Dream Daddy: A Dad Dating Simulator

A masculine figure on a character creator, which says, 'Build that dad!' Options are: bod, heads, hair, eyes, noses, mouths, brows, facial hair, glasses, piercings, and clothing. 'Bod' is selected, with six image options, many colour options, a checkbox for 'hair', and the label 'athletic binder bod'.
  • Developer: Game Grumps
  • Publisher: Game Grumps
  • Year: 2017
  • Genre: Visual novel
  • Platform/s: PC

Dream Daddy features a range of diverse representation. The player-character can be designed as a cis or trans man, with some of the character bodies having binders. The realistic bodies in the game have been celebrated online.

The player-character can be bisexual/plurisexual or gay, depending on the options selected regarding Amanda's other parent. The player can also choose whether Amanda is the protagonist's biological or adopted child (see below).

In one exchange with Damien, it indicates that he wears a binder, implying that he may be trans.

One of the dads that the player-character can date—Joseph—has a wife. Both Joseph and his wife, Mary, seem to be aware of one another's flirtations with others, but going on dates with Joseph also seems to be depicted as a transgression. Ultimately, it's not possible to end the game in a relationship with Joseph. It's unclear whether the dates and flirtations this couple have with others are seen as infidelity or polyamory. In a statement made by the game's creators, they indicate that the player cannot end the game in a relationship with Joseph because they did not want to make players responsible for ending a marriage.

There are other characters that the player cannot finish the game dating as well. The way that relationships form are designed to reflect reality as much as possible, and that means you can't just tell everybody what they want to hear and end up in a relationship with them. Dream Daddy manages to mitigate some of the effects of the usual 'playersexual' approach employed by dating sims by including these routes.