Infinity Nikki and Love and Deepspace have one thing in common, and it’s about time we got more of it

Last year, I dubbed Infinity Nikki as my mobile game of the year, and gave it a solid 9/10 review. I, like many others, was enchanted by the majestic world of Mirraland, including all the stunning outfits, adorable critters, and short but heartwarming story.

Unfortunately, Infinity Nikki hit a pretty big bump with the infamous 1.5 update, which left many players cold. I won’t dive too deep into that topic today (I’ve already said my piece about that in my rant about the changes to Infinity Nikki’s gacha and story), but let’s just say the game has never quite recovered since then.

It’s still chugging along, of course, and its major 2.0 update alongside the anniversary certainly took a good stab at it. But, unfortunately, some beautiful environments and, to quote Aretha Franklin, some “great gowns… beautiful gowns…” aren’t really enough to repair the damage to its reputation. And, while it’s still pulling in a respectable amount of money, I don’t see it ever reaching those high heights again.

However, if there’s one thing that Infinity Nikki and Infold’s other game, Love And Deepspace, have proved, it’s that there’s a massive hole in the industry that we’ve yet to see anyone else truly fill. This is perhaps one of the main reasons Infinity Nikki’s fall hurt so badly, and why it’s still going pretty strong despite such a shaky year.

Ironically, this hole is the one that Infold (and seemingly Infold alone, so far) specifically set out to fill from the offset – live service gacha games intended for a female-first audience. Of course, neither Love and Deepspace nor Infinity Nikki are exclusively enjoyable for female-identifying individuals, and not all women want to play nothing but cute, fuzzy fashion games or flashy dating games where perfect men are vying for their attention.

Heck, I personally enjoy nothing more than curling up with all the best horror games or busting out a rocket launcher in a good FPS. But the point still stands. There’s a serious lack of female-accommodating live service games on the market, and this past year has proved it more than ever.

For starters, let’s look at the greatest goliath in this space. I’m a massive fan of Hoyoverse games, but I’ve admittedly been quite disappointed in the lack of variety in new characters to arrive over the past year. I appreciate a beautiful, busty woman as much as the next guy, but the lack of handsome husbandos has been palpable.

Last year in our 2025 predictions, I guessed that we’d get no more than one S-rank male character (not including the at the time recently-released Harumasa) in the entire year, and I was pretty much spot on. Hugo Vlad saw his debut on his ZZZ banner back on June 5, 2025, and we’ve not seen another S-rank male since then.

I mean, the giant S-rank robot Banyue has just arrived as a playable character on December 17, if you count him. But there haven’t been any other human S-rank males to thirst over, and even the hunk that is Komano Manato was demoted to A-rank, which is pretty sad when we’ve seen the addition of 14 female S-ranks over the past 12 months.

Admittedly, HSR fared much better, but still only introduced five five-star males over the past year, versus 12 five-star females. And, in Genshin, there was a whopping 378-day gap between the release of the two latest five-star male characters, Kinich and Flins, during which time we got ten new five-star females. Admittedly, we did also get a few solid male four-stars, but let’s face it, the trend is obvious at this point. Luckily, Flins is man enough for me any day.

We’ve also seen an increase in well-endowed, sexualized female characters across pretty much every gacha and live service game on the market. This is usually accompanied by the argument that “sex sells” and buxom broads are “what brings in the money”. But, in reality, that’s not necessarily the case. I mean, a brief glance at gacha game revenue shows that Love and Deepspace has consistently been in the top five highest earners, often beating out massive games like Genshin Impact, Wuthering Waves, and ZZZ.

And, as much as I enjoyed my brief time playing Love and Deepspace, I have to admit that it’s definitely not as grand an affair as large, open world action RPGs it’s up against – that profit solely comes from an audience desperate to splash their cash on husbandos.

But, as the very hubando-less Infinity Nikki proves, it’s not all about handsome men. It’s also about cozy vibes, relaxing gameplay, and opportunities for self expression. It’s about offering a welcoming escape from the stresses of everyday life, and a place where the default stance isn’t “you’re a heterosexual male who likes big boobs and close-up shots of a woman’s bare feet”.

This last part is especially important, as, despite the fact that there are countless female gamers in the world, it still very much feels like the industry considers us a myth. I spend far more hours per week gaming than my ‘gamer boyfriend’, and yet, for some reason, things seem far more tailored towards him – and that seems to be the case for most female-identifying gamers that I know. I’m not in any way asking for every game to think ‘female first’, but just a few would be nice.

Unfortunately, it seems like Infold is one of the only gacha/live service developers who fully embraces this, and we all know that one company having a monopoly over something is never a good thing. This is what allows Infinity Nikki and Love and Deepspace to make some very questionable choices and still laugh all the way to the bank the following month.

So yes, there’s a hole in the gacha industry, and it’s potentially a very profitable one. Perhaps not as instantly profitable as raw sex appeal and gooner bait, but it has the potential to be a great long-term investment. There are heaps of gamers from all walks of life looking for this type of experience, and, considering the barren landscape, they’re just waiting for the right game to come along to snatch up their cash and free time.

Luckily, it does look like the big names are catching on. Well, at least one of them. Hoyoverse’s upcoming game, Petit Planet, looks to be an adorable cozy game with a similar gameplay loop and art style to Animal Crossing, and I can see many former Nikki players who felt burnt by the 1.5 retcon migrating to their own little planet among the stars.

Honkai Nexus Anima also appears to have less of a focus on sexualized female characters, with its gameplay revolving around collecting and battling the adorable Honkai Nexus Anima animas. Of course, I won’t hold my breath too much – I’m sure we’ll see characters like The Dahlia (a.k.a Resident Evil’s Lady Dimitrescu Light) breasting around boobily with a posh poodle soon enough.

Either way, I’m holding out hope that we’ll see a wider range of live service gacha games in the future aiming at a more female-first audience, or at least taking a more balanced approach. Perhaps one day I’ll even get to live out my dream of a full Serenitea Pot game, where I can collect and dress up my favorite husbandos, build my own cozy little world, and head out on cute adventures with a fluffy black cat. Is that too much to ask?