Note: this post contains character spoilers for Royal Affairs. For a less in-depth introduction to Asher Garnett, check out their introduction post.

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Asher was a character who came about very early on, back when I was first coming up with the game’s concept. They even got a specific shoutout in the pitch: “Or might you even form a scandalous attachment with your bodyguard?”

I knew I wanted a bodyguard romance for the Royal Affairs PC, and I knew this would be a good way to demonstrate the pressures on the PC’s personal life that come from their high standing. Because Asher’s romance would be socially complicated and controversial in the game, I wanted to make their personality appealing and easy to like (for players who are into that kind of thing!). This was the same logic of making Rosario in Creme de la Creme fairly easygoing and friendly; there are social barriers to getting together with them, so I didn’t want too many personal ones. I also knew at this point that there was going to be a more antagonistic major character, Javi, so Asher served to balance that out.

I had a pretty strong sense of what I wanted Asher to be from the start: loyal, sweet, dutiful. When I wrote them, I thought a lot about what it would feel like to have your identity and goals bound up so strongly with another person and institution from a young age. Because of their proximity to the royal family they’re in the position of seeing their weak moments while also putting them on a pedestal.

In a lot of ways Asher sees the royal family as their family too, though they’re in this strange position where they’re subordinate at the same time. Their birth family, the Garnetts, traditionally guard the royal family so are also very much part of that institution; Tristan and Raimund, Asher’s parents, aren’t very emotionally warm or affectionate people. Growing up with that along with the Queen as a boss/almost-parental-figure gives Asher an extremely stable, solid  foundation and sense of their place in the world… which is extremely unusual at the same time.

A lot of Asher’s friendship or romance journey through the game is learning to see the Royal Affairs PC as a person as well as a symbolic figure. The shape of their romance has elements of “we mustn’t!” and there are social hurdles around it too, but as Asher’s personal feelings develop, it also becomes about relating to each other in a way they never have before.

With their friendship or romance with the PC, or their relationship with another character, Asher isn’t used to wanting something for its own sake, for themselves: this may help them recognise that feeling, and do something about it. Asher doesn’t really realise how young they are and what potential they have ahead, because they’re so used to focusing on the here-and-now and what their training tells them. In some paths through the game – whether they go against their training, or double down on it – what they’ve experienced may lead them to think more deeply about whatever the future holds.