Another Romance Thread [Spoilers]

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Hey, all. I just wanted to put my specific complaints about the game's romances somewhere.

To begin with, I have literally zero complaints about Judy's romance. It's incredibly good; she's a lovable character - one of my absolute favorites from the game - and I think her romance and the pacing were done fairly well, too. I also think they dealt with her sexuality well, in that it's clear from early on that she loves Evelyn, and she had a past relationship with Maiko, etc. If there was ever a solid argument for CD Projekt Red to make about gender locking romances to make sexualities feel more 'authentic', Judy definitely is a good reference point for that argument.

The rest of what I'm about to say is pretty critical, though. I'll go over the other three options critically, and then some other things.

Panam is incredibly annoying for most of the game. She's blatantly just toxic, childish and... I don't know, dumb? It's not quite the right word, but it's the easiest one to attribute to her. She's so brash and incapable of thinking of any consequences for her actions, and while normally that could be an interesting character flaw, she's really irritating to me. Still, she kinda grew on me, but I think that was more the Aldecaldos than her.

Another thing about Panam is that her romance is incredibly forced onto you. I hate to use this word, but it felt like pandering. Hell, a lot of the sexual things in this game felt like that. I already know what some people are going to say -- the majority of the players will be straight dudes, the writers had their vision, whatever -- but if you objectively compare her romance to others, hers was WAY more integrated into the game and the quests. There are at least half a dozen opportunities to flirt with her and be lewd or romantic with her, whereas all of the other options get one chance to flirt at the very end of their questline. Panam on the other hand is basically constantly asking you to bang in some way, which is pretty irritating and bothersome. It was aggressive.

Moving onto River: I don't even know what to say. I like him, but he is literally completely removed from the main story. He has a fairly short quest-line that's pretty interesting, but it's so cut out of everything else that it's clear he was a total afterthought. Everything is also completely platonic until the literal last second/scene, which is more proof that he was an afterthought. Still, I do like him, so he's not a terrible option. I'll put him at #2 after Judy.

The absolute worst romance is Kerry. There are a few reasons why he's such a bad option, and I'll list them numerically.

1. He's an old man. Like, really. Every other option is in their 20s or 30s, and gay guys get a fuckin' 80 year old. I get that he mostly looks young, but it's kind of insulting, honestly. I'd also say he's the least attractive of the options, even though he's a solid silverfox.
2. His romance doesn't feel right. Hell, his plotline also feels like a weird afterthought that they just kinda put in to check the box of having another LGBT romance. I love two of his quests, but at best I get bro vibes from him; like a fun rocker friend to hang around with. I feel absolutely zero chemistry between him and V, which is the only romance I felt that way with. And considering I'm a gay guy, I should be feeling more chemistry with him. Instead, as I said in another thread, when I got to the end of my campaign and woke up with him in my apartment, I was literally like: oh god, I don't want to have to spend my last six months alive with you.
3. This is a personal gripe; the way his sexuality is treated in the story. While Judy's is treated pretty well, Kerry's is literally an object of constant ridicule. People are constantly making gay jokes about him; Johnny cooooonstantly makes him out to be some degenerate and makes fun of his gayness in every other dialogue line about him. It's honestly really homophobic. I'm not someone who calls homophobia easily, either, but the way Kerry's sexuality is treated - as an object of ridicule - is pretty absurd. It's really, really bad, and I'm honestly amazed that it's not incited a controversy.

As for closing comments: Johnny being a straight guy obviously did skew the romance scenes to be pretty heterosexual. Alt's scene was pretty saucy, and there's also his Rogue romance, though that's a bit more... uh, we'll call it tender. Then, male V's also get Meredith as an option. So -- yes, there are blatantly way more heterosexual scenes in the game, specifically for male V.

Normally, I literally would not care, but it was specifically stated that this wouldn't be the case... and again, I wouldn't care, but when the only option for gay men is Kerry, who is by far the worst, and for straight women it's River, who is literally irrelevant... yeah. I just wish the devs did better in that one respect. That's all.
 
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To begin with, I have literally zero complaints about Judy's romance. It's incredibly good; she's a lovable character - one of my absolute favorites from the game - and I think her romance and the pacing were done fairly well, too. I also think they dealt with her sexuality well, in that it's clear from early on that she loves Evelyn, and she had a past relationship with Maiko, etc. If there was ever a solid argument for CD Projekt Red to make about gender locking romances to make sexualities feel more 'authentic', Judy definitely is a good reference point for that argument.
I can't agree more, but here's a thing - they never told us about it. I was hyped from the moment I saw her in trailers, then in single renders, trailers again...
After the launch trailer I couldn't sleep, I was waiting for the next day to start downloading the first day patch and start playing. So, I'm playing the game. Completing side missions first, vacuuming what's possible (didn't even start Dex mission) and then I read the message of one of the developers who wrote about romance options... It was the biggest wtf moment in my life for sure. The problem for me isn't that she's lesbian, for god's sake, but because they've been clearly using her as one of game faces in their ad campaign AND forgot to tell this exact thing, so that ONLY AFTER THE RELEASE I'm about to learn that she's locked for me.
Anyway, I will be believing that they will make her bi to the very end, but of course they won't do it. Now I'm just waiting for them to make all the patches, DLCs, and then modemakers to make a mod unlocking this romance for Mhetero V.
 
