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    So, I really thought about this idea because I've played otome/dating sims/visual novels for more than half my life and they all fall victim to pretty much the same things. If it's not having shit gameplay because it's a "free-to-play" game, it's the game being catered towards one group of people and that means it's boring to literally everyone else. My influence towards the story is the same as for this game, my want to see more games catered towards women, I just think it's a good idea.

    So, here's the main point:

    Think Persona 5, Paper Mario, or The Legend of Zelda for how the game functions. It's mainly text based with player input being to "solve" something. In this case, my ideas for the game can be traced back to other games I've played, so to make it easier on both myself and you, I'll be referencing other games whenever I can.

    So, first things first:

    General Story

    Since in total this story has a total of 256k words, putting the whole story in the game isn't possible or even humane. I should know, it's why I split the story into "years" where every 100 stories is suppose to be an in-story year. I assume the game would be more the same, doing like a New Super Mario Bros U Deluxe or Mario Galaxy 2 kind of thing. Just for this, however, I'll be talking mainly about the "first" game.

    The story would be split into chapters where each of the short stories would happen. It wouldn't be terribly hard for me to organize them and have several stories in one chapter or to have the main stories as the chapters and then have the shorter stories as extra content (either end game or just side quests like). This is where the idea of having the game be built kind of like the Persona series came from. Aside from what I wanted to add, you would play as the default main character, only being able to change her name, and pick certain options to advance the story.

    The story's general basis is simply a reverse harem with an anxious MC. There's no real end to be met, just small goals for the MC to reach. For example, the MC slowly grows more confident in herself and is able to talk about her feelings by the 50ish story.

    I wasn't sure about routes with the MC considering it's suppose to be built where she never ends up with any of them on purpose (like Ash taking twenty years to finally win a Pokemon league kind of thing). This way, a certain gameplay element can happen; more on that later. Instead, I thought just having main goals the player has to reach makes more sense. Again, like in Persona where specific things won't happen unless you have a certain level in your stats. In this case, this is where the main gameplay element comes into play!

    Gameplay

    Now, you'll see sprinkles of this all over my site, but I really really want more games and other media to be catered towards women, those who identify as female, and people who happen to like men. Way too much media has things for guys, weather it's big titted traditionally attractive women (Lady D., Chun-Li, Zero Suit Samus, BIG etc...) or making the "manly" games have nothing but huge explosions and guns in them for the male audience. I have no issue with this, but I have an issue that there's no counter in the female department. Usually when there is, it's a game with shit gameplay, unfun mechanics, or you can complete it in less than a day and it's not replayable. Wonderful. So this idea is to hinge on one genre in particular: fashion games.

    Before I get into the main gameplay, I wanna say one thing: I do not think "games for girls" should be about fashion or other traditionally "girly" things. I actually love playing games with a high skill ceiling, fighting games, and I really want to get into a first or third person shooter one of these days; but obviously, those games are going to be dominated by men and that's not going anywhere. I just want women, girls, and anyone who identifies as a female to have fun with games that entice us the same way Halo does for most guys. Though, not all guys like FPS so they play RPGs and have all kind of cool shit and they get pretty girls in their party. Even more so, if guys don't like games like that, they can play horror games; which (let's be real) is more often than not just a walking simulator. They get a tough or cool MCs Leon S. Kennedy and usually there's some traditionally attractive woman who's a love interest, girlfriend, wife, or future girlfriend/wife Ada. These are the kinds of options I want girls to have. So, here's my contribution to one area I feel is often mocked.

    Why I wanted this to be a "fashion game" was because most people who happen to be female like clothes and other things that look good. We like decorating and getting cute things to give our characters (and come on, some guys like it too). An example of what I mean can be seen in the Legend of Zelda. Most people who like LoZ are women and my theory as to why (outside of us just thinking Link is cute) is because the games give us the faux feeling of being able to customize Link. One thing I always do when I replay Wind Waker in particular is play on a new game+ because I like Link in his lobster shirt I also always have the same three items equiped no matter the situation: the bow, the boomerang, and the hookshot because I like Link with those “options”. Twilight Princess is similar where I usually keep Link in his Zora armor anytime I visit Zora’s domain. This is pretty constant through all the games for me.

    Usually though, fashion games suck or don't have very fun mechanics that keep us on the game for more than an hour overall. My fix to this was just to... make good gameplay (revolutionary concept I know), but to have one of the main mechanics involve fashion to some degree; kind of like how in LoZ: Majora’s Mask there's a huge optional part of the game involving this very thing. Personally, I'd want the game to be free-to-play and to not have microtransctions just to get the better options. In general, I figured the gameplay to be, again, something like Persona or the Yakuza series (I've never play the Yukuza series, but I so want to, it looks like a trip), where you're doing other things outside of just reading dialogue or listening to cutscenes. In this case, I thought of mini-games with an increasing level of difficulty for each of the characters when a story involves them.

