Do you prefer otome game with gameplay element or just text reading element only?

[xiaxiaxiazou]

I think I might prefer pure Visual Novels.
My primary expectation for Otome games is to experience a complete love story with a clear beginning and end. If the main plot is engaging on top of that, it's even better.
"Hybrid" Otome games (Gacha-based) often give me a sense of "working a job"—it feels like I'm just punching a clock every day. Although these games provide continuous updates and longer-lasting engagement, their core gameplay is rarely as fun as dedicated Gacha titles. I find myself getting burnt out on the game systems, to the point where I lose interest in pulling for cards or even continuing the story.
These are just my personal views, of course. Hybrid Otome games definitely have their own unique appeal to be so popular; it's just that I might not be the target audience.
The above was generated using a translator; I apologize for any lack of clarity in the expression.

 

[lilycadence]

Most of the otome games I've played have been text-based but I'm currently playing bewitching sinners and that one has mini quests you can do to add on to the story. I find the quests to be fun but it could be tedious tho. Sometimes I just want to enjoy the story without having to do extra stuff, but as long as the story doesn't get completely blocked by the gameplay element and I can just skip it, I don't mind.

Except gachas tho, I hate gachas. My anger issues can't handle it. The first and last gacha game I played caused me to rage quit and funny enough it also had an extra gameplay element that completely blocked off the story if you don't complete it.

i love bewitching sinners!! the quests and exploration aspects were fun at first but got repetitive quick when i was replaying to complete other routes :/

 

[Scone]

i agree. for example love revo is a fantastic otome game experience that i never forgot. tmgs simulation system is remind me like otometeki love revo even though the purpose of the simulation gameplay is really different. there's also prince maker that similar with princess maker series/volcano princess that let you to raise boy not a girl.

Love Revo mentioned! One of my favorite otome games of all time, just because it has such a good mix of everything: dialogue, strategy, its own minigames, and route surprises. There's more than one way to play it, and the fact that you have to change it up depending on route gives it some of the best replayability I've seen. If anyone reading is craving an otome game with a little extra and you haven't tried it, please try Love Revo! The DS version even has a fan translated patch in English.

I agree with others that I prefer some other gameplay mixed in as a nice break from the reading. On the otome subreddit, I saw someone mention that they disliked the Hakuoki series because it largely changed things to be reading only. I tend to feel the same.

 

[orphan_account]

I do love a good visual novel, but I find that I get more engaged with an otome game that has gameplay and minigames and optional routes for stats like: Tailor Tales, Bewitching Sinners, FFS, Another Northern Duke?! and Royal Alchemist. However, I really like games that also just give us the option to explore a tiny bit of the world itself, like: A Date with Death with the ability to explore the screen and the MC's room, and 14 Days With You that has the ability to use the cellphone. And having a lot of choices regularly keeps my interest, like the Our Life series.

 

[Pastels]

i love bewitching sinners!! the quests and exploration aspects were fun at first but got repetitive quick when i was replaying to complete other routes :/

fr! And since this is my first play through idk what to do to complete the quests the exploration part is fun but I feel like I'm force to do so that I don't miss out on content.

 

[iamvseeker]

depending on the gameplay. for example i enjoy the gameplay part of baldr sky.

 

[lilycadence]

fr! And since this is my first play through idk what to do to complete the quests the exploration part is fun but I feel like I'm force to do so that I don't miss out on content.

i had a hard time completing some of the quests too, so i used this game guide! there's some things you can miss, like clicking near the fountain for the hairpin to sneak into the principal's office. there's also some quests that have time limits TT

i will say that maybe on your first playthrough, you should explore everything, then you can skip through it for other routes and only complete the necessary quests!

 

[Pastels]

i had a hard time completing some of the quests too, so i used this game guide! there's some things you can miss, like clicking near the fountain for the hairpin to sneak into the principal's office. there's also some quests that have time limits TT

i will say that maybe on your first playthrough, you should explore everything, then you can skip through it for other routes and only complete the necessary quests!

