Underneath my yellow skin

Tag Archives: Boyfriend Dungeon

Welcome to the (Boyfriend) Dungeon

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One game I forgot I played in 2021 was Boyfriend Dungeon by Kitfox Games. It came out in late August and I played it in a couple of days. The dating sim was great and the fighting part was adequate. I never warmed up to the latter, but it was fine. I wrote a quick impression of it after I played an hour or so as well as a full review and critique after I finished the game. I gave it an award at the end of the year, and I considered it all said and done. I knew there was going to be DLC, and I was pretty sure a character I met in the original game was going to be in the DLC (and I was right).

I found out that it had come out with little fanfare on August 17, 2022–nearly a year after the original game had been released. To recap, thee was a controversy over the inital release because the marketing for the game (come to the ‘dunj’ and fight the mons with your weps, that you can also date!), which was perky and upbeat, did not gel with the very real and disturbing issue of (*spoiler*) stalking that is a mainstay of the game.

To be clear, the majority of the game is bright, colorful, sexy, and jovial in tone (though many of the characters are depressed and have issues). But there is one character who is a complete asshole–racist against weapons, obsessive, and just horrific in nature. I hated him. I wrote about how I refused to do any of his content. I still haven’t because I hate him so much. And he still showed up in the DLC and was the major asshole he had been in the main game.

It’s weird, though, because *MASSIVE SPOILER* he was the main antagonist of the vanilla game and, as I remember it, I defeated him (and the uber-weapon he created) at the end of it. So, having him in the DLC being his normal dickish self was weird. It made me wonder about the purported timeline of the game/DLC.

But, as I wrote before, I hate that the controversy pretty much tanked the game. I thought Kitfox Games dealt with it well, but there was no winning. People wanted the ability to block the stalking content, and there really is no way to do that as it’s integral to the story.

Being a minority sucks in part because you desperately crave representation. Then, when you get a little bit of it, you want more. For example. In the game, I chose they/them pronouns, but I would have preferred not to use any at all. In addition, I would have liked more body diversity as only one guy–Jonah, the Axe, was allowed to be chunky. The rest were all slim or just hard-bodied/fit.


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The actual awards for games I want to give

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Yesterday, I was musing about the game awards I was going to give out this year, a year that was unlike any other. Yes, the pandemic was part of it, and not my favorite part. I’ll be honest with you. It’s very much not my favorite part of this year. But, there was also the me staying in the hospital for two weeks part, which is also not my favorite part. But it’s the most important thing that happened to me this year. Kind of. More the aftermath and dealing with my parents, but that’s neither here nor there.

Because of my medical trauma and my stay in the hospital, I really fell off new games in the last quarter of this year. I was concentrating on recovery and my stamina loss. I wasn’t really able to process new games so I kept returning to old favorites. There are not going to be many games in my awards this year, but know that each one is giving with 100% sincerity.

Before I hand out the actual awards, I want to mention that I tried a bunch of indie games this year that didn’t hit the mark for me for whatever reason. They include Overboard! by Inkle Studios, Chicory: A Colorful Tale by Greg Lobanov, Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion by Snoozy Kazoo, and Unpacking by Witch Beam. These are all good games in their own ways, but they just didn’t resonate with me. I’m especially sad about Unpacking because it was an indie favorite, but it stressed me out when I couldn’t get items in the right place–which is exactly opposite of what you’re supposed to experience while playing the game.

With that out of the way, here are my awards in no particular order.


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Boyfriend Dungeon and the burden of being a minority

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Ed. Note: I’ve finished Boyfriend Dungeon and I’m going to be talking about the controversy surrounding it, which means spoilers. 

Boyfriend Dungeon by Kitfox Games came out with much fanfare and as soon as people finished it (the same day or the next; it wasn’t very long), a controversy exploded. In the beginning, there is a content warning about stalking and manipulative behavior, but it was pretty tame. I mentioned it in my last post, but to expand, I hated Eric from the moment I met him. I refused to have anything to do with him (and missed a weapon until after I beat the game. My second-fave, by the way, after the cat) and worried I had missed important information or anything that was game-critical.

