Pride month is here, and we at Ulvespill thinks love conquers all, no matter who you are or who you love! Therefore, we’ve made a list of our top 10 LGBTQIA (Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Trans, Queer, Intersex and Asexuals) games (in no particular order). And if it wasn’t obvious, massive spoiler alerts ahead!
Life is Strange
Life is Strange is an episodic graphic adventure video game developed by Dontnod Entertainment and published by Square Enix. The game was released in five episodic parts periodically throughout 2015. The game’s plot focuses on Max Caulfield, an 18-year-old photography student who discovers she has the ability to rewind time at any moment, leading her every choice to enact the butterfly effect.
Life is Strange lets players choose to flirt with Chloe, Max’ best friend from childhood. Or you could flirt with Warren instead, since Max is clearly a bisexual. In addition the game features Samuel the groundskeeper at school, who are hinted to be a crossdresser.
Gone Home
On 7th of June, 1995, 21-year-old Katie Greenbriar returns home from overseas to her family in fictional Boon County, Oregon: her father, Terry, a failed writer who makes a living reviewing home electronics; her mother, Janice, a wildlife conservationist who recently got promoted to director; and her 17-year-old sister Samantha. Upon arriving, she finds the house deserted, with a note on the door from Sam imploring Katie not to investigate what happened.
Exploring the house, Katie begins to piece together what happened during her absence: After moving in, Samantha found it difficult to adjust to her new high school, but eventually made friends with another girl, Yolanda “Lonnie” DeSoto, a JROTC cadet. Albeit friends might be an understatement, as Katie soon discovers Sam has something “to tell her.”
Dragon Age-series
Dragon Age is a Canadian dark fantasy role-playing video game series created by BioWare. The first game, Dragon Age: Origins was released in 2009. Dragon Age II, a sequel to Origins, was released in March 2011. Dragon Age: Inquisition was released in November 2014. The series’ fantasy setting has been used by a variety of other media, including books and tabletop games, and the three main games have been joined by a variety of downloadable content add-ons. A fourth yet unnamed installment has been revealed to be in production.
The game not only features the possibility for your character to be gay/lesbian/bi, but it also features the Qunari, a race which has gotten far when it comes to transgenderism, giving all of those “who identifies as the other gender” a chance to become an Aqun-Athlok.
The Last of Us (Left Behind)
The Last of Us is an action-adventure game developed by Naughty Dog. It was released for the PlayStation 3 worldwide on June 14, 2013. Players control Joel, a smuggler tasked with escorting a teenage girl named Ellie across a post-apocalyptic United States.
In the DLC Left Behind you follow Ellie and her best friend Riley. And let’s just say, Ellie wants to be more than friends, a lot more. My highlight of the DLC is the passionate kiss the girls exchange when Ellie convinces Riley not to leave with the Fireflies. During E3 2018 Naughty Dog showed a trailer for The Last of Us 2, where Ellie was dancing with a girl, ending it all with a sweet kiss.
South Park: The Fractured but Whole
South Park: The Fractured but Whole is a 2017 role-playing video game published by Ubisoft in collaboration with South Park Digital Studios. Based on the American adult animated television series South Park, it is the sequel to the 2014 video game South Park: The Stick of Truth. The game’s narrative occurs one day after the events of its predecessor; it follows the New Kid, who has recently moved to South Park and becomes involved in an epic roleplay involving two rival superhero factions vying to create their own superhero media franchises. The superheroes’ game unintentionally uncovers a conspiracy to raise crime in the town, bringing them into conflict with supervillains, genetically engineered monsters, the police, crime families and the new kingpin of crime.
The game not only allows the player to choose their sexuality, but also gender. The players do not only have the choice of being a girl or a boy. They can also be genderqueer/fluid, transgender, agender and so on. Both their sexuality and gender can change during the game if the players feel to.
Catherine
Catherine is a puzzle platformer adventure video game developed by Atlus. The story follows Vincent Brooks, a man who is beset by supernatural nightmares while torn between his feelings for longtime girlfriend Katherine and the similarly named beauty Catherine. The gameplay is divided between daytime hours, where Vincent interacts with the characters, and his dreams where he must navigate three-dimensional tower puzzles. The game’s ending is affected by moral choices made by Vincent over the course of the story.
Erica Anderson is the bar’s ray of sunshine, bringing warm smiles and cold drinks to her customers. Erica is the waitress at the Stray Sheep. A friendly sort, she often joins in the conversations of her customers. Erica only appears in the “Katherine True Ending”, where it is revealed that she was called ‘Eric’ during school, showing she was assigned male at birth, making her a trans woman.
Night in the Woods
Night in the Woods is a single-player adventure game developed by Infinite Fall. It is a story-focused exploration game in which players control a young woman named Mae, who recently dropped out of college and has returned to her hometown to find unexpected changes.
Many of the characters in Night in the Woods represent the LGBT community. Bombshell is lesbian, Adina Astra and Adina’s Lover are lesbian/bisexual, Angus Delaney, Gregg Lee, and CJ are gay/bisexual, Mae Borowski is pansexual, and Jackie is transgender.
Mass Effect-series
Mass Effect is a science fiction action role-playing third-person shooter video game series developed by the Canadian company BioWare. The original trilogy largely revolves around a soldier named Commander Shepard, whose mission is to save the galaxy from a race of supreme mechanical beings known as the Reapers and their agents, including the first game’s antagonist Saren Arterius. The fourth installment, Mass Effect: Andromeda takes place in the Andromeda Galaxy and features a new cast of characters, featuring Pathfinder Ryder as the protagonist.
All of the Mass Effect games features one or more LGBT-character, and both Commander Shepard and Pathfinder Ryder is bisexual so the player can make their own romantic choices. In addition, the game series feature the Asari, native to the planet Thessia. A mono-gender race, the asari are distinctly feminine in appearance and possess maternal instincts. Their unique physiology, expressed in a millennium-long lifespan and the ability to reproduce with a partner of any gender or species, gives them a conservative yet convivial attitude toward other races.
Fallout-series
Fallout is a series of post-apocalyptic role-playing video games. It was created by Interplay Entertainment. The series is set during the 22nd century, and its atompunk retro-futuristic setting and artwork are influenced by the post-war culture of 1950s America, with its combination of hope for the promises of technology and the lurking fear of nuclear annihilation. A forerunner for Fallout is Wasteland, a 1988 video game developed by Interplay Productions to which the Fallout series is regarded as a spiritual successor.
Since the first Fallout players have been able to choose between both male and female sex partners. Although most of the potential partners are sex workers in the first two games, they both feature non-sex workers for the player to seduce as well. In Fallout 3 all of the potential partners for the player are female. They do not, however, care about the players gender. In Fallout: New Vegas and Fallout 4 almost every sex worker is bisexual and will flirt with the player regardless of gender. There are on top of that some NPC’s that are coded as either gay or lesbian.
The Sims
The Sims is a life simulation game series that was developed by Maxis and The Sims Studio and published by Electronic Arts. The player creates virtual people called “Sims” and places them in houses and helps direct their moods and satisfy their desires. Players can either place their Sims in pre-constructed homes or build them themselves. Each successive expansion pack and game in the series augmented what the player could do with their Sims.
One of the main selling points of The Sims is the ability to make your sim be in any form you like, which of course includes their sexuality. Your sim can flirt with every other NPC regardless of gender. The Sims 4 was the first game in the series to officially make clothes non-gendered which allowed for players to make their sims wear exactly what they felt like without any mods.
