Hugely popular tactical RPG won’t add dating because devs ‘have no real-life experience’

Troubleshooter: Abandoned Children is slowly gaining popularity after originally releasing in 2020, and with that popularity has come demands for a “waifu” or dating system. It’s a demand the developers can’t secede to, though—and for a very funny reason.

Dandylion, the lead developer of Troubleshooter: Abandoned Children, today responded to the chorus of calls on Steam for his team to add a dating system by turning down the many requests and dryly adding the reason: “My team members have no experience with it, even in real life…” The hilarious response immediately went viral when it was then shared by Chise Hator’s Love on X (formerly Twitter), with the quip getting lots of love.

We aren’t too sure whether the dev’s seemingly harsh dating comment was a brutal burn or factual. But it may be true, given how difficult dating is in the 2020s. Regardless, it’s won the game even more fans; many are already calling the dev “so real for that” and suggesting you “gotta respect” them for wanting to do a “realistic dating system.”

Some players are already joking that the developers wanting realistic dating experience to go off of are like them, implying they have “experience with tactical urban combat in real life,” which would be pretty interesting to witness.

This likely boils down to the fact that as Ben Pielstick, the MMO designer for Old School RuneScape, Star Wars: The Old Republic, EVE Online, and Camelot Unchained, pointed out, “a date might be harder to imagine these days, I suppose.” At least when you imagine something impossible, you can’t get it all too wrong because no one has done it, so there’s no absolute right or wrong answer.

However, with dating, the devs would surely be called out for a dating system if something was wrong. Yet, as one fan mentioned, “It would have been better if they made a dating system up based on how they think it would work,” and they’re right; it would have been pretty epic.

So, if you’re ever wondering why some games don’t have immersive dating sims like Baldur’s Gate 3 or Stardew Valley despite it being very popular, the answer could be fairly simple (and quite hilarious); the devs just haven’t got the experience.