Rayna’s job is to look grieving widows directly in their eyes and explain, professionally, why their dead spouses don’t qualify for payouts. And that, honestly, the dead heroes probably had it coming. Rayna loves her job: Reenacting a hero’s death, scene by scene, until she finds the precise moment they’re no longer her problem is the best part of her day. But all of that changes when Rayna’s employer, Heroes United Life Group, is suddenly on the hook for a payout so massive it’ll bankrupt the company. That can’t happen, because Rayna wants to keep her employee-of-the-month streak alive. Her solution: Go find whatever killed the heroes requiring that payout, kill it herself, and use that experience as proof that the original heroes just weren’t prepared to go into battle. Claim denied. World saved, incidentally. Wait. What?

Ledgerbound, a new tactical RPG slash dating sim from OmniMegaSuperCorp, plays like someone crossed Fire Emblem’s combat with Baldur’s Gate 3’s romance system, then added mountains of paperwork. Game director Russ Nickel and his co-founder, CEO Evan Nickel, both worked on Helldivers 2 — which answers a few burning what’s-going-on-here questions quite nicely: Ledgerbound is what happens when the people who satirized the military industrial complex turn their attention to the American insurance system instead. There’s also some fantasy-kingdom theming in the mix, for good measure.

The satire isn’t exactly subtle. Rayna’s best friend and most trusted advisor is an office hat rack she talks to, regularly, out loud, in front of coworkers who have long since given up questioning her behavior. When you recruit new party members, you can’t romance them until you’ve walked them through extensive onboarding paperwork. Jazz, Heroes United Life Group’s Head of Human Resources, runs mandatory Employee Training classes that might feel like side content, but Jazz would never admit to that. Complete a battle’s bonus objectives, and you’ll get a pretty certificate from HR that you will, of course, treasure forever…plus a bump in shareholder value. (For better or worse, it’s worth boosting since high shareholder value comes with extra cutscenes).

Between fights with the game’s enemy factions, you do get a typical 9-5’s amount of downtime to spend as you see fit: Gearing up your party, replaying old battles to see if you can nail your objectives and key performance indicators just a little bit better, or talking to the people in your office. If you choose to chat, just be aware that the game will make you feel guilty about wasting time on frivolity… even though that’s clearly what the game wants you to do. Otherwise, why would they be so fun to talk to?

The team behind Ledgerbound seems fully aware that flirting is a major draw here. The developers have rated their own dialogue “three out of five peppers.” Steam apparently agreed, and in a move Rayna would surely approve of, delayed Ledgerbound’s launch to double-check the game’s general appropriateness. The studio’s launch-delay announcement leaned into it, saying, “Jazz filed all the necessary paperwork this time…as soon as Steam finishes reviewing all three hundred and fifty thousand words, we’ll launch.”

350,000 words is a hefty reading assignment for anyone, even those ready to dive into the scintillating world of insurance claim denials. But the various romance options surrounding you suggest it will be well worth the homework. Your coworkers and potential party members — featuring an incredible voice cast — include:

• Jazz, an HR agent and walking, talking HR violation who is also, naturally, a dragon voiced by Stephanie Kerbis;
• Avarice, a pompous cat prince voiced by Matt Mercer;
• Sylvie, a skittish flamecaster voiced by Cherami Leigh;
• Hobknob, a rat-keeping party member voiced by Todd Haberkorn; and
• Cazian, a broody enemy-faction recruit voiced by Ben Starr.

The game’s romance structure comes with very strict rules that, in a move that would surely disappoint corporate, only serve to illustrate what’s possible. Most companions are openly polyamorous and can be dated simultaneously. But there are a few who are locked to monogamy, so be prepared for a certain amount of frustration on that point.

Rayna’s job is to prove that heroes and the loved ones they leave behind don’t get paid. That doesn’t sound like a setup for a charming RPG, but here, it seems promising. It helps that everyone in Ledgerbound either takes their job far too seriously or is entirely unfazed by it — which leaves the player as the only one assessing this game’s narrative choices and battles as an unbiased, clinical observer…probably. Until you fall for Cazian or get distracted by Jazz, that is. Which leaves you with a pretty clear-cut agenda for your workday: Go deny a claim. Flirt with a dragon. Save the world…and your quarterly numbers at the same time.

Ledgerbound* is available to play on Windows PC via Steam. *