Am I the only gaymer who likes Kerry's romance? Yes he's like "old" but he still looks young thanks to technology. Even in that age he doesn't act like he's old and it's something that I adore about him lol. I understand if many people got turned off with him but seeing his singing in that reunion concert made me fall for him. He's just so sexy.

Btw, can you show me screenshots when Johnny makes fun of Kerry's gayness? Cause so far I haven't seen him do that. I only see him pop up commenting about Kerry's antiques. The scene on the boat, he just lied there gazing at skies while my V talked to Kerry intimately. I was hoping Johnny would comment anything when we're having sex in that boat but no... nothing. It's kinda disappointing but I don't see any homophobic remarks from him... or did I just REALLY miss them? :(

I even feel envious with my brother's V who romanced River and there Johnny felt disgusted that his V made him watch her have sex with a cop. :ROFLMAO:

I even looked at him when my V decided to kiss Kerry in that balcony while saying "I'll even protect you from yourself". I was expecting Johnny would comment cynically at that but he just disappeared... I thought well maybe because he understood that Kerry needed that with him hearing the rumor about Kerry's attempted suicide and other things.

Or perhaps it happened after Act 3? Cause I haven't got motivation to finish the game yet with that kind of endings. :facepalm:
 
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Ashii

Forum veteran
I can't agree more, but here's a thing - they never told us about it. I was hyped from the moment I saw her in trailers, then in single renders, trailers again...
After the launch trailer I couldn't sleep, I was waiting for the next day to start downloading the first day patch and start playing. So, I'm playing the game. Completing side missions first, vacuuming what's possible (didn't even start Dex mission) and then I read the message of one of the developers who wrote about romance options... It was the biggest wtf moment in my life for sure. The problem for me isn't that she's lesbian, for god's sake, but because they've been clearly using her as one of game faces in their ad campaign AND forgot to tell this exact thing, so that ONLY AFTER THE RELEASE I'm about to learn that she's locked for me.
Anyway, I will be believing that they will make her bi to the very end, but of course they won't do it. Now I'm just waiting for them to make all the patches, DLCs, and then modemakers to make a mod unlocking this romance for Mhetero V.

CDPR said from the very start of romance announcement that romance options would have PREFERENCES. So I don't know why it was such "wtf" for you. Because she had to be yet another romance for a straight male? You took it for granted? Sure, they used her fairly often and I'm glad that in the end she's a lesbian. Meredith was also shown fairly often during 2018 and she's not even a full romance option.

Honestly, I pray that CDPR won't change Judy. For once in a video game history, let us lesbians have a nice romance only for us.

Also, OP, Meredith is bi. She hooked up with my FemV.
 
CDPR said from the very start of romance announcement that romance options would have PREFERENCES. So I don't know why it was such "wtf" for you. Because she had to be yet another romance for a straight male? You took it for granted? Sure, they used her fairly often and I'm glad that in the end she's a lesbian. Meredith was also shown fairly often during 2018 and she's not even a full romance option.

Honestly, I pray that CDPR won't change Judy. For once in a video game history, let us lesbians have a nice romance only for us.

Also, OP, Meredith is bi. She hooked up with my FemV.
No need to be so aggressive about it, really. Maybe they really did say so (although, I'm not the only one who didn't know about those preferences), they could have specified what those preferences were. For instance, BioWare always tells players in advance all the possible romance options.
Once again, I don't have any freaking problems with her being lesbian. My problem is, just imagine, you play a game hyping to romance the character and at some point you get to know that this character is not available for you (thank god I learned about judy in advance and not after I would vacuum all the map and get to her missions).
 

Ashii

Forum veteran
No need to be so aggressive about it, really. Maybe they really did say so (although, I'm not the only one who didn't know about those preferences), they could have specified what those preferences were. For instance, BioWare always tells players in advance all the possible romance options.
Once again, I don't have any freaking problems with her being lesbian. My problem is, just imagine, you play a game hyping to romance the character and at some point you get to know that this character is not available for you (thank god I learned about judy in advance and not after I would vacuum all the map and get to her missions).
Trust me, I know that too well, especially from Mass Effect games where every decent romance options were only for straight male. That's why Judy made me so happy and grateful to CDPR. For this one exclusivity just for us. Sorry if I came in too strong. I'm just really tired of people saying that Judy should be for males "because this game is mostly for them", like... jesus.

