Princess Maker 2 Refine: its lineage, descendants, and standing in Japan
01What this origin is
Princess Maker 2 is a raising simulation developed by Gainax, originally released in 1993 (the Refine edition is the one on Steam). The player becomes the foster father of a young daughter and spends years scheduling her education, work, and lessons, watching parameters accumulate until those choices branch into one of many endings, from queen to merchant to ordinary townsfolk. As the defining entry in the Princess Maker series begun in 1991, it crystallized the raising-sim loop of scheduling a girl's time over a fixed period and letting accumulated stats and choices decide her future, and is a foundational origin of the raising simulation lineage.
02Sources
03Buried gems that carry this root
Raising a Happy NEET Buried gem
A Japanese doujin cohabitation sim where you take in a shy, shut-in distant relative and teach her how to live: the books and meals you choose become life knowledge, and it comes back as chores done and growth. Very Positive in Japan at 201 reviews and 90 percent, but only 29 English reviews, so the West has barely found it.
Robot girl's dream -RobotBattleChampionship- Buried gem
A Japanese 2D raising simulation about a robot girl who has lost her memories and must build a life from scratch. Each turn you choose how she spends her time, going out, working, entering tournaments, and through those actions she grows and forms bonds with the humans and robots around her. Your choices, the dialogue options you pick, and the results of her battles accumulate and branch the story into multiple endings, all framed around her goal of winning the Robot Battle Championship. It is a raising sim with adventure and RPG elements: schedule, choose, fight, and watch a person take shape out of a blank slate. Made by the Japanese doujin circle DeskClub Games (creator Uwagaki), whose earlier RPG using the VOICEROID Kotonoha sisters earned a 95 percent on Steam, and released January 2025. Very Positive at 190 reviews and 97 percent. It already supports English and Japanese (about 18 percent of reviews are English), yet it is Japan-centered and the wider West has not broadly found it. At 1,900 yen it is a paid, fully released game.