Paper Mario, but the romance between "Blumier" and "Timpani" is surprisingly touching. Anyone whose played the game knows what I'm talking about.

 

[Edl01]

Anyone here played School Days? The romance in that game is amazing, specifically the endings

 

[Zeke63]

For me it's romance options in Dragon Age: Origins. Characters were all very likeable, and the fact that the protagonist is a mute character that can represent you made it infinitely more immersive. I love that game.

It's so sad how bioware thinks it's not immersive now. Always like the dragonage/kotor/jade empire dialogue format way more than mass effect.

 

[Marcus Kehoe]

I may catch some hate here, but I was seriously a fan of FemShep/Garrus.

I like ManShep/Tali, but the element of Tali crushing on Shepard made it a wee bit Mary/Marty Sueish. Garrus' romance just seemed more natural to me.

No hate. At least not from me. I loved Fem Shep and Garrus together. I remember being annoyed in the first game when I realized he wasn't an option to pursue.

Now that's where I have some issue, in the transition between mass effect 1 and 2 I found Garrus change in character to drastic, while awesome, drastic. So it kinda felt like you where meeting him for the first time, in a way hurting the relationship elements to me. But for Tali, she felt the same, while matured, the same. It felt like there a was game in between
when we first met and started a relationship, and I liked that.

 

[CarlsonAndPeeters]

Nathan Drake and Elena for sure, there scene after the pirate segment in 3 was a great touch.

Such a good scene. I also think when you compare Nate and Elena's relationship to Nate and Chloe's in Uncharted 2 their chemistry really shines through. Like with Nate and Chloe, it's kind of just about money and sex, but with Elena the personal connections are very apparent.

It's not really a romance per se, but the relationship between Ico and Yorda in ICO was handled brilliantly in my opinion. It's pretty amazing that something as simple as making holding hands a core mechanic can make you feel so close to a character and so invested in their safety. The bits where she has to jump and you have to catch her were always heart-in-mouth for me, just because I couldn't stop thinking "what if she falls?"

Spoiler

And the bit where you jump and she catches you is one of the most moving scenes I've seen in a game.

It's even more remarkable that they managed to do this without any significant dialogue; Yorda speaks... something, but her subtitles are a sort of amalgam of kanji and hieroglyphs, so neither you nor Ico know exactly what she's saying.

Favorite relationship in any game, hands down. Except possibly for Wander and Agro (lols). Hit the nail on the head with the hand-holding thing. Also:

Spoiler

the end sequence when you have to progress without Yorda is the loneliest gameplay experience I've ever had (except for SotC, perhaps). So well done. Makes you love her even more in retrospect.

The Kid and Zia from Bastion, don't tell me I imagined that. It just made the ending better and it didn't feel tacked on at all.

Funny, I always thought there was more of something between Zia and Zulf. Like, all that time when the Kid was off adventuring, they had to get to know each other. Guess its up for interpretation.

 

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

The opening scene is where both Monkey and Trip are captured on a Slavers ship (Trip isn't a slaver, they are the bad guys in the game)

Trip, in her desperation and fear to escape steals the last escape pod, which Monkey jumps on to the outside of to also escape. There is a mild misunderstanding from this.

Monkey gets knocked unconscious from the pods crash and awakes to find the slavers electrocuting collar around his neck, which is used to punish the slaves. Trip had put it there because she knew that she needed Monkey's help to get back to her family (who are holed up away from the city, and may need her help) and she didn't know whether he was good or bad...

Does that help?

It helps, but it doesn't really change my opinion of Trip from "Wow, she's a *****."

Being desperate does not justify slavery, not even close.

She doesn't really enslave him... it's more blackmail! And her alternative is for both of them to be captured and enslaved anyway!

The whole story is based off an old Chinese story called Journey to the West. It's there that the theme comes from, back in the 1500's. It was toned down massively, and greatly simplified... The original monkey was:

The first is Sun Wukong, or Monkey, whose given name loosely means "awakened to emptiness" (see the character's main page for a more complete description), trapped by the Buddha for defying Heaven. He appears right away in chapter 13. The most intelligent and violent of the disciples, he is constantly reproved for his violence by Xuanzang. Ultimately, he can only be controlled by a magic gold ring that Guanyin has placed around his head, which causes him unbearable headaches when Xuanzang chants the Ring Tightening Mantra.

I am getting a feeling that you have a personal issue with the theme, and are disliking of it, whatever the way it is meant. I have themes like that too... Like I hate stories where bad guys are 'Evil; just because' as I am a great believer that people are inherently good, and only do things that are perceived bad because of other justifications, or because that is what they honestly believe is right... But that is a different discussion or issue!

I seriously recommend that you play the game, and see the characters! The acting is spot on, and the gameplay is actually pretty good too! If you still think the same after, then it would make for a much more justified discussion!

 

[Denamic]

The opening scene is where both Monkey and Trip are captured on a Slavers ship (Trip isn't a slaver, they are the bad guys in the game)

Trip, in her desperation and fear to escape steals the last escape pod, which Monkey jumps on to the outside of to also escape. There is a mild misunderstanding from this.