As for BioWare, yes, they usually tell, but only when it comes to Dragon Age. I remember they didn't say a word before Andromeda's premiere. When people kept asking about Cora or other romances, they only replied "play the game and see :)".
 
I would also add my 2 eddies that I have a few issues with how they handled some story elements regards them.

I never even met River in my playthrough, but others and my BF told me that there is a very natural feel of relationship build up with him even as a male V, only to be turned down by him in the end.
Now normally I wouldn't mind. I too prefer to have characters with identity and sexuality is unquestionably often a huge part of one's personality. But as I was getting near to the end of the story, I was getting rather "desperate" to find an interesting Loveinterest. And I know if I would have experienced the let down from River without knowing my other options.. I would have felt devistated and cheated.

At first I thought Takemura will be an option since their relationship seemed to be growing rather organically and it felt right.
After the fact, I was really confused becuause I was ready to start the ending, and I haven't even seen any gay romance options.

So I went to google the options, and found out that I have to finish the Jhonny sidequests to find Kerry. And alrighty.. maybe it was my fault for focusing too much on the main campaign... even though the feel of urgency was forced on me.
My dissapointment with him started at the very beginning. The scene with Rogue feels a bit wierd... like yeah V agreed to hand over control... but it still feels a bit.. meh...
Anyways! So yeah, not only the quests with Kerry didn't feel like there was a natural chemistry and build up between them, I actively hadto put the main quest aside and just drive around the city skipping time to wait for the next quest to pop up.

I personally didn't feel the whole romance appealing at all. He is definitely a personality that only works for 1 night stands, and the fact that after the sex scene you have no interaction with him? Yeah just like an overcommited one night stand or buddy with benefits.

I was upset because I personally felt that if they can make the build up so much smoother with Panam, then why not with all the other options? Hell I would even forgive that he isn't part of the main story if it was at least more, meaningful for the player char. I actually like Panam, she feels human and even as a gay man, I am actually considering romancing her just to give some happiness for my V.

((Possible Spoiler below))

And then I found out that if you take the nomad ending, Kerry just ditches you to follow his own 80 years old ass dreams... WTF...
 
I can't agree more, but here's a thing - they never told us about it. I was hyped from the moment I saw her in trailers, then in single renders, trailers again...
After the launch trailer I couldn't sleep, I was waiting for the next day to start downloading the first day patch and start playing. So, I'm playing the game. Completing side missions first, vacuuming what's possible (didn't even start Dex mission) and then I read the message of one of the developers who wrote about romance options... It was the biggest wtf moment in my life for sure. The problem for me isn't that she's lesbian, for god's sake, but because they've been clearly using her as one of game faces in their ad campaign AND forgot to tell this exact thing, so that ONLY AFTER THE RELEASE I'm about to learn that she's locked for me.
Anyway, I will be believing that they will make her bi to the very end, but of course they won't do it. Now I'm just waiting for them to make all the patches, DLCs, and then modemakers to make a mod unlocking this romance for Mhetero V.
I feel you. She definitely was hyped a lot in the trailers/etc -- however, I think she deserved that hype whether she was romance-able or not, because she's a genuinely great character. So, no complaints from me on that front, but I do totally get you.
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Am I the only gaymer who likes Kerry's romance? Yes he's like "old" but he still looks young thanks to technology. Even in that age he doesn't act like he's old and it's something that I adore about him lol. I understand if many people got turned off with him but seeing his singing in that reunion concert made me fall for him. He's just so sexy.

Btw, can you show me screenshots when Johnny makes fun of Kerry's gayness? Cause so far I haven't seen him do that. I only see him pop up commenting about Kerry's antiques. The scene on the boat, he just lied there gazing at skies while my V talked to Kerry intimately. I was hoping Johnny would comment anything when we're having sex in that boat but no... nothing. It's kinda disappointing but I don't see any homophobic remarks from him... or did I just REALLY miss them? :(

I even feel envious with my brother's V who romanced River and there Johnny felt disgusted that his V made him watch her have sex with a cop. :ROFLMAO:

I even looked at him when my V decided to kiss Kerry in that balcony while saying "I'll even protect you from yourself". I was expecting Johnny would comment cynically at that but he just disappeared... I thought well maybe because he understood that Kerry needed that with him hearing the rumor about Kerry's attempted suicide and other things.

Or perhaps it happened after Act 3? Cause I haven't got motivation to finish the game yet with that kind of endings. :facepalm:
Johnny constantly makes ass jokes about him, jokes about how Kerry always wanted to bang him, jokes about him being a slut, jokes about banging Kerry himself (only to later be like "he has a dick tho, so no") etc. Nancy made a joke about him taking it up the ass, too, and I'm pretty sure Rogue did at one point as well. So yeah. I don't have any SS's because I was pretty immersed in the game; didn't want to start uploading things to complain about. It's just, looking back, it was pretty excessive.

