I read "the holy grail of eris" a couple days back because someone recommended it to me but it never ended up as a discussion so I'm posting my thoughts here. The manga itself was really cool when it came to the way it mixed characters and settings. The main character is your average otome game inspired manga heroine, but the setting is just straight up game of thrones. Which I feel is the best way to experience a setting like that, since I feel like a part of the reason why I couldn't super into got when it was big was because it didn't really have a good perspective character. The shock value is fully retained because you get to see a character actually being shocked at the things going on in the world.
But more importantly, it made me wonder where all the otome game type stories come from. I've attempted to research this and see where common tropes like denouncing a villainess are from in the first place, but there's just no game like that. The prevailing theories I've seen is that it's either from some mobile game series that was exclusive to japan since that was the main medium for otome games when the trope was introduced to manga and webnovels, or that it was made up by some webnovel author specifically as a fictional trope that wasn't tied to any specific game that was inspired by rough plot outlines.
And since the closest genre contrast is isekai, we know exactly where the tropes came from there. It's all dragon quest and years of iterating on the basic themes of it. You see anything in an isekai and you can probably either trace it back to dragon quest, or some type of asian MMO that isn't super popular in the west and is the most hardcore game ever that also requires a substantial amount of microtransactions. All that being said, it's fascinating how a trope of a game genre can be invented just for characters to either be isekaid into otome games, or to make for native otome isekais.
But more importantly, it made me wonder where all the otome game type stories come from. I've attempted to research this and see where common tropes like denouncing a villainess are from in the first place, but there's just no game like that. The prevailing theories I've seen is that it's either from some mobile game series that was exclusive to japan since that was the main medium for otome games when the trope was introduced to manga and webnovels, or that it was made up by some webnovel author specifically as a fictional trope that wasn't tied to any specific game that was inspired by rough plot outlines.
And since the closest genre contrast is isekai, we know exactly where the tropes came from there. It's all dragon quest and years of iterating on the basic themes of it. You see anything in an isekai and you can probably either trace it back to dragon quest, or some type of asian MMO that isn't super popular in the west and is the most hardcore game ever that also requires a substantial amount of microtransactions. All that being said, it's fascinating how a trope of a game genre can be invented just for characters to either be isekaid into otome games, or to make for native otome isekais.