Alright, I've followed this project for quite a while now and I have a genuine question at this point. When you meet Perjin in the palace, there's mention of genuine body transformation, and it got me thinking. In a society that values pronouns as heavily as is shown in the game, will the genuine BTF allow the Crown to be trans? I know they technically can by selecting one sex, and using opposite gendered pronouns, but would a genuine BTF allow them to change their sex to match their identity? I didn't know if that was a thing since it wasn't mentioned anywhere as far as I'm aware, so I didn't want to take the risk of playing as a MtF Crown if some sort of transition wasn't a possibility, so I guess my actual question is if that is something present in the game? I get if it's too big of a hassle to write, but I guess my curiosity got the better of me leading to me actually asking about it. It just seems like something that would fit a setting like this, so even from a lore, if not game perspective, if it's actually a possibility for trans people in your universe?
The answer is plainly yes, but I'll add an explanation regardless:
The concepts of 'cis' and 'trans' don't exist in Arsur because no one is assigned a gender at birth. However, from our own perspective, we can obviously still label characters as trans or cis based on our standards. For example, if you have a character that would have been assigned male at birth by our standards but considers themselves otherwise, they're obviously a trans character to us, even if the concept doesn't apply in universe because they were never misgendered and socially pressured to be male.
Similarly, body transformations are also used in-universe for a variety of reasons, including to better match someone's identity even if gender assignment isn't a concern. You obviously don't have to physically transition to be trans, but the option is definitely there!
It's not something that will be explored in the game though, it's not really a focus of character development for MC: they are comfortable with their identity at this point in their life. Of course you are free to headcanon that your MC used a body transformation themselves when they were younger to fill in the gaps!
That's also why I didn't make the player specify their Crown's gender and sex in-game, only their pronouns - whatever you imagine for your Crown's gender and their experience is fully up to you and is equally canon to anything else.
From a lore stand-point, that's super cool. As a trans person based on our perception on gender and sex, it's cool to see someone who's build a whole ass universe where gender is mostly up to the individual themselves, rather than up to the general perception of society as a whole. I'm a trans woman, and although I live in a pretty liberal country in Scandinavia, there are obviously those who would always proclaim firmly that I'm a man who can't accept myself.
And although trans protagonists are becoming far more common, especially in the interactive fiction scene, I always feel like the protagonist being trans is either just handwaved away as being okay in the setting without any further explanation as to why that's the case, or them being trans just isn't mentioned at all which to me does take away some aspect of what it means to be trans. I'm by no means saying everything should have a big philosophical debate about gender and sex, but some games which even features sex scenes be they explicit or fade to black, often don't have the protagonist mention that they're trans to the love interest at all, yet they go on to have sex without it ever being brought up before or after the sexual encounter which honestly just doesn't make sense.
I can handwave away that all the love interest are magically attracted to the protagonist regardless of gender, but even if they are attracted to their gender, that doesn't automatically apply to their genitals. Some lesbians are more than happy to date trans women regardless of if they've had surgery or not, while some just aren't attracted to male genitals and therefor aren't interested in dating a trans woman (Which is completely fair, genital preferences aren't transphobic) and obviously that goes for gay guys too. So I feel like the protagonist not talking with them about it prior, and it never being brought up after the fact, makes the protagonist being trans feel disingenuous if that makes sense? Obviously we want a setting were our identity is accepted, but it's naïve to not at least make it a topic of conversation when it comes to relationships, because even if the setting is completely accepting of it on a social level, it can still very much make a potential relationship incompatible.
Even in a society where we're fully accepted, it's absolutely still something that's important and needs to be mentioned as a part of the story, because otherwise what's the point in making the protagonist trans? At that point, it just feels like it was added for the sake of being added. We like to pretend that we're no different than cis women, but at the end of the day we are different. Sure we're still the same in terms of our gender identity, but being trans inherently makes us different on a physical level which is something I feel like should be addressed more, especially in games that are romance heavy. It doesn't have to be the main part of the plot mind you, but an offhand line of dialogue where the protagonist tells the LI that they're trans would be enough if that makes sense? Like that I feel like when the LI is fine with it, they've accepted who we are, and established that it doesn't matter to them, which I feel like is a super important thing to establish in a relationship when one of the people in set relationship are trans.
Sorry for my massive long ass commentary on the status of trans protagonists in interactive fiction, it wasn't ever intended to get as long as it did xD. I mostly only ended up going on that tangent to show how much I appreciate your setting, due to how open they are as a society when it comes to identity and biological sex. It's refreshing that there's a deeper meaning behind why being trans isn't a big deal, and it's written in such a way where having those casual conversations about it aren't necessarily needed. It feels genuine, and not just like being trans is accepted just for the sake of making it an option, without any thought-out reason behind why it's accepted the way it is.
Not at all, I really appreciate hearing your thoughts, it's really useful insight for me as a cis game developer! I absolutely agree that it's often a topic that's handwaved away unfortunately for the sake of convenience for the writer, which can really cheapen the experience of an interactive fiction novel. That's also part of the reason why I tried to build a foundation in the worldbuilding for Arsur for why it genuinely isn't an issue, aside from me also just trying to get away from cisheternormative standards.
Also, I want to add that while MC's own experiences with gender identity are left up to the player, the way gender works in the game's culture will definitely be further touched on in future lore sections to further expand how such norms work in Arsur. While it may not be a focal point, it's also just fun for me as a writer to experiment with it!
In any case, thanks for taking the time to leave such thoughtful comments 💖