Rune Factory 5 brings about change to the series’ relationship system with the inclusion of same-sex couples. This has been received very well by the community, and Rune Factory 5 director Shiro Maekawa believes it will be a feature that will carry on to future titles.
“We received a lot of feedback from players who wanted the ability to pursue same-sex relationships from the start, so we made sure to include them in Rune Factory 5,” said Maekawa to Nintendo Everything in an interview published on March 26. “I think it’ll be a standard feature in any future games.”
However, same-sex relationships aren’t included in the Japanese version, despite bing pushed heavily by localization company XSEED Games. After many years of requests from fans, the employees of XSEED pushed heavily on the feature and added new cutscenes made by the developer Marvelous as well as provided new lines to include gender-neutral terms.
“This was something we had argued to be included for many years, and we’re so grateful to everyone who helped make it a reality,” XSEED said in a blog post to its fans.
Maekawa also expressed interest in including an English voice acting commentary option in future games. Currently, only the Japanese cast has one, and it’s included in the western release of Rune Factory 5. “It’d be nice to include commentary from the English cast as well someday,” said Maekawa.
Despite a few faults like a bad frame rate, Rune Factory 5 has a unique charm that will likely please long-time fans of the genre. The inclusion of same-sex relationships makes it even better.