    So, here's all the dateables:

      Ankara
      Akuma
      Amai
      Akihiko
      Brayleigh
      Chris
      Hayate
      Koto
      Shugi
      Terumichi

    And each of them would have a game specific to them that, unless completed, would stall their story. For sections where a mini-game makes no sense, I was thinking something like needing a certain item to continue (key items like the Pokemon gym badges), needing access/intimacy to pick a specific dialogue choice (like the Persona social stat system or any Otome game's intimacy system), or knowledge of what the right answer actually is (like in TTYD where you had to learn the code in order to meet with Don Pianta).

    So, for solo interactions, each boi's mini-game would be something specific to them. (Added concepts of some mini-games Feb 23, 24)

    Here were my general first concepts:

    Ankara

    In the story, Ankara is the self-made billionaire (maybe Trillionaire ┐(シ)┌ ). Because of that, it only made sense to give him a management sim. We all know how those work, but just for those who don't, it would be the player's job to help Ankara with something going on in his company. For ex. he frequently needs to meet with people and it would be your job to send him the right people in the right order so he can either get through them with the most efficiency or to send him people who enable him to speak with the next person. So if he needed to meet with the director before meeting with the actors of a movie he's financing, it's up to you to send them in the right order. If you fail, you have to start over and it would gradually get more difficult as the levels went on. Some other games that could influence this would be Papers, Please or Do Not Feed The Monkeys

    Akuma

    His has always been set in stone because I happen to love the Devil May Cry series. It's not going to be DMC, but it'll have the same theme. Something like The Binding of Issac or Don't Starve. In this case, it's somewhat of a puzzle esque maze where you're tasked with escaping before the devil finds you. It would be parts of a game so one level would be simply escaping a room you're trapped in, another level would be battling a boss, and so forth and so on.

    Amai

    Being one half of the pop stars, I obviously elected them both to have a similar game. While rhythm games in general are difficult to make unique from one another, there are obviously different rhythm games. In Amai's case, I wanted him to have the Dance Dance Revolution since in his fake idol group, he's the main dancer. It wouldn't be exactly like Friday Night Funkin' but that's a good way to look at it. Just a DDR clone with the obvious goal of either getting a certain score or getting a specific rank. I think adding challenges would also make it fun as well.

    Akihiko

    I had a hard time even deciding this, but then I remembered there are games like this and I am currently playing one. I don't know what the exact name of this would be, but he was going to have a Stardew Valley Skull Cavern mini game. For anyone who hasn't played it, essentially you go through different levels with monsters searching for whatever you're in the cave for. Resources, items, or just a monster that only appears there. In this case, the player's job would be to find artifacts since he does have a little knowledge in archaeology. I also think the Grand Underground from Pokemon Diamond and Pearl is another good example of what something like this would be. I actually love exploring the Grand Underground so I'd love something like this.

    Brayleigh

    He's in a similar group to Amai but he would get the Guitar Hero esque game. I'm not exactly sure how I would make it drastically different from just normal guitar hero, but I wanted it to be something similar to that. Originally, I was thinking for him to have a copy cat game because as a kid, I used to play Spondegebob Squarepants: Lights, Camera, Pants and had the BEST time playing the Sand Stadium's mini-games… like ALL of them. So I was thinking of having something like that as it would be super fun to get to play whatever instrument considering Brayleigh is supposed to be able to play multiple instruments anyways.

    Chris

    Still on the fence with this one, but I was thinking of a similar thing to either Cooking Mama or something similar to the Warioware series where you're doing various tasks and you have to fulfill them perfectly or you just fail I would say, fire instead since that's more lore specific. They would be different activities, but they would all involve some kind of restaurant service. Cooking simulation games are actually pretty interesting all things considered (if you think otherwise, just watch CallMeKevin and come back to me lol), so who knows maybe it would be cool to have a cooking sim where you can even build your own restaurant/bar.

    Hayate

    A 2D fighter. That's it. Pretty much Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Tekken, Soul Caliber, etc... I was thinking it would have been really cool to have a similar kind of arcade style with fight after fight that you have to win, but it progressively gets harder and you would have to use different fighting styles since Hayate is versed in a few different styles.

