Image: Kitfox Gamesīoyfriend Dungeon’s core narrative recently brought developer Kitfox a round of discourse. Balancing dates, texting, and intimacy throughout the game felt comfortable, and never overwhelming. It worked as a conceptualization of dating. The initial concept, of combining dating and dungeon crawling, felt natural to me: I was able to get to know the folks around me and figure out which weapon best suited my play style. There are seven different romance options and thus there are seven different weapons that can be used to blast your way through Boyfriend Dungeon’s two dungeons. In between the dunj and dates, you also build these relationships through text conversations. Dating happens in a visual novel-esque style, with interactions playing out in real-time conversation choices.

Taking people (weapons!) into the dunj means leveling up a love ranking, which is essentially a power ranking - this is how you gain new abilities and increase your stats.īut to get there, you’ve got to date. You date in spots around Verona Beach, and supplement those dates with sessions in the dunj. Image: Kitfox Gamesĭating is mixed with sessions in the dunj, which is also a place where you can meet new folks. And you just so happen to be open to wielding them.

In the dunj - short for dungeon - is where you learn that there are some people in Verona Beach that can turn into weapons. Jesse sets you up with the first date, and things spring off from there before the monster fighting begins. Spending the summer in Verona Beach, paired with your matchmaking cousin Jesse, means learning to love. The story goes like this: You’re a person with no dating experience. What of it?īoyfriend Dungeon begins with the player character moving to a charming seaside town called Verona Beach, after a short customization stage where pronouns, look, and name are all adjustable. So yeah, the game is about dating people that you’ll also use as weapons to fight your insecurities. But it’s a concept that’s executed in earnest, with thoughtfulness and care grounding the otherwise implausible world. I mean, it’s a dating simulator in which you date people that can turn into weapons, which can then be used to fight through monstrous dungeons. It’d otherwise be easy to write the game off as a joke, a concept that’s wacky just to be wacky. The sincerity with which developer Kitfox Games enters into Boyfriend Dungeon is contagious.

For ios download Boyfriend Dungeon