Anyway, no hate if you like Kerry. I just don't feel chemistry between him and V, and here's one thing...

Yes, he looks young. But his age means that he's already experienced a ton of life -- he doesn't really have the same development as someone like Judy or Panam, and there's not that sense of adventure of V and him being young and exploring life together. To me, that's important to any romance; it's the only reason why I'm so bothered by his age gap, really.
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CDPR said from the very start of romance announcement that romance options would have PREFERENCES. So I don't know why it was such "wtf" for you. Because she had to be yet another romance for a straight male? You took it for granted? Sure, they used her fairly often and I'm glad that in the end she's a lesbian. Meredith was also shown fairly often during 2018 and she's not even a full romance option.

Honestly, I pray that CDPR won't change Judy. For once in a video game history, let us lesbians have a nice romance only for us.

Also, OP, Meredith is bi. She hooked up with my FemV.
Got it. Thanks for letting me know she's bi. Also yes, I would rather CDPR not change Judy. However, I would actually like for them to change some other options to be more inclusive, or add more. I'm glad lesbians get Judy, but most of the options are pretty atrocious.
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I would also add my 2 eddies that I have a few issues with how they handled some story elements regards them.

I never even met River in my playthrough, but others and my BF told me that there is a very natural feel of relationship build up with him even as a male V, only to be turned down by him in the end.
Now normally I wouldn't mind. I too prefer to have characters with identity and sexuality is unquestionably often a huge part of one's personality. But as I was getting near to the end of the story, I was getting rather "desperate" to find an interesting Loveinterest. And I know if I would have experienced the let down from River without knowing my other options.. I would have felt devistated and cheated.

At first I thought Takemura will be an option since their relationship seemed to be growing rather organically and it felt right.
After the fact, I was really confused becuause I was ready to start the ending, and I haven't even seen any gay romance options.

So I went to google the options, and found out that I have to finish the Jhonny sidequests to find Kerry. And alrighty.. maybe it was my fault for focusing too much on the main campaign... even though the feel of urgency was forced on me.
My dissapointment with him started at the very beginning. The scene with Rogue feels a bit wierd... like yeah V agreed to hand over control... but it still feels a bit.. meh...
Anyways! So yeah, not only the quests with Kerry didn't feel like there was a natural chemistry and build up between them, I actively hadto put the main quest aside and just drive around the city skipping time to wait for the next quest to pop up.

I personally didn't feel the whole romance appealing at all. He is definitely a personality that only works for 1 night stands, and the fact that after the sex scene you have no interaction with him? Yeah just like an overcommited one night stand or buddy with benefits.

I was upset because I personally felt that if they can make the build up so much smoother with Panam, then why not with all the other options? Hell I would even forgive that he isn't part of the main story if it was at least more, meaningful for the player char. I actually like Panam, she feels human and even as a gay man, I am actually considering romancing her just to give some happiness for my V.

((Possible Spoiler below))

And then I found out that if you take the nomad ending, Kerry just ditches you to follow his own 80 years old ass dreams... WTF...
Wow, Kerry ditches you in the Nomad ending? Wtf, man... lol. This is just more proof that he's a horrible option.

Dude, did you also notice how to get to the quests to romance Kerry, you literally have to wait for WEEKS for him to call you back? The ones after the rock concert. Mind you, this is in Act 3, where you're supposedly dying with like a day or two to live. They were desperately trying to hide his flirting dialogue for all but the most interested parties, presumably to not make straight guys feel uncomfortable. It's really upsetting. No other romance had that delay -- a day or two, at the most, so imo it was obvious that it was an attempt to hide him.

Also, I totally agree with you. I felt a lot of chemistry between Male V and River, but then he just awkwardly rejects you. I think, if anything, they could've just made Kerry and River bi; I would've been much happier with that.

Last two things: yes, I hate that in order to do the gay romance you need to let Johnny try and bang women using your body. If you really think about it, it's kinda rapey, lol. But I probably would've done those quests even if Kerry didn't exist, so that's a super minor complaint.

Also: I really wish Takemura was the gay option. It would've been so much better, and he was so integrated into the storyline, too. I really liked him, and I kept hoping he'd be an option, but to no avail.
 
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Doing my first playthrough. But I personally didn't feel that panama was forced. In fact I felt it took effort to romance her because all efforts usually ended in nothing happening. Sure she is flirtatious but so are other characters. I mean it took one text to have sex with Maradeth.. My wife is romancing River and she says it felt about the same as romancing Panama did to me. I guess it's all in how you look at it.
 
