Other Media Review

Game Review: Dream Daddy

If you’ve been on Twitter over the past month, you might have seen tweets and photos about the dad-dating simulator Dream Daddy, created by Game Grumps and written by Vernon Shaw and Leighton Gray.

In the game, you play a single dad with a teen daughter named Amanda (she’s way cooler than me) who just moved to the small town of Maple Bay.

In Maple Bay, there are seven dads available to romance:

  • Mat – hipster dad with tattoos and a love of baking and coffee
  • Craig – athletic, bro dad who has the cutest little baby
  • Hugo – dapper dad who happens to be your daughter’s teacher
  • Brian – the burly redheaded dad with a corgi
  • Damien – goth dad! It was also confirmed on Twitter that Damien is transgender.
  • Robert – bad dad who wears a leather jacket and hanging out at the local bar
  • Joseph – preppy dad who has four children, a wife, and is a youth minister

There’s pretty much a dad for everyone! Right from the start, I knew my first dad pursuit was going to be Damien.

Dream Daddy characters
From left to right: Robert, Damien, Craig, Joseph, Mat, Hugo, Brian

Before we get to the game, a note about these sorts of dating sims and visual novels. It’s been tough to find these sorts of games for women to play in English – where you play a woman and pick from a host of men to romance – and while this isn’t exactly that, I’ll take it. Now, I’ve played some Japanese visual novels before using all manner of computer rigging, such as running a translator program simultaneous with the games. The text would come up on the game, feed into the translator, and hopefully I’d get some readable text. In those narratives, there are usually good endings (happily ever afters) and bad endings.

Trigger Warning
In some of the other games where you play a woman, a bad ending could end in the death of your romantic interest or you could be raped. But there’s nothing quite that bad in this one.

I do know that there are both happy and not very happy endings in “Dream Daddy.” Some players would prefer to collect every ending, but if you’d rather just go for the happy ones and read about what the other ones are, there are guides available online.

Also fair warning: a couple of the dads don’t have HEAs at all and the only ending you get is a “bad” one. You can read about them here and to be honest, I think the reasoning is sound, despite my disappointment.

Before you start the game, you have to create your dad-sona.

My dad-sona - a man in glasses, with a man bun and mustache. He's wearing a blue shirt with a fried egg print over his nipples

I’d like you all to meet Doctor Spaghetti. He has a great backstory – according to Sarah. Doc is a bisexual Italian national. He had his daughter Amanda with his longtime lover/girlfriend who happens to be an international photographer, which is where Amanda got her sweet photog skills. Because of his lover’s hectic, globe-trotting lifestyle, they separated and agreed that Doc would have primary custody of Amanda.

Doc moved to the U.S. to continue his pursuit of a medical career, but soon realized his schedule was becoming just as busy and he didn’t want his daughter to feel neglected by her two incredibly busy parents. So Doc quit his medical career and began pursuing his dream of being a food blogger, making cooking homemade Italian meals approachable for families. As a bonus, Amanda does all the food photography his blog.

Plus, with a name like Doctor Spaghetti, it’s easy to know what he’s about, right from the get go.

Brian, his corgi Maxwell, and his genius 10-year-old daughter in the park
Brian, his genius daughter (who’s ten), and his Corgi, Maxwell.

Most of the game is bopping around town and meeting dads and other residents. You communicate and pick from three conversation options. If a dad likes what you say, hearts pop out and scatter across the screen. You dad-sona also does some pretty dad things, like referring to coffee as “bean juice.”

There are a few mini games involved as well. For example, you and Brian have a brag-off about your daughters and it’s setup like a Pokemon battle where each brag lessens your opponent’s health until one of you reaches zero.

Mat in his coffee shop in all his rambling, awkward glory
Mat in all of his rambling, awkward glory. He also loves puns.

I don’t want to inundate you with too many details and ruin the fun discovery elements of the game, like how and when you encounter characters, so I’ll just move on to my initial thoughts. The game is incredibly text heavy; prepare to do a lot of reading. For me, it’s not a game I can successfully binge play like I would with an RPG game like Fallout 4, where there’s shooting and action. On the bright side, the game will keep you occupied for a long time and you can replay it and pursue other dads.

The inclusiveness of the cast is great and it was honestly tough choosing the dad I wanted to romance. I thought I was set with Damien, but interacting with Brian was really sweet. HE’S SUCH A GREAT DAD TO HIS GENIUS DAUGHTER. There are some fantastic customizable options – you can choose whether Amanda has a mom or two dads, and whether she was adopted or conceived with you partner, which means certain details and interactions can change depending on which options you pick.