    Koto

    After seeing the game Storyteller I feel like something a little like this would make sense. Koto, in the story, is a playwright and there's not a lot I can do in terms of "game copies". However, Koto also has an origin that created his job as a playwright. Originally, Koto was a wizard/mage/spellcaster who could only make his spells based on the emotions of people's stories he heard. For ex. if he was told the tale of someone's burning love for someone, he would be able to create a powerful fire spell depending on how passionate the story was. I figured to have it where, the player finds pieces of a story or needs to find the right story for whatever the particular scene is in Koto's play. From there, you would arrange the story properly so Koto can be able to properly direct his cast members.

    Hopefully that makes sense (⌒_⌒;)

    Shugi

    So, since he's a cop I didn't want cop simulator since that can get annoying real quick (Though the game 911 operator would be the only way I would justify this mini-game being more police related, no shade against police officers I just don't want politics in this and simply want 'bad person did bad thing, stop them'). Instead, I figured something like Phoenix Wright or Miles Edgeworth Investigations would be better. Just anything where you're doing some kind of investigation or odd jobs as an undercover cop.

    Terumichi

    Yet another rhythm game, but this one would be closer to Hatsune Miku or other tough rhythm games. This is because he's a singer so the game would need to be focused on the lyrics of a song compared to the beat. Some of the hardest Hatsune Miku songs are the ones with fast paced lyrics (rip fingers).

    Other Gameplay Elements

    With those as the main gameplay elements, I also had an idea to fuse them when necessary. As you'll see in the story, I sometimes have multiple characters in one story and when I thought to fuse their games together, it ended up pretty good!

    Essentially, if Akuma and Ankara were in a story together, their combined mini-game would be helping clients who are lost in a supposedly haunted forest. Letting them get back to their job (aka Ankara) since no one else wants to search the woods for these lost people. I went through a few mixes and all things considered, most of them work pretty well together!

    As for the other characters in the story, the MCs best friends (Jessica, Quana, and Keris) would be nothing more than either bonuses to make the mini-games easier or people you can add to increase your odds of success (like they would have different abilities depending on the game). I don't want to exclude them from the game, so this is the best concept I could come up with. One other reason why I'm against giving them their own mini game is because of the demographic I want this game to aim towards. More often than not, games that are made with women in mind always have a female (or females) where they use them as an antagonist or nuisance through the game (rude) and other times, they force them into the game and they always happen to be better than the guys and end up kind of ruining the experience in the process (think most games that have romancable characters. More often than not, the female characters have better stories, options, and designs while the male characters are bare bones and boring). I don't want that to happen because I already have thousands of other ideas where women and girls are the main focus, just this one time I want them to be to side and allow those who like men to focus on them.

    The last thing in terms of gameplay is about the fashion part. So, I really want a game where I can build a character, by them clothes and other accessories, and make a house for them, but most the games that are made like this have a paywall behind all the good options. While I understand FtP games make their money like this, I figure having players pay for the option to speed things up or getting an item to make a mini-game easier makes more sense instead.

    If you're like me, you would be willing to spend a few hours a day working on a game for something you wanted, but I know there are some people who aren't like me. Because of that, it would make sense to assume those people would be willing just to spend five dollars to get whatever thing they wanted instead of working for it. So, having a decent player base, that would be a good source of income. Alongside that, players who are simply generous and would want to support the developers for their hard work would also also contribute to this. In an ideal world, this is how the game would support itself and it sounds so poetic that I want this game for the players and the players actually support it.

    Aside from my fanciful ideas, the actual gameplay part of this would involve in-game currency for different cosmetics (low key, as I was editing, I thought of this. Instead of using gold or dollars, I thought of a made up currency where it would involve anxiety to some degree and have it where you buy things to calm the MC's anxiety. Obviously, it's not a real meter, but it would be pretty funny to think of a currency that's not real but still pays for the things that makes a very real impact). It wouldn't be a grindy slog where the in-game items cost 10,000 and your typical payout is 100 or less; whatever the cost of the items, it would be relatively easy to just pick one mini-game, complete it, and get the item. The players would have to earn their keep; but like I also said, the players would have the option to speed it up or cut out the gameplay aspect all together if they didn't want to waste the time.

    Conclusion/tl;dr

    So, just to try and wrap things up in a pretty little bow, my interest in wanting this to be a reality more stems from the fact that there aren't a lot of games specifically made for a female audience. Just a few games here and there is all I ask for and the one itch that has yet to be scratched is a fashion game with actual gameplay and story elements. While I'm sure there are some that get somewhat there, I don't like the idea of locking items behind a paywall or sacrificing good gameplay for tedious daily tasks and other bad gameplay elements.

    This game would be a strange mix of visual novel, life sim, fashion, and skill-based gameplay to satisfy the long standing desire of mine to have a game where it's catered to those who happen to be women and they play video games.