Is It Strange to Fall for a Game Character?
You come home from work, lie down on your bed, and turn on your phone, and the man on the screen calls your name. The voice was performed by a voice actor, and the lines were written by a writer.
Even knowing that, there are moments when your heart beats a little faster. The longer it has been since you were in a relationship, the more that moment will make your heart flutter.
✦ The Game at a Glance
Basic information
Tears of Themis is a game that targets exactly that kind of flutter. It's a mystery romance adventure made by HoYoverse; it launched in China first in July 2020, and the global version, which includes Korea, came out on July 29, 2021.
The protagonist is a new lawyer. You collect evidence, question suspects, and cross logic in the courtroom, solving cases together with four men.
Four Men, Four Kinds of Heartbeat
✦ Meet the Four
Jobs and personalities
Luke Pearce is a private detective and the protagonist's childhood friend. He's bright and cheerful, but clumsy when it comes to romance. Artem Wing is a senior attorney, a calm and rational person. Vyn Richter is a psychiatrist and a gentle person.
Marius von Hagen is the heir to a conglomerate; he wears the image of a rebellious playboy, but that is closer to a mask.
Just from their jobs, each one covers a different kind of pull. The one who runs beside you, the one who sets the standard ahead of you, the one who reads your heart, the one who shows the true feelings behind the mask.
All four are voiced in Korean too, so the immersion of hearing your name called in Korean is quite large.
Virtual Romance Isn't Cut Off From Reality
If you worry that being drawn to a game like this happens only to you, let me introduce one study. It's a paper that Hao Gao, Ruoqing Guo, and Qingqing You, researchers in China, published in the journal Media and Communication in 2025.
They interviewed 25 Chinese female otome game players in depth from March to July 2023, and Tears of Themis was among the games covered.
✦ The Study Behind This
Gao, Guo, and You, 2025
This is the paper's conclusion.
The parasocial romantic relationships formed in otome games are not entirely cut off from reality; they are embedded in daily life through in-game interactions and the players' imagination, and they influence how real-life intimate relationships are rebuilt.
Those relationships are said to play a positive role in fulfilling emotional needs, regulating negative emotions, building self-identity, and redefining perceptions of intimacy.
Parasocial relationships mean the one-sided closeness you feel toward a person on the screen. The study didn't treat this feeling merely as an escape.
It shows that by experiencing which words make your heart flutter and in which scenes your feelings cool in game romance, what you want from an intimate relationship becomes clearer.
A Solo Game, But You're Not Alone
✦ Where Fans Gather
In chronological order
Tears of Themis is basically a game you play alone, and interaction between users stops at a friends list. Perhaps that's why fans gather outside the game.
At Hoyoland, held at KINTEX in Goyang from October 9 to 12, 2025, a 3m balloon doll stood in the Tears of Themis booth and an on-site photocard printing experience was run. About 32,000 people reportedly gathered at the event as a whole.
At Hoyoland from October 2 to 5, 2026, there was an experience where writing a message on the heart tree got you an Artem photocard. One outlet summed this up as moving the emotional connection between game characters and fans into an offline experience.
It is an official event hosted by HoYoverse Korea, but it is also a place where people who fell for the same game gather in one spot.
In July 2026, the fifth anniversary event "You Are the Only Truth in My Heart" was held, and an event PV was released on the official Korean channel.
Sarah Christina Ganzon of Concordia University in Canada analyzed, in a 2019 study, the role fan bloggers play in promoting and distributing otome games outside Japan.
People who fell for the same character understand each other, so that place can become the starting point of a bond.
What to Know Before You Start
✦ Before You Start
Quick checklist
The game supports a Korean UI and Korean voice acting, and you can download it from the Android and iOS stores.
The global version has been distributed outside Korea, but whether you can download and access it may vary depending on each country's store availability. The age rating is shown as 12+ on the App Store and as "Youth" (청소년) on the Korean Google Play.
Card pulls are probability-based. The conditions for guaranteed cards and the guarantee rules differ by banner, so be sure to check the announcements.
The Next Scene After the Heartbeat
✦ Three Questions for Your Heartbeat
Draw your own map
The experience of falling for a man in a game is not wasted time. Which words moved you and which person made you feel safe becomes a map of your taste.
Carrying that map into meeting real people, you should be able to say what you want in romance more clearly than before.
The case of Tears of Themis isn't over yet. You could open just one more scene tonight, or go find the places where people who like the same story gather. The guys really are charming, though. Ehehe♡
Well then, shall we begin today's adventure?
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🌐 한국어 버전: 게임 속 남자 4명에게 설렌다. '미해결사건부'로 보는 가상 연애의 심리
