Dream about a vampire dating sim
Oct. 22nd, 2021 03:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alias_sqbrThe dream itself was like a very mild nightmare, not because of the vampires but because I was playing the game in the dream and OTHER PEOPLE KEPT TALKING OVER IT AND BLOCKING THE SCREEN (they all thought I was a bit cringe for caring but I just wanted to see the end). Also the game controls were confusing, and I kept accidentally dying and having to restart etc. So I saw a bunch of inconsistent variants of the story, and was thinking about how I'd do it differently as I played. The post below is me collecting the interesting parts.
It was not a sexy game, in fact I kept thinking "this is surprisingly unsexy for a vampire dating game, but I guess that makes it less embarrassing to play in this communal game playing club I have apparently joined". Which also makes it less embarrassing to describe in a post, so, thanks subconscious! I guess! No thanks for the annoying hecklers, though.
So! Classic gothic novel setup, heroine finds herself working at a Mysterious Old House for a Mysterious Family. They were literally called The Mother, The Father, The Daughter, and the Son, which, sure. The mother and father were typical milfy and dilfy vampire tropes, like Morticia Addams and...no exact example is coming to mind but he was distant and coldy patriarchal with hints of hidden intensity. The daughter was a spoiled princess type literally played by Alexis from Schitt's Creek, and the son had a sort of Henry Crawford-esque charming but mildly dangerous rake persona. What familial vibes they had felt very artificial, like they were playing a family for the heroine but their real opinions and dynamics were harder to uncover, and more like awkward coworkers.
A lot of the game was spent getting to know them, making decisions about which of them to spend time with and how to react to their Creepy Vampire Bullshit etc. Variables kept track of things like how much they respected you versus liked you, how moral and strong willed you are etc. As the game progresses it becomes clear that heroine herself has some sort of Special Destiny/Magic Blood, and also that the family has some eldritch goal they're working towards.
But! There were also other important characters! There were the classic minor NPC locals Warning That The Family Is Dangerous In Unhelpfully Vague Ways. But there were also some people secretly working against the vampires who claimed to understand what was really going on and that they wanted to help the heroine, but it didn't take much digging to realise their story didn't add up and that they wanted to use her Specialness for their own, possibly nefarious ends. Which gave the heroine more reason to be like ok SOMETHING is up with the family, sure, but EVERYONE here is lying to me and I'm not sure I can trust ANY of them.
There was also a female BFF, who was a Normal Teen Girl in a Nice Sorority because we're in the US now I guess. You can choose to spend time with her and her friends instead of all the creepy weirdos.
There were also...combat...elements?? Maybe just idk doing gymnastics with the sorority girls or archery with the daughter or something, this was not well fleshed out. But the heroine has strength/EXP etc stats, as well as like...bloodthirstiness or something.
The main plot was the same whatever choices you made and I had 'already played it' so it didn't get fleshed out in the dream. But it is finally revealed that the vampires had been working towards some huge lovecraftian summoning ritual. The house (and maybe town?) is destroyed and becomes a strange otherworldly landscape, terrifying monsters spill out of cracks in the ground, and the vampires stop pretending to be anything but monsters themselves. They have much less conventionally attractive but not-bad-in-a-monsterfucker-kinda-way true forms, and different, more inhuman personalities. The mysterious group show up and their secrets are revealed (my brain didn't bother actually coming up with what those secrets were though), and then THE SORORITY ARE REVEALED TO BE AN ANCIENT ALL GIRL ORDER OF VAMPIRE HUNTERS. There is a big battle.
Then there was a relatively short ending route based on what choices you'd made up to that point, and one of multiple endings depending on further choices etc. At most one vampire is left alive by this point. The vampire's original plan was to sacrifice the heroine for their ritual, and if you're on a particular vampire's route and didn't get the relevant points high enough, they go through with it, though they do feel a little bad about it. It's also possible to die because you fail some physicality/combat check etc.
I did not play the mother and daughter's endings in the dream, but 'had played them previously' and thought they were underwritten and frustratingly lacking in romance.
I didn't get to see all of the son's ending, I think I 'fell asleep' during it and died lol. Like the mother and daughter, it wasn't super romantic, he had SOME affection for the heroine but his flirty charm had mostly been an act and his real personality was just mean. It felt like a bit of a judgment on people who like vampire bad boys and I was annoyed. There was the option to side against him with the mysterious group.
The father's route was the hardest to get onto, but his ending was the most fleshed out of the vampires. He was by far the oldest, like a thousand years old or whatever. He'd gathered the others to do the ritual, and had initially seen the family act as entirely false, but by the end was fond enough of them to feel bad that they were all dead. By default, his best ending is him leaving the heroine alive but alone and then completing the ritual, which creates some key change in him and the world that actually isn't entirely evil in its goals, even if he did kill a lot of people to get there. He then retreats to a lonely vault to wait and transform, knowing that she'll be dead of old age by the time he is done.
But! If you made EXACTLY the right choices, you are cold and competent enough to have gained his full respect, and understand everything well enough to unlock your potential and transform as well. You become some sort of horrifying immortal eldritch being, and there's a romantic scene where the heroine confronts him in the vault in her new form and he's both horrified for her and delighted that they can be together.
And then there's what the game considers the true happy ending: joining the sorority and becoming a badass vampire hunter. The vampires all die but everyone else is safe. This was NOT a romantic ending which I thought was bullshit, when the bff was RIGHT THERE.