I couldn’t do it, though. I could not interact with him because he repulsed me so much. I’m not someone who’s been stalked–well, not really. Not in the conventional way and he still creeped me out to the point where I refused to interact with him. I was also confused because the tone of the game is “Let’s go to the dunj! Smooch some swords! Have all the fun!” It’s very light and silly (though with some real emotions) and to have this stalker-character in it was jarring. Was he supposed to be a joke? Was he supposed to be menacing? I didn’t know. In addition, the other characters mostly treated him like a benevolent nuisance (which, to be fair, is how stalkers are treated in real life) so in the first half, I just ignored Eric when I could and gritted my teeth through the scenes he had to be in.

In the second half, however, and this is where I put out a really big spoiler, the game took a turn for the strange. So, ok, in the first half, you learn that someone is kidnapping weapons, damaging them, and leaving them in the dungeons. It did not surprise me one bit to find out it was Eric. In addition, he was using their bits to create an uber weapon of his own. He called it Matsume or something like that, but everyone else called it Katana. I was really confused because, again, I hadn’t done any of the Eric stuff. After I beat the game, I went back and did the Eric stuff. He says some really foul bullshit about how the ‘pure’ humans are superior to the ‘hybrids’ and that he was dreaming of making his own ultra weapon that would earn the name Matsume or whatever.

That made the denouement make more sense, but it wasn’t really necessary. Plus, I felt vile after reading Eric’s bullshit and wish I hadn’t. But, in the end, I was able to brush it aside. Here’s the issue. Many people were traumatized by the stalking part and I can understand why. It’s really well done (I mean, true to reality) and gives the player a sense of what it’s like to be stalked. He shows up everywhere and you can’t escape him. Plus, he ends up being the big baddie and you have to kill him (his sword, but really him). I can see why that would be horrible for people who had gone through it.


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Dating my weapons is a dream come true

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Many moons ago (maybe even in the Before Times), I heard whispers of a game in which you could date your weapons. As a person who describes my relationships with my weapons in terms of romantic relationships (hot torrid affair with my double sabers, for example), this grabbed my attention. The name of it gave me pause–Boyfriend Dungeon–because it seemed oddly prescriptive. Reading up on it more, the developer, Kitfox Games (which, I think is only one or two people. I just Googled. It’s three), said that they would not have chosen than name if they were starting now, but it’s too late to change it at that point.

Side Note: It tickles me that the developer is called Kitfox Games and the mysterious character in Cozy Grove (Spry Fox) is a fox called Mr. Kit. That’s just me, though.

The premise of the game is that it’s a cross between a dating sim and a dungeon crawler. Specifically, you can date your weapons. Date my weapons?!? Hell to the fucking yes!! Now, I don’t like dating sims for the most part, but this was different. In addition, I learned that you as the playable character could be she/her, they/them, or he/him. (I chose she/her, but only after great hesitation). The weapons are (the ones I’ve seen in posts and in game), male, female, and nonbinary. You can also date people-people in the game, none of them have been nonbinary so far (but I know there are nonbinary options in the game). The style is reminiscent of Dream Daddy (Game Grumps), although there aren’t as many options to customize. I can’t emphasize enough, however, that this is three young people doing the vast majority of the work.

I watched Aoife Wilson of Eurogamer play the EGX/PAX build of it last year and was moderately impressed. I’m pretty sure I played the demo myself, but I can’t say for sure. My impressions might be because I saw Aoife play it, but I was more appreciative of the concept than the actual game.

The story is that you move to Verona Beach to live at the apartment of your cousin Jesse (how convenient that they have a girlfriend they live with but are still renting the apartment for the summer) and to run the dunj. That’s what they called the dungeon, by the way. Dunj. A bit too cute for my taste, but not teeth-grindingly so. It’s set at the mall, which is funny to me. Anyway, I have a phone and I get so. many. texts. From Jesse. Then my mom (who is a total sweetie, by the way). Then each potential date.


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