Thanks for the guide! I was holding off on using one cause I wanted to see how far I can get on my own but I really don't know how your suppose to finish these quests without one . Right now I'm just clicking everything on screen and hoping something pops out lol and yes I hate timed quests it just makes the game more stressful

 

[sdmjssvkfd]

i love bewitching sinners!! the quests and exploration aspects were fun at first but got repetitive quick when i was replaying to complete other routes :/

this! i typically try to 100% any otomes or VNs that i play and gameplay aspects are definitely fun and can keep me more engaged/interested than pure text, but (depending on the game) on replays i find them more burdensome than enjoyable and bewitching sinners was the first one where it was so bad i was struggling to push through it all again by the time i was on the last route (although it def didn't help that i left Thane for last and iirc his route was dependent on completing a specific quest to bring him home at the end).

anyways, to answer the original question of the thread, i think gameplay elements usually help me feel more engaged with the story and even though they can get tedious/repetitive when replaying i tend to find ones with gameplay more memorable than ones without (for better or for worse lol)

 

[lilycadence]

this! i typically try to 100% any otomes or VNs that i play and gameplay aspects are definitely fun and can keep me more engaged/interested than pure text, but (depending on the game) on replays i find them more burdensome than enjoyable and bewitching sinners was the first one where it was so bad i was struggling to push through it all again by the time i was on the last route (although it def didn't help that i left Thane for last and iirc his route was dependent on completing a specific quest to bring him home at the end).

i left thane for last too cuz his route was so complicated... imagine how tiring it was playing every route too TT thankfully, i had other games to entertain myself with when i felt like taking a break

 

[Litth]

Hmm... I would prefer text-redding in otome games because I focus more on how they write about relationship development and the difficulties they overcome rather than the mini-games, although I don't dislike the mini-game elements either.

 

[Arisara]

I prefer pure Visual Novels. I don't like to be distracted from reading too much. It's like when i play first person horror games and in a tense moment I am forced to solve puzzle :( But still one of my fav otome games is Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side series .Though never finished all routes heh

 

[plumtree]

Depends on the implementation/difficulty I guess. I'm not a fan of stat-raising Long Live The Queen
and Dandelion ~Wishes Brought to You~ traumatised me but it's tolerable in Ren'Py games because of easy save editing/ability to enable console for cheats.

I like exploration aspects like in Freakquency/Amplitude/Bewitching Sinners (that dev has a signature style and I respect it). I'm always going to be a fan of "shop" elements especially with clothes and dress-up. I think the clothes designing element in Tailor Tales was super fun and innovative.

Combat (Love and Deepspace style) is too stressful for me but I would be fine with strategy/turn-based elements like in Fire Emblem/Persona. I just don't like minigames/additional elements that are difficult for the sake of being difficult. It usually ends up overshadowing the romance element which is crucial for otome.

 

[Syntaxcha]

I'm pretty much okay with either as long as the story is good since that's one of the main reason I play otome.

 

[甘味鎮痛剤]

I think I actually prefer just reading the story in otome games—I can be pretty lazy, after all. Mini-games don't bother me, but if they get in the way of unlocking all the CGs, I'd be pretty frustrated.

 

[AkinaSR27]

I really don't mind either way! Whether it's stat raising, rhytm game, investigation-type, or point and click gameplay.

But I really hope for less RNG driven gameplay. Been playing angelique (og) lately and enjoying it but my goodness the guardians reactions are so unpredictable and online guide can only help so much. Thankfully I read that the later entries are not as unforgiving? But it can bum me out to want to complete a game and stopped by bad RNG.

 

[fr4pp3cinn]

I tend to prefer pure visual novel myself, but I do like some gameplay heavy games as well. In that case RPG or stat-raiser mechanics work better with otome/romance games for me (stuff like Harvest Moon, Rune Factory, LoveRevo, the Prince of Tennis DS games and the like).

There's Ore ga Omae o Mamoru as well, which was fun, but not really to my tastes. The DS had more experimental games in that regard.

 

[B539]

fr! And since this is my first play through idk what to do to complete the quests the exploration part is fun but I feel like I'm force to do so that I don't miss out on content.

This is exactly why I can't finish this game lol. The story looks interesting but I got bored of wandering around and clicking on every NPC to see if they have something important to say.
I hope the second game will have better system for this.

