Is it possible to have a romance with your original robot?

[Twipidash]

I have to say, I grew very attached to my first robot and assumed that the "robot romance" option would involve simply staying with my original companion. Are there certain choices that make this possible, or do you always have to create a new, gendered robot for that romance path?
I would normally just test this myself, but seeing as there are still many paths left to explore after this first playthrough and that part only comes at the very end, I'd really appreciate any information so I don't waste too much time on it if it's impossible!

[Matin Sanguine]

Your first robot is more of a paternal relationship (I'm being purposefully broad here) than a romantic one, the latter is what your second robot is for.

I could be wrong though, there is a lot of nuance in these COG text adventures, and a lot of nooks and crannies can easily be missed.

[Professor Bright]

5 hours worth of permutations and I am 60% sure that is a no. Still quite a few unexplored options left, and there are a few options left in the empathy path that I think MIGHT go that route, but I dunno. It seems they were big on the paternal guardian idea, which does prevent some very odd possibilities.

I certainly can't see a romance with my eight legged giant death robot working out.

[Twipidash]

I understand that point, though I always tried to treat my robot as an equal and never really saw or described our relationship as a parental one, especially since rer intellect and knowledge progressed so much in a very short time that the more childlike phase was quickly forgotten.
I guess it makes sense that the game wouldn't let you pursue the robot romantically if you've made it clear that you consider her/him/it/rhim to be your child, but I'd be a bit disappointed if they didn't allow it in other cases, especially with high empathy and autonomy and even more if it's a humanoid that's about the same size as you.

[Carnwulf]

I had the same problem. I had a robot romance. And my first robot "Ariel" seemed to be full of envy towards her despite luckily never doing anything stupid....

[TravelerTraveler]

This is hilarious and sad

[Twipidash]

Traveler님이 먼저 게시:

This is hilarious and sad

How so?

But yeah, I'm pretty certain now that it's impossible to romance your main robot. I'll be sure to mention it in an eventual review in case it hasn't been stated already, since It's not clear from either the game description or the demo that the romanceable robot isn't actually the one you spend the vast majority of the game with. I still like Choice of Robots a lot, but it's always a bit disappointing when your feelings and intentions are decided for you in these types of games!

[Bazil]

Dunno, I haven't logged enough hours but I feel like some of that comes down to how you read it.

Like with the ending I got it seemed an awful lot like you could have read it as either a paternal relationship or a romantic relationship. They never did anything overt with each other but it seemed like if you wanted to it wouldn't be a huge leap in logic to read it as romantic.

I chose to read it as paternal because that's just how I saw the character but looking back it could go either way.

For what that's worth anyway.

[Twipidash]

Which ending did you get? I'm curious, as I don't think I was ever able to interpret any as being romantic despite my best efforts. In most of the endings, I was forced to build a second robot, who then got all the romantic focus. The ending I got which would have the most potential is probably the one where you end up alone with your first bot, especially with the 'cliff in Ireland' dream where you can tell rhim/her/him/it something along the lines of "I don't mind not having a perfect companion bot, you're enough for me." But it still all felt very platonic to me.
The only hint I got that my main robot was even able to express romantic feelings was in an ending where rhe and the new companion bot start developping feelings for each other, haha.

[Bazil]

Twipidash님이 먼저 게시:

Which ending did you get? I'm curious, as I don't think I was ever able to interpret any as being romantic despite my best efforts. In most of the endings, I was forced to build a second robot, who then got all the romantic focus. The ending I got which would have the most potential is probably the one where you end up alone with your first bot, especially with the 'cliff in Ireland' dream where you can tell rhim/her/him/it something along the lines of "I don't mind not having a perfect companion bot, you're enough for me." But it still all felt very platonic to me.
The only hint I got that my main robot was even able to express romantic feelings was in an ending where rhe and the new companion bot start developping feelings for each other, haha.

Err. I don't know how to figure out which is which. I got 6D I think? I also started with the Anubis thing.

All I know is that I had really high grace, autonomy and empathy and I was going to die of brain disease.

Very sad ending really, very moving.

[Tispity]

I've played this a lot and am pretty certain the robot romance option always involves building a 2nd Bot. The relationship with the 1st Bot is always made to be maternal / paternal to the point that if you get married (to a human or to your 2nd Bot) you can choose "1st robot name will always be my child in spirit'' instead of having/adopting kids .

I once got the outcome where my 2 robots seemed to be forging a relationship with each other, although it isn't that explicit. To do this: I went down the robot companion pathway and had high enough empathy to build a 2nd bot but then consistently rejected his advances without being outright horrible enough to him that he left completely.

[JohnSolaris]

I think one of the reasons you can't romance your original robot is that you can make your original robot not even remotely humanoid (e.g. ring of cameras for head, eight legs, size of a giant monster). That does make some sense, but I'm still kind of disappointed. I personally would have put in an option that lets you transfer your original robot's mind into the body of a companion bot, hence enabling the romance, since it's already been shown before that you can build new bodies for your robots.

[Sirus]

Kinda wish they'd add this option, if it isn't implemented already. I didn't feel any attachment to the second robot at all, while my first one stuck by me the entire game. You'd think the writers would have seen this coming.

[Twipidash]

"All I know is that I had really high grace, autonomy and empathy and I was going to die of brain disease."

Interesting! Maybe I was missing something by getting myself cured. I really should take note of the letters for every climax chapter, now that I think of it I'm not sure I even saw all four main variations.

"I think one of the reasons you can't romance your original robot is that you can make your original robot not even remotely humanoid"

That does sort of make sense, though they could have allowed it with humanoid robots at least?... But maybe people with non-humanoids would then feel excluded, and so on.
I love the idea of transferring the robot to a new body! That could have been a great solution.

"I didn't feel any attachment to the second robot at all"

Yeah, same here... After spending the whole game with my first robot and doing everything together, I didn't want just any other robot, especially not one with a personality so intense and unchangeable.
It also irked me a bit that you have to make a gendered bot when you choose the robot romance option (or even sometimes when you don't choose it, if I recall correcty). I don't get why the robot would *have* to be male or female even if you do romance it (unless you want to sleep with it and only have one gender, but that choice only comes after the creation) , but if you never meant to romance it at all, it just seems even more silly.

[lys_xen]

Twipidash님이 먼저 게시:

It also irked me a bit that you have to make a gendered bot when you choose the robot romance option (or even sometimes when you don't choose it, if I recall correcty). I don't get why the robot would *have* to be male or female even if you do romance it (unless you want to sleep with it and only have one gender, but that choice only comes after the creation) , but if you never meant to romance it at all, it just seems even more silly.

What makes it even weirder is along some of the pathlines, you can actually decide to make companion robots which aren't 'sexbots'...and then it talks of modders a little later ^_^

[Plutonian Prime]

I've bought this game solely for the promise of romancing non-human machines and I was utterly dissapointed! Like, ugh, who cares about these boring humans that don't wanna build Terminators or whatever. I also didn't get attached to my second bot cause, well, he isnt given much time to be developed, he just pops out and goes (if you have enough stats) "Yo, your first Ariel bot is jelly. Lmao. Wanna bone?" Ugh, I mean it's not terrible, but still, I formeda much deeper connection with my original baby bot.

And dont give me that crap about different sizes and what-not! It's like that scene from Flubber when that flying toilet bot turned into a hot lady in order to try and pork with Robin Williams, God rest his soul, totally hot!