Story spoilers throughout the review.
The game's handling of stalking makes it difficult to write about.
On the one hand, tackling this subject in a video game in any shape or form is a vanishingly rare occurrence, and Boyfriend Dungeon does succeed in making you feel like your actions cannot affect your stalker's behaviour: repeatedly telling him to stop is interpreted as playing hard to get, and ignoring him will not prevent him from inserting himself into your day-to-day.
On the other hand, this success is achieved only because the game withholds from you the tools one would utilize to address stalking in real life: you cannot report him to the authorities, so for him there's no cost to harassing you; you cannot block his number, and so his constant messages are always in your face whenever you pick up your phone.
And, most importantly, his behaviour never escalates enough to feel menacing. He's never more than an annoyance. In the United States, stalking has been a crime for decades; over two thirds of intimate stalking cases turn violent, but here the stalker sees the error of his ways and goes to therapy of his own volition. You can ghost him and effectively ignore his storyline until you're done getting to know all the love interest characters, then speed through his story in under ten minutes to see the game's ending and call it a day.
The game goes farther than simply touching on the subject, but it does not go far enough, and it's incredibly frustrating.
Even more so when the rest of the game is taken into account, because it is good. The hack-and-slash combat may be on the simpler side, but it does not have the opportunity to grow boring because of how varied the weapons are. The art style is pleasant and evocative. The weapons are charming and each feel like a person with their own desires and concerns. The dialogue's well-written. The parts of the main story divorced from the stalking subplot are interesting enough.
You can befriend a cat who turns into spiked brass knuckles. Where else are you going to find that?
This game's more than enough to entertain you for a couple of evenings, if you can ignore the whole stalker thing. Unlike in real life, it's far better this way.
The game's handling of stalking makes it difficult to write about.
On the one hand, tackling this subject in a video game in any shape or form is a vanishingly rare occurrence, and Boyfriend Dungeon does succeed in making you feel like your actions cannot affect your stalker's behaviour: repeatedly telling him to stop is interpreted as playing hard to get, and ignoring him will not prevent him from inserting himself into your day-to-day.
On the other hand, this success is achieved only because the game withholds from you the tools one would utilize to address stalking in real life: you cannot report him to the authorities, so for him there's no cost to harassing you; you cannot block his number, and so his constant messages are always in your face whenever you pick up your phone.
And, most importantly, his behaviour never escalates enough to feel menacing. He's never more than an annoyance. In the United States, stalking has been a crime for decades; over two thirds of intimate stalking cases turn violent, but here the stalker sees the error of his ways and goes to therapy of his own volition. You can ghost him and effectively ignore his storyline until you're done getting to know all the love interest characters, then speed through his story in under ten minutes to see the game's ending and call it a day.
The game goes farther than simply touching on the subject, but it does not go far enough, and it's incredibly frustrating.
Even more so when the rest of the game is taken into account, because it is good. The hack-and-slash combat may be on the simpler side, but it does not have the opportunity to grow boring because of how varied the weapons are. The art style is pleasant and evocative. The weapons are charming and each feel like a person with their own desires and concerns. The dialogue's well-written. The parts of the main story divorced from the stalking subplot are interesting enough.
You can befriend a cat who turns into spiked brass knuckles. Where else are you going to find that?
This game's more than enough to entertain you for a couple of evenings, if you can ignore the whole stalker thing. Unlike in real life, it's far better this way.
