Love as a Service in Otome Games

This paper, by Joleen Blom of Tampere University and presented at DiGRA 2025, is a qualitative work-in-progress that examines monetization in otome games, a subgenre that offers players imaginary romantic relationships with fictional male characters. Its central argument is that free-to-play otome games combine affective engagement with gambling-like gacha mechanics, so that romance itself becomes a paid service. The author uses Love and Deepspace (Papergames, released January 2024) as a close-play case study. The game reportedly became the fastest-growing title in Japan by revenue shortly after release and drove a global surge in revenue for the interactive story subgenre of mobile games.

The analysis situates this design within the broader "gamblification" of digital games and the Games as a Service model, where gacha and lootbox mechanics accounted for a substantial share of mobile revenue. Industry-cited figures indicate that such mechanics appeared in roughly 15 percent of mobile titles in 2022 and generated about 73 percent of mobile game revenue worldwide, with character collection the leading monetization feature among top-grossing titles. The paper contends that self-regulatory industry measures and legal compliance remain insufficient, particularly where gambling-like mechanics are camouflaged within affective features such as gift-giving.

In the case of Love and Deepspace, the author argues that the most desirable romantic content, including fully visual scenes and story-supplementing rare five-star cards, is randomized, paywalled, time-limited, and sometimes gated behind matching card pairs. Players can access these experiences either through extensive grinding or through spending money, making romance a conditional service. The scope is primarily East Asian gacha games aimed at transnational female audiences, and the study rests on textual and play-based analysis rather than a large-scale survey.