Say it in Red | Episode 40: Lovestruck and Games Preservation

Paris. A city full of historic architecture, beautiful filming locations, priceless art, and at least one group of high-class chaotic queer thieves. Dear Listener, if you were desperate, would you join them in the Parisian underworld? Would you  risk your life each and every day to pull off bigger and bolder heists? And how many hours would you spend petting Elizabeth the Cat?

This week, Sara and Runa are joined by their friend Rawles who guides them both through the life and unfortunate death of the mobile dating sim app, Lovestruck. Having closed down in 2022, Lovestruck is no longer available to play in its original form but fortunately fans have archived and preserved all of its dozens upon dozens of romance routes. The breadth of Lovestruck is far broader than we could ever hope to cover in a single episode, and the individual stories within the app are often longer than the games we've covered on this show. Today our focus is primarily on Queen of Thieves, a delightful queer dating sim starring a fresh art school graduate who gets swept up in the high-stakes world of heists, forgeries, intrigue, and flirtation with the notorious thieving group, the Gilded Poppy. With two women and four men available for the female protagonist to date, and each route spanning several hours and containing dozens of gorgeous CG scenes, it's easy for just about anyone to find a route they might love in Queen of Thieves. To read it now in 2023, however, you have to watch a video playthrough - with the app itself closed down, there's no way currently to play any of the Lovestruck dating sims in their original form.

As we discuss Lovestruck, we also take a more detailed look at games preservation, the fate of games and creative work controlled by corporate profit motives, and the possibilities for future game preservation, marketing, and dating sim development. This episode represents something bittersweet and in more than one flavor... Lovestruck may be gone, but all of its stories and the wonderful writing and queer character relationships still exist in archival form. Even so, it's hard to feel entirely satisfied and content after seeing such rich potential and knowing how rare and fragile such opportunities are for queer dating sim developers in the current games market.

 As always, if you enjoy our episodes please give us a rating and write a brief review wherever you listen to podcasts - we don't have an advertising budget so your reviews and recommendations are one of the main ways new people find out about our show! Also if you'd like to hear more content or find out how to support us, you can visit our patreon at patreon.com/sayitinred! 

All of our reading this week was made possible by the LS Salvation Squad! Check them out on tumblr and youtube for a full archive of the Lovestruck App's stories!