Fantastic Boyfriends is heading West with its gay main character and hunky ogres

There aren’t a lot of video games with gay lead characters, but one Japanese developer is bucking that trend.

Tokyo-based Lifewonders is currently adapting its fantasy role-playing game and dating sim Fantastic Boyfriends: Legends of Midearth for a Western audience. It’s already out for iOS and Android devices in Japan, and Lifewonders has now turned to crowdfunding site Indiegogo to raise money to speed up the localization process.

Looking to raise a total of $20,000, the crowdfunding campaign is already on $4,000 after just two days, so success is looking likely. It shows that there’s a market for interesting new games with a LGBT theme.

The game revolves around a gay main character, Yuji Ono, who’s currently looking for a boyfriend. Ono gets summoned to Midearth from his Tokyo apartment, and romance blossoms between him and some of the fantasy characters he encounters, such as Orgus the ogre and Sol the monk.

“This project’s success will show that there are many players who are looking for different kinds of romantic relationships in their video games,” reads the Fantastic Boyfriends campaign page. “We believe that more and more start-ups in digital media such as comics and games that include various kinds of romantic relationships will only enrich video-game culture.”

Lifewonders says it will continue adapting Fantastic Boyfriends for a Western audience even if it doesn’t reach the crowdfunding target, but the process will take longer.