BioWare/Ho Yay

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Dragon Age

  • All love interests (except Sebastian) are bi in Dragon Age II, but it doesn't necessarily stop with them. Aveline, post Match Maker Quest, can ask Hawke if there might have been something between them regardless of gender.

Varric: If you have something to say, just spit it out.
Anders: Are you sure you want to encourage me? I might be about to confess my undying love.
Varric: (unfazed) I get that a lot. So what's on your mind?


Knights of the Old Republic

  • In Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, there's a hidden scene which can be watched (if your main character is a light-side female) in which the formerly evil female Jedi you rescued from herself professes that she has feelings for you. X-Play did an absolutely hilarious send up of this, which featured the appropriate music playing dramatically while she makes her confession.
    • Not surprised. Stanley Woo (Juhani's writer) explicitly stated that he intended Juhani to be not only gay, but the Gay Option. Lucasarts was not happy, leading to him dialing it down, but sneaking it in, anyway.
    • Let's not forget about perpetually grumpy Jedi Belaya, who can be seen power walking around the main plaza inside the Jedi enclave. She seems to have more than a friendly relationship with Juhani, and if you kill off Juhani in the grove, she goes Psycho Lesbian on you, says some very texty things, and the next time you see her, she's joined the Sith Academy on Korriban and is out for your blood. But surely that can be attributed to wanting revenge for a platonic friend, right?
    • Play female and talk to Juhani about Quatra in the grove. She will remark "In my own way, I truly loved her." It could be "merely" read as the whole Master/Padawan dynamic (the only love a Jedi is really allows to have), but Courtnay Taylor was apparently handed the memo about Juhani being gay.


Mass Effect

  • Mass Effect. Sure, there's the canonical stuff (if you wish to pursue it) between female Shepard and Liara, but subtext-wise there's male Shepard/Kaidan. There are some lines to support it as well ("When it's just you and me, Alenko, consider it off the record..."), especially if you choose to save Kaidan over Ashley.
  • Mass Effect 2 also features massive amounts of Les Yay between female Shepard and Tali after earning Tali's loyalty - Tali confesses that the most intimate thing a quarian can do is link their environments, their most important gesture of trust and acceptance. She hasn't trusted anyone enough for that, though, except... well, no quarians. Shepard can either teasingly ask if she's blushing and get first a flustered reaction, then an exaggeratedly petulant response, or Shepard can say she feels the same way but Tali doesn't have to prove anything. In that case, Tali says, "Nevertheless, I'd be honored to link suits with you, Shepard. You know, if you were a quarian and we weren't already on a suicide mission." Either way, she ends the conversation with a flustered excuse.
    • It's clearer once you've played through as a male and gotten to that point, and she tells male Shepard that the tradition also signifies a willingness for... intimacy, then says it's not always like that.
    • Further evidence is found in The Lair of the Shadow Broker DLC: after getting access to Shadow Broker's secret files, Tali's folder will reveal that she's been repeatedly activating and turning off her suit's "neural stimulators", and gathering information about human mating practices, after you complete her loyalty mission - completely regardless of Shepard's gender!
      • Considering the kind of stuff that you'd find on the Extranet, it's pretty likely that she stumbled on the Asari porn Joker loves so much.
    • Partially lampshaded when you speak with Mordin Solus constantly in Mass Effect 2 and if you're not romancing anyone. While a largely Asexual individual, Mordin remarks that if he ever wanted to try a human, he would try Shepard. And yes, he says this to Shepard no matter the gender.
    • Another salarian sends you an email about Thane which is... well.

Seeing him changed my life, woke up something in me I don't fully understand yet. I don't know what I'm going to do, but salarian lives are too short to waste as custodians, especially when there's so much else out there. I'm going to find something that lets me capture what I saw in him, that beauty, that aesthetic perfection.

I'm also going to buy some nice clothes.

So if you could tell him that... or just whatever parts of that you think appropriate... I'd appreciate it.

    • Mind you, that e-mail was a Shout-Out to a particular fan on the old BioWare official forums, who was well-known there for her love for Thane before the game was even out (and the e-mail is in reference to her particular style of posting). But, as most of the salarians seen in-game are male, techincally it still counts as ho yay.
  • Mass Effect 3 makes Kaidan an official romance for male Shepards. The fans saw so much Ho Yay between them that they campaigned in the Bioware forums to make it happen, and Bioware went Sure, Why Not? and created the option. This does not apply to female Shepards and Ashley, since there wasn't such a demand for them.
    • Lieutenant Steven Cortez, the Kodiak pilot and the other Gay Option, seems to have a bit of a flirtatious relationship with the new recruit James Vega, who is stationed on the floor as him. When you talk to either one of them, often times they will call out to the other during dialogue, often teasing each other somewhat flirtatiously.

Shepard: Do you maintain this armory?
Cortez: I share that duty with our illustrious Mr. Vega. (yelling to him across the room) Though I believe the only weapon he cares to maintain is himself!
Vega: (doing pull-ups) You know you like the show, Esteban!

      • Also in the last mission, if Cortez dies because you didn't complete the friendship/romance path, then James ends up completely flipping out.

(Cortez's ship crashes and explodes) James: You're gonna pay for that you fuckers! RAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH! Come on! COME ON!

  • Liara T'Soni quickly develops a crush on Shepard regardless of gender, and her pairing with a female Shepard is one of the more popular pairings of the fandom. Their respective voice actresses, Ali Hillis and Jennifer Hale, took it one step further by having massive Les Yay during interviews.