Of course now I'm like "The only person stopping me from experiencing a fun vampire romance without random strangers blocking the screen etc was ME" but I already knew my subconscious was a jerk.
ANYWAY. I think some of that could make for a good game, so. Sorry my tenses are all over the place I am very tired today and fixing them is too much work.
It was not a sexy game, in fact I kept thinking "this is surprisingly unsexy for a vampire dating game, but I guess that makes it less embarrassing to play in this communal game playing club I have apparently joined". Which also makes it less embarrassing to describe in a post, so, thanks subconscious! I guess! No thanks for the annoying hecklers, though.
So! Classic gothic novel setup, heroine finds herself working at a Mysterious Old House for a Mysterious Family. They were literally called The Mother, The Father, The Daughter, and the Son, which, sure. The mother and father were typical milfy and dilfy vampire tropes, like Morticia Addams and...no exact example is coming to mind but he was distant and coldy patriarchal with hints of hidden intensity. The daughter was a spoiled princess type literally played by Alexis from Schitt's Creek, and the son had a sort of Henry Crawford-esque charming but mildly dangerous rake persona. What familial vibes they had felt very artificial, like they were playing a family for the heroine but their real opinions and dynamics were harder to uncover, and more like awkward coworkers.
A lot of the game was spent getting to know them, making decisions about which of them to spend time with and how to react to their Creepy Vampire Bullshit etc. Variables kept track of things like how much they respected you versus liked you, how moral and strong willed you are etc. As the game progresses it becomes clear that heroine herself has some sort of Special Destiny/Magic Blood, and also that the family has some eldritch goal they're working towards.
But! There were also other important characters! There were the classic minor NPC locals Warning That The Family Is Dangerous In Unhelpfully Vague Ways. But there were also some people secretly working against the vampires who claimed to understand what was really going on and that they wanted to help the heroine, but it didn't take much digging to realise their story didn't add up and that they wanted to use her Specialness for their own, possibly nefarious ends. Which gave the heroine more reason to be like ok SOMETHING is up with the family, sure, but EVERYONE here is lying to me and I'm not sure I can trust ANY of them.
There was also a female BFF, who was a Normal Teen Girl in a Nice Sorority because we're in the US now I guess. You can choose to spend time with her and her friends instead of all the creepy weirdos.
There were also...combat...elements?? Maybe just idk doing gymnastics with the sorority girls or archery with the daughter or something, this was not well fleshed out. But the heroine has strength/EXP etc stats, as well as like...bloodthirstiness or something.
The main plot was the same whatever choices you made and I had 'already played it' so it didn't get fleshed out in the dream. But it is finally revealed that the vampires had been working towards some huge lovecraftian summoning ritual. The house (and maybe town?) is destroyed and becomes a strange otherworldly landscape, terrifying monsters spill out of cracks in the ground, and the vampires stop pretending to be anything but monsters themselves. They have much less conventionally attractive but not-bad-in-a-monsterfucker-kinda-way true forms, and different, more inhuman personalities. The mysterious group show up and their secrets are revealed (my brain didn't bother actually coming up with what those secrets were though), and then THE SORORITY ARE REVEALED TO BE AN ANCIENT ALL GIRL ORDER OF VAMPIRE HUNTERS. There is a big battle.
Then there was a relatively short ending route based on what choices you'd made up to that point, and one of multiple endings depending on further choices etc. At most one vampire is left alive by this point. The vampire's original plan was to sacrifice the heroine for their ritual, and if you're on a particular vampire's route and didn't get the relevant points high enough, they go through with it, though they do feel a little bad about it. It's also possible to die because you fail some physicality/combat check etc.
I did not play the mother and daughter's endings in the dream, but 'had played them previously' and thought they were underwritten and frustratingly lacking in romance.
I didn't get to see all of the son's ending, I think I 'fell asleep' during it and died lol. Like the mother and daughter, it wasn't super romantic, he had SOME affection for the heroine but his flirty charm had mostly been an act and his real personality was just mean. It felt like a bit of a judgment on people who like vampire bad boys and I was annoyed. There was the option to side against him with the mysterious group.
The father's route was the hardest to get onto, but his ending was the most fleshed out of the vampires. He was by far the oldest, like a thousand years old or whatever. He'd gathered the others to do the ritual, and had initially seen the family act as entirely false, but by the end was fond enough of them to feel bad that they were all dead. By default, his best ending is him leaving the heroine alive but alone and then completing the ritual, which creates some key change in him and the world that actually isn't entirely evil in its goals, even if he did kill a lot of people to get there. He then retreats to a lonely vault to wait and transform, knowing that she'll be dead of old age by the time he is done.
But! If you made EXACTLY the right choices, you are cold and competent enough to have gained his full respect, and understand everything well enough to unlock your potential and transform as well. You become some sort of horrifying immortal eldritch being, and there's a romantic scene where the heroine confronts him in the vault in her new form and he's both horrified for her and delighted that they can be together.
And then there's what the game considers the true happy ending: joining the sorority and becoming a badass vampire hunter. The vampires all die but everyone else is safe. This was NOT a romantic ending which I thought was bullshit, when the bff was RIGHT THERE.
Of course now I'm like "The only person stopping me from experiencing a fun vampire romance without random strangers blocking the screen etc was ME" but I already knew my subconscious was a jerk.
ANYWAY. I think some of that could make for a good game, so. Sorry my tenses are all over the place I am very tired today and fixing them is too much work.