I think that’s really the most attractive element of this game: the options. My main critique is that your relationship with your daughter is the most fun and interesting thing. Amanda is funny and confident and such a cool teenager. At times, it overshadowed my interest in romancing DILFs because I just kind of want to hang out with my daughter. To be honest, I’d love a dating simulator in the future with Amanda as the star. Maybe when she starts college?

Amanda during her horse phase.
Amanda during her horse phase.

It’s such a fun game, despite how my attention would wane at times. That just means I have to pace out my play time! The art is wonderful and the dialogue is cute, quirky, and hilarious. Now if only I could get happy endings with all the dads! ARGH! But given the success of Dream Daddy so far, I’d love to see what this team does next.


Dream Daddy is available to purchase and download on Steam.

Add Your Comment →

  1. LG says:

    This is definitely still on my “to buy” list, but the news that there isn’t a HEA for all the dads bugs me and smacks of the same reasoning people give for “realistic romance novels” that don’t have HEAs. If something is advertised as a dating sim, I expect it to have a decent happy ending for all dateable characters. I doesn’t have to be 100% “everything is wonderful,” but at least all the characters in a decent place, emotionally, or clearly on the path to getting to a decent place. The spoilers I read for one dad sounded fine, but the other one just sounded deeply depressing.

  2. Mina says:

    This post blew my mind–I had no idea “dating sims” were a thing. (Sure, I’ve heard of The Sims, but never played, don’t know anyone who has, and have only the vaguest idea of what it’s like.) This is the kind of thing that’s dangerous for me as I can see myself becoming fully absorbed/obsessed by it. But dayum, I’m intrigued.

    @LG, I’m with you. I want my romances w/HEAs, dangit, though I dig that there are folks who don’t care. At the very minimum, books should come with HEA seals on the covers (if they have them), so a body can make an informed decision before becoming emotionally invested in a story. (No seal? No buy!)

  3. LG says:

    @Mina – Dating sims and visual novels are fun (when you get the good ones), but it can be a heck of a time and money suck. I used to get them through the Google Play store but got frustrated with the pricing model that my favorite developers used: you’d get the first chapter or character introductions for free, but then you’d have to pay extra for each character to get their full route. I mostly buy them on Steam now – I wait for sales and ignore the few that don’t let me buy the full game at once. The main drawback to getting them on Steam is that any nudity is censored, but so far I haven’t played games where that’s really mattered or left me feeling I’d missed out on anything (and, honestly, the censoring in one I just finished, Animal Lover, was hilarious).

  4. Ren says:

    I keep hearing about this from my friends, but there’s no Linux version. Sadness.

  5. ima says:

    As a side note, your dad can also be transgender – there is an option during the building your dad process to have a binder, so there’s that.

  6. Ele says:

    This is kind of like a re-imagined otome game — these are japanese visual-novel games, where generally you play the young heroine choosing among a bunch of guys, with a bit of adventure thrown in. Ones I’ve played include Men of Yoshiwara and Pub Encounter. (I tend to experience culture shock when I play these. Usually the action choices are things like, “stammer,” “blush” or “apologize.” And only one leads to a happy ending. But my American computer-gaming self thinks in terms of your basic “f**k” “marry” “kill” options. So I know I’m missing alot of the nuance in these games which, as noted above, are often badly translated.)

    Anyway, I can recommend Dream Daddy for people who enjoy fun, light romance. (So far, I have had no bad ending — maybe things will get heavier when I play it again.)

  7. ktr says:

    First reaction: “Ok but is it as good as the pigeon dating sim?”

  8. Amanda says:

    @ktr: Loved Hatoful Boyfriend!

  9. Rikki says:

    I watched so many plays of Hatoful Boyfriend. It was glorious. Completely ridiculous. And the backstory was completely insane.

  10. Holly says:

    I am loving Dream Daddy! My Dad is called Rio, he’s sporting a fancy blue man bun and that hot suit with the kitty print shirt. Already Got the good ending with Robert and Hugo (his Dadbook profile is basically the inside of my brain!) and aiming for Mat next because adorable puns.

    Can’t wait to see if they add on any new chapters or DLC! Also I can’t stop singing that blasted theme tune in my head.

  11. BrittBritt says:

    I saw a walkthrough of this game on twitch and instantly liked it. I love video games and any game with a bit of romance is automatically a must-play. Now if only we can get a Jane Austen Dating Simulator with rich men in need of wives. I’d play the hell out of that!

    I think out of all the dad’s I would’ve chosen Hugo! His romance was soooo cuuuuuute!

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