Yeah I was pretty annoyed especially since the call trigger seemed to be rather annoying. Like even if you time skipped, you need to run around a bit or visit a completely different part of the city trigger.
And that is definitely not immersive and didn't make me feel like this will grow organically.

I was so certain up until the very and that Takemura would be an option... all the banters, about food, pulling eachother's legs...
And funny! I was actually considering calling the Rogue/Jhonny scene rapey, but decided not to since V does give consent... but still... I was actually relieved when rogue chickened out.
 
Doing my first playthrough. But I personally didn't feel that panama was forced. In fact I felt it took effort to romance her because all efforts usually ended in nothing happening. Sure she is flirtatious but so are other characters. I mean it took one text to have sex with Maradeth.. My wife is romancing River and she says it felt about the same as romancing Panama did to me. I guess it's all in how you look at it.
I dunno. I think the fact that you get like 6 opportunities to flirt with her, whereas for other options it's only 1, makes it feel pretty forced onto you. She's also the only one that goes out of her way to hit on you - none of the others do.
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Yeah I was pretty annoyed especially since the call trigger seemed to be rather annoying. Like even if you time skipped, you need to run around a bit or visit a completely different part of the city trigger.
And that is definitely not immersive and didn't make me feel like this will grow organically.

I was so certain up until the very and that Takemura would be an option... all the banters, about food, pulling eachother's legs...
And funny! I was actually considering calling the Rogue/Jhonny scene rapey, but decided not to since V does give consent... but still... I was actually relieved when rogue chickened out.
Yeah, the rapey part to me was when he was trying to hook up with that girl the first time you give him access to your body, when he says he's just going to talk to Rogue or whatever.

Anyway, totally agree with you on Kerry's romance not feeling organic, and Takemura being a great option. But I guess they had to give us the extremely stereotypical option with no real ties to the plot...
 
I dunno. I think the fact that you get like 6 opportunities to flirt with her, whereas for other options it's only 1, makes it feel pretty forced onto you. She's also the only one that goes out of her way to hit on you - none of the others do.
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Yeah, the rapey part to me was when he was trying to hook up with that girl the first time you give him access to your body, when he says he's just going to talk to Rogue or whatever.

Anyway, totally agree with you on Kerry's romance not feeling organic, and Takemura being a great option. But I guess they had to give us the extremely stereotypical option with no real ties to the plot...
Oh yeah shit! I completely forgot about the hooker part! Tbh that whole sequence was very upsetting which is fine I guess since it was meant to be... but still..
 
Oh yeah shit! I completely forgot about the hooker part! Tbh that whole sequence was very upsetting which is fine I guess since it was meant to be... but still..
Yeah, not a real complaint. Just made me uncomfortable haha.

Anyway; hopefully, they'll add better options in a DLC or something... or maybe the next game... or maybe they'll patch some of the romances to be bi. We'll see, I guess. Most likely, unless there's a major expansion, it'll probably have to wait until the sequel.
 
Trust me, I know that too well, especially from Mass Effect games where every decent romance options were only for straight male.
I dunno, my boy Garrus is a hell of a man, although his appearance, umm, kinda specific:giggle:
As for BioWare, yes, they usually tell, but only when it comes to Dragon Age. I remember they didn't say a word before Andromeda's premiere. When people kept asking about Cora or other romances, they only replied "play the game and see :)".
Really? They said that? Oh boy, my apologies, CDPR. That's even lamer than keep the silence:(

Anyway, I hope they will add a couple of romance options for all of us in DLCs and maybe add something in the ones that exist. But for Judy I will wait a mod:D
 
I dunno, my boy Garrus is a hell of a man, although his appearance, umm, kinda specific:giggle:
I meant that only decent female romance options were for guys, I should've been more specific. Sure, there was Liara for everybody, but again it was lame copy/paste with everything and honestly, not my type of girl. And romance with Traynor was lame as hell. Practically no content with no meaningfull conversations, only some autodialogue comments.

So... you can imagine why I'm so happy for having Judy.
 
First of all, I LOVED the Judy romance. Everything except the after bit when you have successfully made her your girl and then that's it. You get a few texts and some extremely lacking contact. It's all very flat and sour and honestly it made me lose interest in the game as a whole. I will be copy-pasting a quote here from me and user "Trinixy" on romance depth and what we think should be done to improve it ASTRONOMICALLY.


