GAME CLEAR No. 206 -- Five Dates

Five Dates (2020, Multiplatform)

Developer: Wales Interactive, Good Gate Media
Publisher: Wales Interactive
Clear Version: PS5
Clear Platform: PS5
Clear Date: 1/22/25

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Why should I care?
If you love dating sims but always wished they featured live actors, have I got the game for you.

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Love in the time of COVID

When I wrote about Late Shift two posts ago, I said I wasn’t particularly interested in continuing to talk at length about FMV games since I had just given a talk on them at MAGFest. That remains true, so this one will be a stub as well. You cannot help nixon dot computer by expanding it because you do not have write access. :(

Five Dates is a little FMV dating sim by Wales Interactive (also the publisher of Late Shift) that follows the 2020 lockdown dating life of Vinny, a single thirty-something Londoner. The game opens with a view of the fictional video dating app Vinny’s trying. Once you set up his profile, it’s off to the races as Vinny quickly racks up “video game numbers” of matches (five). You must narrow it down to three potential first dates based on the women’s profiles, then the video dates commence.

From there, the interactivity is essentially just choosing dialog options as you talk to each person. How you approach that is up to you. Will you just say what you think they want to hear? Will you role play some guy or self-insert? Regardless, as long as you’re not dreadfully stubborn or unpleasant, you’ll probably at least get a second date from one of your matches, but the process of elimination continues as you may only choose two to ask on a second date (an intentional mechanic of the in-game app, apparently). If you’re smooth enough to handle those okay, you’ve got to do it one more time, and then on the final date, maybe you’ll get some actual personal contact info from your lady of choice.

It’s a simple enough format and ensures that even a Casanova playthrough in which each person you date wants to see you again will end in a timely manner (between an hour and 90 minutes). For a genre that runs a high risk of it, I didn’t generally find the writing cringe-worthy — except when it was trying to because I was intentionally tanking a date — and in fact often found it funny and charming. The women are somewhat archetypal, but not to an annoying degree. The acting is solid and generally captures the combined awkwardness of early dating and video calling alongside the general anxious desire from both parties to try to have a decent time.

As a piece of pre-vaccine COVID media that really leans into that, it’s also an interesting reminder of that time without being an uncomfortable one. By virtue of its very format, it is constantly acknowledging the time it took place in and was made in, but it strikes me as an optimistic work that sought to highlight people’s continued sincere desire to connect without being too cloying about it. It’s a bit of a weird feeling to play it today, but I like it as a 2020 time capsule with a surprisingly positive outlook. That year was obviously horrible for lots of people, so I understand that approach may not be to everyone’s taste, but it’s certainly something to play Five Dates in 2024.

Like Late Shift, I don’t think this is by any means an essential game or one that I’m dying to recommend, but if you’re looking for something a little different for your gaming diet, there are few things that hit all the specific notes this one does.