You Should Play Otome Games
Otome games are weird. Now, this isn't because they're strange in a conceptual sense, or even in execution. They're weird because they're a niche within a niche—and extremely stigmatized, for that reason. Most of the popular, commercial releases of otome games are visual novels. Some have stat raising mechanics or other gameplay. Sometimes they do veer off into gacha or RPG territory to great success (after all, Love and Deepspace is immensely popular outside of the normal playerbase for otome games), but most often, the games that gain popularity are the VNs. That's the first niche, of course. Visual novels have a high barrier to entry, since they are generally what is advertised on the tin: a novel. It's almost all reading, with little else gameplay-wise outside of the occasional break to make the decision of selecting a dialogue option. A lot of people in the gaming spaces don't want to constantly press the A button or enter key and just read. ...
