I am an acquired taste

Indie Game Spotlight: Boyfriend Dungeon

Get ready to romance your swords in this week’s Indie Game Spotlight. That’s right… your swords! Boyfriend Dungeon is a dating simulator, dungeon crawler mash-up where your weapons turn into beautiful people. Within the game, you can forge precious moments with your lovers and work together to clear the rampant monster infestations, because after all, a couple that slays together, stays together.

We spoke with Victoria Tran, Community Developer at Kitfox Games, about Boyfriend Dungeon and all the great things you can expect!

In Boyfriend Dungeon, you can date your weapon. Where did this idea originate?

While we love dating sims and visual novel type games, we always felt there was something missing - we wanted to interact with them more. Since we’ve made games with action before, we naturally wanted to fit that into the game. From there, we thought: “Who do you spend the most time with when you’re fighting in a dungeon?” ….And that was your weapon!

What are some major influences to the game?

We learned a lot from our previous game Moon Hunters, both from its successes and mistakes! Many aspects of the game like narrative and combat, had a huge influence on how we approached Boyfriend Dungeon’s development. We’re also big fans of the Persona series, and we admire how the combat in Bastion feels. In terms of art style, our art director Xin Ran Liu found inspiration in Akihiko Yoshida, James Gilleard, Robh Ruppel, and Alberto Milego.

The game is called Boyfriend Dungeon but, players can romance male, female, and nonbinary characters. How important was it to be inclusive to all genders and sexualities?

We wanted a game that made us feel like we belonged. Our creative director and captain, Tanya X. Short, was tired of dystopias. She wanted to see cozy worlds that were positive, aspirational places for us to live and play in; especially, since our small team is made up of people with different sexualities, genders, and backgrounds. It became a vital part of the game.

How does the game balance being a dungeon crawler and a dating sim?

If we’re talking about time spent in the game, it leans a bit more on the dungeon crawler side due to how long it takes to slay monsters versus read. But we want players to play how they want, so there will be different difficulty levels, depending on how combat-heavy you want the game to be. Either way, we’ve made it so the two gameplay styles fit in seamlessly together. Mini dates are scattered throughout the dungeon, where you can buy and share an ice cream cone with your beloved weapon, or play some games at the arcade together, in-between clearing monsters.

What were some things the team learned while creating the game?

Making a mash-up game is hard, because you essentially have to make two amazing stand alone games that also work with each other seamlessly. It was interesting to see people who had never played a dating sim (or a dungeon crawler) pick up the game and fall in love with it.

I guess people are really thirsty for swords.

What weapon would you be and why?

A butter knife, because I love food; but, also, I am not deadly.

Ready to slay with your bae? Follow @boyfrienddungeongame to get all the latest updates leading up to its release! You can wishlist Boyfriend Dungeon on Steam.