Almost almost corruption for me although I usually try both routes if possible. It's fun to act like someone completely opposite from who I am IRL, same goes with things like incest and so on. Crazy hot in games, never even gave it a thought in the real world.
Corruption because a) romance you can get anywhere and b) it's interesting to see where my own lines are drawn. There are cases where the plan was to go full corruption but sth just happened at some point and it just did not feel right to go over to the dark side completely.
Both, but if the corruption is heavy it has to be optional OR connected to the romance, like somewhat innocent but also kind of intentional or unavoidable. I don't want my MC's to hurt their people unless that's what they're into but even then if it's too abusive I'd prefer an option to reverse that damage lol.
Reverse corruption then? I guess that would be the best way to describe what I prefer: heal a broken mind or personality, or even just altogether improve the quality of LI's life situation.
It depends on the characters and scenario. Some characters are just build to be corrupted and it's so much more fun to see the downfall
Romance is almost always the safe choice you can never go wrong
From my perspective, I see it as a game where the prize is that character. The path of romance is normal: you put in the effort, meet that character, connect with them, and it ends in love. Corruption, on the other hand, is like cheating; there's no effort or relationship, and they're only there because you forced them to be.
With corruption, you lose a lot of satisfaction, and you don't truly value the character.
Obviously, I'm not saying that corruption isn't viable for certain games, there's also soft corruption which is like "freeing" the character's mind, there are games based on that, characters who follow a strict discipline or code that doesn't allow them to do X things, but by corrupting them you get them off that path and you can romance them.
For me, it really depends on the game. Certain games just have a more "be a heel, it'll be fun" feel vs some that you can feel more heart to the characters. A balance is always best to me, but I know that's not always available.
I ultimately choose the Romance route, although I will try out the Corruption option first to see the result before scrolling back to use the other route.
100% I will always do the Romance route over the corruption. I find that I don't enjoy corruption most of the time, and sometimes It can be way to extreme for me (Alwaysfans) is a good expample where it makes me actually uncomfortable.