First Person Podcast Episode 26: I Dream of Daddies

Published: March 2, 2018, 3:09 p.m.

In this month's podcast, we discussed Dream Daddy, an interactive visual novel developed and published in 2017 by Game Grumps that describes itself on its Steam storefront page as “a game where you play as a Dad and your goal is to meet and romance other Hot Dads”. So far, so good. Given the dearth of games catering to explicitly queer players, the FPS staff were naturally thrilled to have such a game and were eager to sit down to discuss it. As a bunch of gay and queer-identifying scholars, some of whom conduct research on queer representations in media objects, we had much to discuss about this game. While praising the game's merits, including its diverse cast, focus on queer romance, and inclusion of a trans character, we consistently found ourselves undercutting that praise by noting the conspicuous absence of roles, opportunities and content in the game.