In Prom Queen you play a teenage girl who has just moved to Queensport, struggling to become the Queen of the end-of-year Prom. Prom Queen requires you to struggle for social survival (and later domination) by interacting with the people around you in your every day life. The challenge of Prom Queen is navigating the social landscape, knowing whom to back stab, whom to bully and whom to praise. This while keeping up a good show for the school and your parents.
Prom Queen is designed as an explorable, sandbox world, where time and AI progresses the narrative, which the player can influence. Freedom is given to choose between for example becoming a disregarded punk, a prep and pretty cheerleader, the talk of the town or a party monster.
The town of Queensport has a number of locations such as the beach, house parties, the school, your home, a cinema, a church and a mall. These fill different functions, such as confessing your sins in church, or shopping for more popular clothes in the mall.
The central game mechanics in Prom Queen are dialogue and time management (spending time with the family, versus going to a hip party, for example).