Anonymous Coward · 3mo
A vid dropped on yt about Tokimemo 3 "killing" the dating sim genre. As it's 90 minutes long, I'll shorthand the premise: the first game kicked off the genre, other brands filled in the 4 year void (long) between the first and second, the second game did well critically but not as well financially, 3 was "kickstarted" in the 2000s, 3 was bad and did bad, 4 was a sendoff in the handheld era, the west hasn't engaged the genre seriously ever other than as side material or ironically. Any thoughts or expertise?
[Mildly Long]
I watched it and while it was decently researched, many of the sweeping statements fall flat to me as someone more specially invested. To begin with, the central thesis of the video is flawed. Though it cites Tokimemo 3 as the death knell for the genre (granted he admits toward the end this was more of a clickbait), dating simulation was already on the path of decline by the time it released due to a variety of factors not limited to but including:
-Windows PCs becoming more accessible, which effectively throttled the market for console ADV games (which heavily relied on stat/raising elements to retain interactivity)
-Key and Leaf effectively cornering the bishojo/galge market starting in the early 2000s and producing hit after hit, which created more interest in games with curated narrative
-A general trend of market oversaturation and gamers wanting to play different types of games as the industry continued to expand
More importantly than that, however. It fails to account for Tokimemo Girl's Side, the otome branch of the series. The first game in that series came out after Tokimemo 3, and it was a mega hit. It was so successful that it ended up taking the scene by storm, and there are still various otome games that release nowadays with those traditional stat raising and schedule planning features. Ignoring the women-oriented market here is a significant misstep, I feel. The different target audience doesn't mean those games aren't part of the simulation genre. While they're slightly less common than they used to be, they were releasing otome games with full mechanics right through the Vita era, almost a full decade after the release of Tokimeki 3.
Even setting aside the ignored otome aspect, it would be stupid to ignore Amagami which released in 2009 and spawned not only a successful game franchise, but a multimedia network of anime, manga, and Drama CDs.
I agree that the west hasn't really embraced or engaged with this particular genre in the way it should be, but to claim it ever truly died, especially as early as 2001, is somewhat deceptive. Anyway this was written pretty much off the cuff and off the top of my head, so I could be missing some better examples. For a video specifically about Tokimeki 3's failings, it was fine. For a video about the genre overall, it was lacking.
