Best Friend Forever is a combined dog-raising and guidance counselor sex videodating simulator — objectively two of the best video game genres to exist. Released today, it’s an undeniably charming concept marred by an unforgivable flaw: You cannot adopt the best dog in the game.

Developed by New Zealand studio Starcolt, Best Friend Forever has you move into the dog- and singles-friendly Rainbow Bay, looking for a fresh start, a new paramour, and a pup to help you sniff out love. Aside from chatting up hot young singles in your area, you also plan activities with your newly adopted dog, levelling up stats such as Manners, Sociability, and Trust.

Dating sims are already full of possibility, allowing you to romance everything from a swordto a sexy Colonel Sanders. It doesn’t matter how terminally single you are in real life. Like an overachieving fairy godmother, the magical world of romance games can transform you into someone attractive enough to tempt a whole suite of suitors.

But combine this with a raising sim that lets you minmax your very own good boy or girl, one who’ll be there to comfort you through love’s highs and woes? Sign me the heck up.

A good girl, but not the dog I was after. Credit: Best Friend Forever

Best Friend Foreveris a beautiful game, filled with bright art and brimming with optimism. Having spent a couple of hours playing through it on PC, it’s a welcome, brief escape from the general horrors currently consuming the world. There’s just something rewarding about choosing the right activities to ensure your dog is happy, healthy, and well-versed in the doggy arts.

Unfortunately, Best Friend Foreveris also rather shallow. The dating and raising aspects don’t influence each other at all — it’s not like your dog has to reach level 2 in Fitness before fitness guru Maribel will take things to the next level with you. The characters' narratives feel incomplete as well, hinting at stories and personalities that never have meaningful progression or are even really explored. Choices seem largely inconsequential, leaving relationships feeling unsatisfying.

The game is still fairly enjoyable in a gently simple way though, primarily due to its premise, and any of the available dog adoptees will bring you joy. There’s Titan, a shy four-year-old Maltese; Blocker, a rescued mutt who needs a bit of love; Cheeseball, a cheeky Shiba Inu pup whose previous owners gave her up; and Cardigan, a grey Staffordshire Terrier stray. All dogs are good dogs, and these four are very good indeed.

Even so, as good as they are, none of these dogs is the best dog. None of these is the croissant boy, the sausage prince, the large barge. None of these four adoptable dogs on offer is the absolutely adorable Boatmeal.

I will fully own my bias here: Boatmeal is my own real life red and white Border Collie, who won a place in Best Friend Forever’s Paws Academy via a Twitter competition. Players get to see him during regular assessments to measure students’ growth, along with fellow real dogs Cornelius, Ghost, and Junebug.

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He also won valedictorian. Credit: Best Friend Forever

I am, of course, thrilled at his inclusion, preserving him forever in digital form so future generations may know his love and be blessed. Yet Best Friend Foreverstill falls short by not offering him as an adoptable option — a choice I understand considering the rigours of game development, but one I still deeply resent.

Look at him. Look at his fluffy fur, his eager smile, his little face that says “I love you and will follow you anywhere.” His soft ears optimised for scritching, and his innocently trusting eyes. How can you look at this boy and not want him?

To be clear, you absolutely cannot have him. Boatmeal is not up for adoption in reality, and will be living a long and happy life as a member of my family. Still, I am sorry that Best Friend Forever’s players won’t at least get to experience Boatmeal’s unconditional love in virtual form.

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Aside from the unobtainable Boat, Best Friend Forevercould do with more work in other areas as well. Several bugs still need to be ironed out, such as incorrect pronouns, notifications for your purposeless in-game email that you can't clear, and even a bug that wouldn't let me continue until I restarted the game. Spelling errors and misplaced text are fairly common, and some functional aspects grate, like the inability to check your dog's stats from the map or go back to read skipped dialogue. This is particularly frustrating since it’s easy to accidentally skip text when interacting with your dog. Hopefully some of this will be fixed in later updates.

This is on top of the game’s writing and structure feeling rushed, with a single brief meeting enough to make potential suitors your friends. I found myself pulled into a sexual encounter I couldn’t decline on the second date (fortunately absent visuals), which ended so comically abruptly I laughed. There was no third date either, leaving me more or less marking time in the relationship until the game's end. The loading screen tips from pet store owner Fox also seem more like put-downs than the sassy quips they appear to be aiming for, undermining the comforting atmosphere.

"Take a moment to think back on everything you've achieved in your life... Oh, you're done already?" Why does this game think she's a friend? Credit: Best friend forever

Despite all this, Best Friend Forever's cute aesthetics and good intentions help you forgive at least some of its transgressions. At least, it helped me forgive some of its transgressions. I'll concede I may find the game's problems easier to overlook because at least I get to see Boatmeal in-game.

In many ways, irritation offset by comfort is just the experience of owning a dog — just not my dog, who is always a perfect sunshine boy made of magic beans.

There’s an extremely high demand for comfort right now. People are baking breadand buying chocolateat a highly accelerated rate, searching for anything that might provide some temporary relief from the overwhelming stress and anxiety of 2020. It’s even caused a dog shortage, with so many people adopting pups during their self-confinement that shelters are being emptied. Dogs are widely recognised as beneficial to people’s mental health, after all.

Fortunately, Best FriendForeveris full of very good boys and girls just waiting to be your new best friend. The game is buggy and shallower than you’d hope, but it provides a small, optimistic space in which you can hide for a few hours. If you can’t bring home a IRL fur friend, whether that be due to the dog drought, rental restrictions, or accursed allergies, you can spend time with a lovable video game pup instead.

Just not Boatmeal.

Best Friend Foreveris available now on PC and Nintendo Switch.

Related Video: Pet fostering, adoption is skyrocketing during the coronavirus pandemic

Topics Gaming