 

[B539]

fr! And since this is my first play through idk what to do to complete the quests the exploration part is fun but I feel like I'm force to do so that I don't miss out on content.

This is exactly why I can't finish this game lol. The story looks interesting but I got bored of wandering around and clicking on every NPC to see if they have something important to say.
I hope the second game will have better system for this.

 

[star light]

I also like visual novels, like Harvest Moon.

 

[orphan_account]

fr! And since this is my first play through idk what to do to complete the quests the exploration part is fun but I feel like I'm force to do so that I don't miss out on content.

Very relatable! I just downloaded a ren.py editor so that I can cheat my way into having more time and money so I can see as much as I can at once. Nothing more exhausting than having to play a game 300x just to understand the lore.

 

[qixianxiaomiao]

Both are acceptable as long as they don't affect the experience of the story. However, I hope that the difficulty of otome games with gameplay elements is not too high.

I used a translation tool. If there are any mistakes, I apologize.

 

[はなび]

I'm alright with gameplay if it flows naturally from the story rather than feeling like an interruption, or if the gameplay is integral to the telling of the story. Like if it adds to the storytelling or themes in someway, but I honestly haven't really personally played an otome where I feel like the gameplay enhanced the story too much for me. I like games in general so I like gameplay, but I play otome for the story (and view it basically like a novel but with some interaction in terms of the choices) so a lot of the time, it just ends up feeling like a bother if I'm interrupted in the middle of reading and forced to play a gameplay segment. If the gameplay is difficult, I feel like it would be a problem if I couldn't beat it and thus could not advance the story, basically soft locking me. But if it's too easy or I dislike the gameplay loop, I feel like it might start feeling like a chore that I have to do in order to get back to the story. And if I enjoy the gameplay too much over the story, I may want to just continue playing that, instead of going back to the story haha.

In terms of games in general (not just VNs and otome) there are some that integrate the gameplay and story very well (like having story inside or as part of the gameplay harmoniously) but I feel like there are many games where story and gameplay are almost at odds with or overshadow each other (especially when they're very separate from the other, so it feels jarring when switching over). They almost seem opposed in concept to me. Gameplay gives the reigns over to the player, letting them actively do something, while story is more like you watching passively and giving the control primarily over to the creators. These mindsets are basically the opposite to me personally, so when I want to read or experience a story, I want to focus on the story instead of being interrupted by gameplay, and when I want to do gameplay and find it too fun, I generally only want to do gameplay and I don't want to be interrupted by long segments of story or cutscenes (unless it's integrated well and the gameplay and story enhance each other, like I said). I guess I get too absorbed in each thing (story or gameplay) that I don't want to be forced to stop and do something else.

This goes for all games, but especially otome and VNs because I view and enjoy them as stories. Therefore, I'm just here to read so I usually prefer no additional gameplay mechanics and just pure story like a full visual novel. But even without additional gameplay mechanics, I think visual novels can do innovative things just by creatively using the elements and norms of their own medium, and I would personally be more interested in seeing something like that (if I wanted to see something that took advantage of its "game" format) instead of something that incorporates elements from different game genres (as I would just play those genres if I wanted them). But even that isn't necessary for me, as I am fine with and even prefer just full text and a linear story (even without choices or only minimal choice, which I actually might prefer).

 

[Mutamento]

I'd vote for pure text-based gameplay. While games with other elements are nice, they never quite get me hooked enough to open them again. It would be more fun if each playthrough was different, but unfortunately, most games I've played just end up sending me back to jail again.

 

[otomegirly388]

Recently i've been thinking about this after sharing hana awase(an otome game with hanafuda battle), even japanese community is discussed about this too before on twitter after love and deepspace (恋と深空/恋与深空) booming successfully on otome game market nowadays.

So what do you think? do you prefer an otome game with full visual novel reading style format or otome game with visual novel with some gameplay? like maybe simple simulation/dungeon crawler/rpg maker style,etc.

Personally i like full visual novel format but i don't mind some gameplay element too, but in my opinion the bad side of mixing gameplay element is i'll be focusing on grinding instead rather than continuing the story thus making the game longer than i imagine. (laugh)

I like pure text based Otomes the most. I don't mind gameplay elements but only if they are strategy ones like in Royal Alchemist.