Constructing Parasocial Intimacy in Otome Games: A Data-Driven and Autoethnographic Study Based on Love and Deepspace

This study examines how parasocial intimacy between players and virtual characters is constructed and sustained in otome games, using Love and Deepspace as a case study. It combines forum-based text analysis of Reddit data with autoethnographic reflection to investigate how narrative design, interaction mechanisms, and community participation jointly shape immersive emotional experiences. The analysis proposes a "player-avatar-character" ternary model, arguing that parasocial intimacy is a dynamic, continuously reinforced process rather than a one-directional act of emotional projection, and that it should be understood as a culturally meaningful mode of game participation.

The quantitative findings indicate that player emotional investment is strongly character-centered, with references to individual characters occurring far more often than discussions of world-building or settings. Plot developments and key narrative events intensify discussion activity and act as contextual triggers that amplify relationship construction. The study identifies a gradually deepening trajectory, moving from initial emotional stance to personality matching and self-identification, and finally to exclusive fantasy and imagined future scenarios, with the Reddit community serving as a channel for affective circulation. Character-related discussions show high concentration, expressive richness, and multi-layered emotion, and emotional orientations vary across event contexts, suggesting that festive and narrative-driven mechanisms reinforce bonds.

Qualitative analysis further suggests that emotional investment arises not only from narrative guidance but also from players' own projection, with player-driven narrative moments responding to emotional expectations and sustaining continued participation. Drawing on symbolic interactionism and parasocial relationship theory, the study extends these frameworks from traditional television, idol, and social media contexts to participatory, immersive game media.

The author acknowledges that parasocial intimacy in otome games remains a form of human-machine interaction and cannot fully substitute for real-life intimacy, though the emotions players experience are genuine. The work therefore raises the question of how to balance technical efficiency with emotional depth in game design. The study is a single-case investigation of one title and one platform community, so its findings are framed as analytically generalizable rather than representative of the otome genre as a whole.