Kagematsu: romance and privilege in old Japan

At the fabulous Fabricated Realities convention, I played Danielle Lewon’s Kagematsu, which gave me a new perspective romance and gender politics. It messed with my expectations of how a courtship should proceed, and exposed some of my unconscious cultural assumptions.

In this game a female player portrays Kagematsu the wandering ronin, and the male players play peasant women who must entice and woo Kagematsu to convince him to save their village from a dire peril. The women take turns attempting to elicit gestures of affection from Kagematsu, from a stolen glance to a kiss to a roll in the hay to a confession of love, culminating in the promise to aid the village. Whether or not the woman gains the gesture, Kagematsu’s player secretly awards her Love or Pity based onpersonal judgment. Only if Love is high enough will Kagematsu have a chance of defeating the threat.