This is a merge of 2 comments from the thread "Romance options and updates", both pretty much saying the same things, but I think both comments have really solid points:

MY COMMENT FROM "Romance options and updates":
I have quite a few points about romance companions I would like to make that I hope CDPR will seriously evaluate to bring A LOT more depth to the game, the romance companions and V as a character. I romanced Judy in my playthrough, still not halfway through the game though. And the story arc and everything about the Judy missions are really amazing in my opinion, up to the point where you complete "Pyramid Song". After successfully romancing Judy it all turns sour very fast and the following list of suggestions will definitely remedy that to some extent in terms of making romances actually FEEL like proper relationships, because at the moment they absolutely don't. I don't know how any other romances are currently, but this could be done for every single romance partner:

1. After successfully completing a romance, let the player be able to initiate physical interactions like kissing, hugging and even the occasional sexual intercourse. Perhaps with a short 24 hour cooldown in in-game time for example. Adding this with some new dialogue attached would go a LONG way.

2. MORE DIALOGUES. This is a must in my opinion. I can somewhat understand the lack of dialogue options before romance, but I think there should be more romance-related dialogue options from the start and way past successful romance/completion of final mission for romanceable NPCs. These options could be gradually unlocked as you progress the main missions, which would bring more depth to the game, romanced partners and V as a character.

3. Let the player invite their romance partner to V's apartment, and let the player also be able to sleep at the romance partner's place as well as store gear safely. This could be tied with physical interactions as well, for example when approaching the bed you get a prompt to "get busy" as they say, maybe even in the shower in V's apartment.

4. Why not be able to go on a date in Night City with your romance partner? Great way to get immersed in the incredible world and it could be woven in with more dialogue options. For example when progressing the story and unlocking more and deeper dialogues, they can be their own instances where you get a call or you call your romance to go on a date, and that is where you experience the new dialogues the first time. And of course the new dialogues should always be available after such an event! Very important in case the big "I love you" comes into play.

5. This one I assume could be very tricky, but I will mention it anyway. I had an idea where if you're about to assault a relatively difficult side gig or some such, you can in some cases get a prompt to call your romance partner for backup, and they'll fight with you to complete the gig. This can bring some cool RPG elements where your romance can have negative or positive reactions to the gig at hand, depending on their own morals. And after completing the gig together they will either kiss you goodbye or scoff and ignore you for a day or something.

That's about it I think. This is what I want to see regarding romances at least. Romances feel so empty at it's current state (mind you I have only romanced Judy and all the missions before successfully romancing her were amazing, these are mostly suggestions for after successful romance)


QUOTING USER «TRINIXY»:
The biggest issue by far is that the romance to your character of choice basically ends at the beginning of your relationship. Lack of depth and things to do, quests to go on past the first intimate moments left me so damn sad. It may sound silly to some but this will make or break it for me going forward. The single most rewarding experience in the game was my relationship and romance to Judy, it's what will stay with me in memory going forward. And any single bits more with her, messages, quests, events, intimacy and dialogue will make me play the game all over again. And this is why i don't advocate for more romance options atm because simply they would disappoint you all that want them i fear for the same reason. At the moment no matter where you finish Judy, Panam, River, Kerry you will still be left with the void of knowing the best has passed and your sweetheart is nothing more than few sweet messages and repeating lines of dialogue. It will crush you because you know all the investment and emotion you put into it leads to loneliness and unfulfillment.

I don't agree that the restrictions should be removed they were made to keep the integrity of the character and define them within their world and background story. Making the romances all player sexual takes away from the immersion in the realities of life. In a Cyberpunk future where unimaginable things are real this bit of human interaction and character is same as it is in reality and it is better for it. I personally feel that making everyone bi would water down the significance of who these characters are and sever many peoples connection they hold in relating to them and who they are at the core.

For purposes of hammering down the points that could improve on romance ill list few i wrote earlier:


1. Your character of choice for romance should be the only one that calls you by your full name after the start of the relationship.

2. Work on what is there already and build on it, randomize and expand the answers these characters can give us, its same lines atm, have them surprise us with different answers based on met conditions. If i ask Judy what new braindences she mixed up have her tell me 5 different things and let me choose other things to say based on her response.

3. More messages and text responses, this shouldn't be difficult but its what couples do endlessly so please. If they ask me what i want to eat for dinner or arrange a dinner after based on my response.... you get the point.

4. More quests together, casual or serious, romantic and sweet. Don't tell me that there isn't some misfit that wouldn't try get back at me tru my gf/bf in Night City, you can make so many stories its a damn gold mine.

5. More intimacy, option to kiss, hug should be somewhere in these responses we give to our person of choice. Ways to trigger more sex scenes with our partner, the ones already there are so damn tasteful and wonderfully artistic.

6. Don't make it easy. We want the challenge and sharp decision making to getting into the heart of ones we love. Triggering the intimate scenes should come with perfect decision making in dialogue choices and actions in quests/events.

7. Make more use of that apartment after they let us live with them i beg of you.

8. Let us take them with us in our car or on our bike on a mission. These characters are basically invincible and invisible anyways so just having them as support fire and some dialogue would mean so much already.

