Date Ariane Games

Date Ariane was first released in early 2004 as Ariane's Dating Simulator a simple HTML Javascript "Choose Your Own Adventure" style game. I called it a "date simulator" because I heard the term used in reference to games in Japan, but having never played any, I just took the term literally. I made what I thought a date simulator would be like. Without realizing it, I created an all new sub genre of "visual novel". Date Ariane may not have been the first dating sim to only have a single character, or created using 3D graphics, though I don’t know any that predate it, and I wasn’t influenced by any. Since then dozens of similar character romance games with 3D graphics have been released online and as downloads, many of the creators citing Date Ariane as an influence. It has become its own western sub genre of bishojo. The first game was an HTML/Javascript game for the web, which ate all my bandwidth due to it's popularity, so for the sequel I decided to find a gaming engine and found Renpy in 2011. In June of 2013 I released the first 3D rendered renpy visual novel, a "harem" game called "Something's In The Air". Since then THOUSANDS of similar character romance games with 3D graphics have been released via Renpy and other gaming engines. I have since made 4 other games, because I enjoy making these games more than playing them, and the number of people who have discovered this hobby and discovered the same thing doesn't surprise me at all.