Papergames, are you homophobic or not? — That's probably the biggest question Western Love and Deepspace fans want answered right now. On one hand, the company used an openly gay VTuber for overseas marketing. On the other, they dropped an official notice banning all BL (Boys' Love) fan content involving the game's male leads. This spectacular self-contradiction blew up international social media overnight.
The backstory is straightforward. Papergames issued an explicit notice prohibiting 'otome BL' — any male x male romantic shipping involving the game's love interests. In the Chinese otome gaming community, this is basically standard operating procedure, a rule so deeply embedded that nobody bats an eye.
But here's where it gets spicy. International fans dug up Papergames' promotional history and found that the company had collaborated with Uki, a Nijisanji VTuber who is openly gay, to promote the game overseas. So a company that literally hired an LGBTQ creator as a promotional face is now banning queer fan content? The hypocrisy was instant ammunition for the outrage machine.
Things spiraled out of control fast. On Western platforms, 'otome' started trending alongside 'homophobia' — a surreal pairing to say the least. One camp accused Papergames of blatant homophobia and demanded an apology. The defenders deflected blame onto China's broader stance on LGBTQ issues, which then escalated into accusations of scapegoating an entire country. A perfect storm of cross-cultural rage.
The NGA comment section had its own flavor of chaos. One highly upvoted user snarked: 'So creative freedom doesn't matter now? What a typical double standard from the XXN (a derogatory term for certain female gamers) crowd' — weaponizing the 'fan creativity freedom' argument that otome fans love to invoke against others. Another commenter nailed the dynamic perfectly: 'This is the mirror version of yuri fans forcing themselves on harem games' — pointing out this is the exact same genre-breach energy that male-oriented gamers feel when their waifus get shipped together.
One user offered a blunt confession of the attitude: 'I don't get why they call it "homophobia" — I'm not scared, I just discriminate.' A masterpiece of abstract internet humor. Another took the manufacturer's side outright: 'Shippers need to stay far, far away' — a reminder of just how deeply the Chinese otome community despises BL content in their space, far more intensely than Western fans might expect.
Several commenters tried to bridge the understanding gap. One used a galgame analogy: 'Imagine a visual novel where people ship all the female love interests together in yuri, completely ignoring the male protagonist — I genuinely find that disgusting.' While this triggered protests from Xianjian (Chinese Paladin) fans who objected to the comparison, it did help some outsiders grasp why otome purists are so fiercely anti-BL.
At its core, this drama is a textbook case of cross-cultural context collapse. China's otome community has long-established 'no BL' rules that are considered common sense — nobody questions them. But when Papergames brought those norms to the international market without any cultural sensitivity calibration, they walked straight into a minefield. In Western fandom, 'banning fan content' is itself considered a cardinal sin. Throw in the fact that the company actively used an LGBTQ creator for promotion, and you've essentially handed your critics the knife to stab you with.
In this free-for-all, the one getting hit from every direction is Papergames itself. Chinese otome fans blame them for sloppy overseas marketing. International players call them homophobic. Casual observers嘲笑 them for trying to please everyone and ending up offending everyone. The situation, as the original post perfectly summarized, is an absolute clusterfuck.
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