All these are within reach and not unreasonable. If at least some of the upper ones aren't met then please don't start introducing new romance options. "Quality over quantity, V." All the aforementioned can simply exist easy outside of the main storyline and simply build on the side. I'll tell you now that any new additions and changes that expands the romance of my character of choice will have me easily play tru all of the game again. And a separate multiplayer game without them as romance choice or extension of the main game will get no real interest from me. Build on your strengths, don't be a Destiny or Warframe that will get boring and beg for play tru simple grind. Build on story and dialogue and relationships that is what will make your audience sing praises.
 
I agree with almost everything you said except the Panam part because come on, she is such a mommy lmao Yeah, she can act childish sometimes but that's attractive (in my own opinion of course)
But in general, I would really love to see more of interaction with secondary characters such as Panam and Judy. I really loved the idea of romancing them and becoming like a couple but it felt unfinished. I thought it felt weird how once you finish a romatic arc with them there's nothing else to do except saying the same lines over and over again. I don't like that it basically finishes on them having sexual interaction and saying "keep in touch" after that. I really want to see more of hanging out with them after that like going to the bar (maybe even getting drunk
🤓
😂
like Judy did with her friends and drunk texted V lmao), doing like a gig together where two of us can kill someone or save someone, going to the arcade, bowling, going to the movies etc. All the fun stuff couples usually do (I mean look at GTA - you can invite ppl to clubs) and just more interaction in general such as more romantic options and conversations. We really need to see a continuation of relationship with those characters
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I mean, if you added the romance option at first, at least make it more realistic. I just need a DLC where u can go beyond just having sex with ur romanced one and thats it. (ALSO!! I feel like sex scene with Panam could be changed because it didn't feel intimate enough or as exciting as the one with Judy. I mean it is a cool idea to have it in the tank but come on, Panam is a whole content so we need something bigger than that) It would be awesome if there were reasonable reactions from ppl present in the game such as: if you cheat on Panam or Judy, or River, or Kerry, they get mad at you and maybe even worse (who knows?).

*Same with your choombas! Hanging out with them would be nice too, right?
 
I agree that all romances definitely need to be expanded, but especially the River/Kerry ones. I really feel that CDPR really catered more to straight male players (lucky lesbians who for once got a decent romance, but I have a feeling they might not have been the target demographic) than to women and gay men.

Now, I'm a straight woman who prefers to play m/m romances becuase that's just what I like, so I think I might have a slightly different perspective than gay men playing m/m romances, but I really liked the romance option of Kerry. He's interesting, he's flawed, the boat scene was both moving (musing about loops and so on) and entertaining (burning ship sex scene), BUT it only felt like the beginning of a possible romance, like he and V just started discovering they might have feelings for each other. And then it ends. Nothing after that sex scene except one voice message. The fact that his questline is the last major questline you can trigger before the end and many people haven't even played it apparently, doesn't help and make it feel like the writers just added it because they had to. AND THEN these endings: I can call Kerry before the final fight and hint that I want a repeat with him, but what do I get in the end? In the Nomad ending he straight up dumps V without even giving him a chance, making their relationship seem like a meaningless fling. And in the Crystal Palce ending, they are technically together, but V behaves incredibly abrasive as if he didn't give a shit about Kerry and in the voicemail you get Kerry says that he would like to spend more time with V, but V is never at home. WTF
I wasn't able to romance River but from what I've read, it's basically the same as with Kerry: not really involved in the main story, dumps you in the Nomad ending, gets treated badly by female V in the Crystal Palace ending.

TL:DR:
Both male romances aren't part of the main story, they dump you in the most explicitely hopeful ending and get treated like shit in the Crystal Palace ending. All romances need to be expanded and be made more organic, but people interested in romancing male characters definitely drew the short straw in this game.
 
I agree that all romances definitely need to be expanded, but especially the River/Kerry ones. I really feel that CDPR really catered more to straight male players (lucky lesbians who for once got a decent romance, but I have a feeling they might not have been the target demographic) than to women and gay men.

Now, I'm a straight woman who prefers to play m/m romances becuase that's just what I like, so I think I might have a slightly different perspective than gay men playing m/m romances, but I really liked the romance option of Kerry. He's interesting, he's flawed, the boat scene was both moving (musing about loops and so on) and entertaining (burning ship sex scene), BUT it only felt like the beginning of a possible romance, like he and V just started discovering they might have feelings for each other. And then it ends. Nothing after that sex scene except one voice message. The fact that his questline is the last major questline you can trigger before the end and many people haven't even played it apparently, doesn't help and make it feel like the writers just added it because they had to. AND THEN these endings: I can call Kerry before the final fight and hint that I want a repeat with him, but what do I get in the end? In the Nomad ending he straight up dumps V without even giving him a chance, making their relationship seem like a meaningless fling. And in the Crystal Palce ending, they are technically together, but V behaves incredibly abrasive as if he didn't give a shit about Kerry and in the voicemail you get Kerry says that he would like to spend more time with V, but V is never at home. WTF
I wasn't able to romance River but from what I've read, it's basically the same as with Kerry: not really involved in the main story, dumps you in the Nomad ending, gets treated badly by female V in the Crystal Palace ending.

