Silksong is powerful, but a new foe emerges at Gamescom: over 70 million horny otome game players – "Today is truly a momentous day"

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GTA 6? Hollow Knight? Sorry, I only know my hot stepbrother in Love and Deepspace

The five love interests in Love and Deepspace smile against a starry night background
(Image credit: Infold Games)

Yes, women getting the right to vote was a big deal. I'm not saying it wasn't. I just want you to also recognize that we've now experienced the Mars landing of women's history: Love and Deepspace has become the first romance game to win Gamescom's Best Mobile Game category.

Developer Infold producer Lizi says in a translation provided by a press release, "Today is truly a momentous day for us. The list of nominees included many outstanding Chinese games, and being recognized alongside them, showing the world the creative strength of Chinese games, is an honor in itself." Chinese fans translated the rest of her award acceptance speech: "We wish you all dreams to pursue, love to cherish, and the courage to embrace yourselves and life passionately. May every one of you 做幸福女人, become a happy woman."

GamesRadar+ staff member Maddy Kendall-Murray was personally able to confirm the line and noted to managing editor Ali Jones that it was made up of "girls trembling while standing next to cardboard cutouts."

Another press release informs me that these cutouts were Thermal Standees offering "Fluttering Touch," which might sound illegal, but actually falls in line with the various activities you can do with your boyfriend in Love and Deepspace: listen to his heartbeat, rub his shoulders with your fingertips, fall asleep to his euuuggghh moans in "immersive stereo." I usually ask merman-artist Rafayel what I should eat and then choose the "I'm allergic" dialogue option when he responds.

In any case, now that Hollow Knight Silksong has finally received a release date and we know GTA 6 is imminent, I've seen some people wondering what the next game with enough buzz to make a honeycomb will be. I need to tell them, with over 70 million downloads and "overseas revenue surging 48% month over month" according to PR, you're looking at it with Love and Deepspace.

Some might dismiss otome games as frivolous, but Love and Deepspace's presence at Gamescom shows that a mostly female audience might be even more authoritative than another. Plus, what is tying up a terrifying dragon man with beautiful eyes who's about to ravage your flesh unless you hold him down with iron chains if not "serious gaming"?

There's more Gamescom on the way – take a look at our Gamescom 2025 schedule.

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Ashley Bardhan
Ashley Bardhan
Senior Writer

Ashley is a Senior Writer at GamesRadar+. She's been a staff writer at Kotaku and Inverse, too, and she's written freelance pieces about horror and women in games for sites like Rolling Stone, Vulture, IGN, and Polygon. When she's not covering gaming news, she's usually working on expanding her doll collection while watching Saw movies one through 11.

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