Monkey gets knocked unconscious from the pods crash and awakes to find the slavers electrocuting collar around his neck, which is used to punish the slaves. Trip had put it there because she knew that she needed Monkey's help to get back to her family (who are holed up away from the city, and may need her help) and she didn't know whether he was good or bad...

Does that help?

It helps, but it doesn't really change my opinion of Trip from "Wow, she's a *****."

Being desperate does not justify slavery, not even close.

Yeah, it kinda does.
You really need to play the game before you make these kinda of judgement calls.

 

[Avalanche91]

I love the romance options in Persona 3/4.....but they are somewhat undermined that you can have 4/5 girlfriends at once without consequences.

Indie game "To The Moon" had an absolutlely hardbreakingly beautiful romance.

 

[Brainwreck]

What Chris Avellone tends to make of romances.
In that there can be no happy endings.

 

[PedroSteckecilo]

Gonna be WAAAAAAYYYYYY Old School here and say...

First would be: Locke and Celes from FF6, that relationship always gave me most excellent "feels" as far as heart strings go. It's really just my all time favorite videogame relationship, I guess I'm just a sucker for the "love redeems" trope.

Second: Femshep and Liara from Mass Effect (all three games), initially I thought it was just a "hee hee lesbians and Kaiden is a weeny" thing but Liara's coldness in ME2 followed the resumption of the relationship in Shadowbroker and the closing of it in ME3 was a fantastic "romantic arc" for me that also hit me right in the feels... right...in...the...feels.

Third: Fei and Elly from Xenogears, totally love the reincarnated, time spanning romance of those two. Also they "settle" on being in love about halfway through the game and it's good to see stories where the characters don't mince about it for the entire game.

 

[SweetShark]

Saya and Fuminori from the game "Saya no Uta".
Yes, I know what you will say, but I don't care. This game had a giant impact to me when I play it...
Also this romance is so effective, that even you know this is wrong, you want to see the them happy. You know they deserve to die for the horrible things they did, but you don't want this to happen. You don't know why, you just don't.



To a more suitable selection, I will say also Goal and Rufus from the game "Deponia" and "Chaon on Deponia"
Reason? Rufus is a jerk. An egomaniac, irritating, assh*le, jeck, care only for himself. And this is the reason why this make this romance so effective. This romance show to us that even an assh*le like Rufus can change for the better. Sure, it is a Comedy Adventure, but it is affective to me at least. I am waiting the last part, "Goodbye Deponia"
Also Goal have a great ass!!!!

 

[lord.jeff]

i can't believe no-one's said Shadow of the Colossus yet! come on, the whole game is a guy taking out 16 COLOSSI for a woman, whats not to love!

Because neither character has a strong personality, ones dead and the other is always silent, the idea of it is romantic but the romance itself is nothing more then he cares for her because we say so.

I'll go with Junpei and Chidori in Persona 3.

 

[Mr Cwtchy]

She doesn't really enslave him... it's more blackmail! And her alternative is for both of them to be captured and enslaved anyway!

The whole story is based off an old Chinese story called Journey to the West. It's there that the theme comes from, back in the 1500's. It was toned down massively, and greatly simplified... The original monkey was:

The first is Sun Wukong, or Monkey, whose given name loosely means "awakened to emptiness" (see the character's main page for a more complete description), trapped by the Buddha for defying Heaven. He appears right away in chapter 13. The most intelligent and violent of the disciples, he is constantly reproved for his violence by Xuanzang. Ultimately, he can only be controlled by a magic gold ring that Guanyin has placed around his head, which causes him unbearable headaches when Xuanzang chants the Ring Tightening Mantra.

I am getting a feeling that you have a personal issue with the theme, and are disliking of it, whatever the way it is meant. I have themes like that too... Like I hate stories where bad guys are 'Evil; just because' as I am a great believer that people are inherently good, and only do things that are perceived bad because of other justifications, or because that is what they honestly believe is right... But that is a different discussion or issue!

I seriously recommend that you play the game, and see the characters! The acting is spot on, and the gameplay is actually pretty good too! If you still think the same after, then it would make for a much more justified discussion!

'Do as I say or you die' sounds like nothing but slavery to me. And actually her alternative was to wait for him to wake up and, y'know, ask for help. Sure he might refuse, in which case fuck, that's life.

But yeah I suspect you are right with this being a personal issue to me, and moreover I can't fathom why someone would think differently. Oh well.

@Denamic: As said above, in my mind it fucking well doesn't. Best leave it at that as I sense myself getting angrier the more I think about it.

Unfortunately I feel this question of ethics is too much for me to get any enjoyment out of it. Maybe not though. If I do get around to buying it I'll see how I feel then with a more informed opinion.

 

[Captain Billy]

Ico and Yorda. Done. Boom.

 

[Mr Cwtchy]

Hint: before crucifying the writers you need to actually experience the writing. Don't be so arrogant.

It's arrogant to consider slavery inexcusable no matter what? Fuck. That.