TL:DR:
Both male romances aren't part of the main story, they dump you in the most explicitely hopeful ending and get treated like shit in the Crystal Palace ending. All romances need to be expanded and be made more organic, but people interested in romancing male characters definitely drew the short straw in this game.
I have to agree with you. You see people crying abt not having more time with Judy and Panam but ignore that they both are way more involed than River/Kerry. You can even miss them both if you focus only on mainquestline. I would like for CDPR to develop them all more and add new characters to romance (maybe make them BI) next expansions. Here they have good conceps for next romance characters look!
 

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Well i feel that romances are way too short and all have pretty same issue- The last mission always is "fuckmission" and the fact that after that u get into relationship that doesn't do anything to the game. I will mainly talk about Judy romance because it was the best one for me :p
1. After the last mission only thing she does is sending u messages that are pretty cute but still it is not enough for me.
2. She was the only one to get "personal mission"- i mean mission where u get more into her past. For comparison what do we know about panam after the whole questline? almost nothing because the questline is more focused on Aldecaldo family than on her. Also we can't find anything about her past in her tent. With Judy we have the pyramid song quest that is focused 100% on her. In that one simple quest we learn everything about her- her past, who raised her, how she ended up as BD editor etc. We also get known about her relations with other kids. Also in her apartment we can find many files and generally things that we are able to check out. We can read her messages and find out about her hobbies. I think that Judy is the most developed character in that case. Shit i even think that we know more about her than about johnny who is living in our head.
3. The whole romance feels pretty well paced, you can feel from the beginning that she is interested in female V(Johnny will have something to say about it too) she also have a shy way to make us notice this, in many moments she does something nice to you like making you breakfast if u decide to sleep on her couch during pizza party quest. For me it's good that u don't have a choice to try to romance her before like with panam(for me she had too many moments where u could try to have sex with her)
4. Making her lesbian was a good choice. We can see that Judy is a very shy person that have problems in sharing feelings but with golden heart. She tries to help everybody he can, we can see this in one of her arguments with Susie at lizzies bar. Also she is the most tragic character in the game, life was not easy on her. She never got to knew her parents, she was raised by her grandfamily( i mean grandma and grandpa xd) in a city that was completely flooded when she was around 12. Kids made fun of her saying that she is too poor to afford having Parents. She encountered Cruelty when she was very young, maybe that's why she tries to be so helpful now? In main game we see that Maiko basically used her twice 1- when they were together 2- during her sidequests tryin to fool judy and V. Evelyn killed herself and Judy took the blame thinking that it was her fault because she haven't noticed anything until it was too late. Everybody she knew manipulated her, even Evelyn that decided to contact her after a few years just to get help with Konpeki plaza heist, it's clear she did it only to get her help because she is the best BD editor in the city. Judy is looking for acceptation and a true friend/lover that will be there for her, not for her abilities. V is this person- she helps her without asking for money and can refuse in the moment where she wants to pay her(it's player decision). It's sad that only in one ending Judy can finally be happy, in every other ending V and Judy break up :/ ultimately she always leave the city, with V or without her.

Now some things that i don't like about this relationship and it's something that is happening with every other one.
So we have no option to hang out with Judy in free roam. We also get only 1 new voiceline with her after getting into relationship. She gives us access to her apartment asking V to move in, but we can't do basic things like sleeping in her apartment. The only thing we can is accessing the stash. I think that we should be able to i dunno sleep there or have a shower. This things are already available in V's main apartment so why can't we do this in judy's one. Especially that she asks V to move in. I think that we need some more interaction with our love interest. It feels bad that she disappears from the game for a dozen of hours until we get to the ending. I think that being able to invite her to cinema or pub would be great.
Also i think that we should have an option to acknowledge somebody that we're in relationship, In river's last quest he tells you that he loves V, in that moment i was in relationship with Judy already, i think that there should be a short dialogue option that just tells him that V already have her second half. It's not a big deal but i would like to see it :p
The next thing i pointed out already is the fact that the last mission is "fuckmission" i won't say much here, i just think that we should get at least 1/2 missions with every romance option after having sex. This missions would be way more focused on your love interest.
Also i think that some romances should be way more personal especially Panam one, We don't get to know anything about her comparing to Judy, Every quest about her is actually focused on aldecaldos. I think that we lack things that would get us attached to her. The same goes with kerry for me, all his quest are focused on him being a bad rockerboy that hates pop xd River was pretty good though.
 
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