The recent Steam censorship debacle actually sort of opened me up to adult games.
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Tycho, of Penny Arcade, actually had some words on this subject around the time the PC version of Stellar Blade came out and people were up in arms about it. I'll quote it here because I think it's a good passage.
I used to say that I grew up Christian, but I think it's probably more accurate to say Evangelical, especially now that more people might know what I'm talking about. Sex was VERY naughty and we needed to be constantly on the lookout for incursions of this secular, demonic, but also somehow worryingly inherent force…? Breaking that pernicious notion down and enabling people to express themselves was the project I thought I'd more or less seen completed. Now it's come around some weird bend, with precisely the same energy as before, except now it's being done for the correct reasons. It can't possibly be this dumb. And yet!
It's incredibly fucking boring to have the tail end of the revolution you saw win shame the tools that gave them victory, dust off a bunch of regressive shit, and then have the pluck to feel righteous about it.
It sort of mirrors my own experience (minus the evangelical upbringing). I definitely recall a period of general sex-positivity that has now come around some strange turn whereby the very same voices are admonishing people for daring to enjoy sexy things.
It's very strange.
It has taken me nearly 30 years to undo that programming and it still affects me. The puriteens scare me.
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I've never really played any porn games more hardcore than Baldur's Gate 3 before, but you remember a couple weeks ago when GOG gave away those NSFW games, as a direct response to the whole thing?
Well I claimed the bundle just to boost their numbers (because censorship is bullshit), but recently I needed a low-difficulty gaming distraction, so I checked a few of them out, and... some of them are kind of good?
Like first off you have to be okay with visual novels (usually), but if you're cool with that, some of them actually have some compelling characters, and occasionally even good gameplay in between all the fucking and whatnot.
Leap of Love is amusing, kind of adorable when it comes to the not-sex stuff, and charming. It is also a game where you (a former frog) can marry and simultaneously bed 3 princesses and their stepmother after deposing of the evil king. My brain is still trying to reconcile this.
Huniepop is one of the best match 3 puzzle games I've ever played, with a chill as hell soundtrack. Also a scantily-clad foul-mouthed love fairy wants you to fuck every woman in a 5 mile radius who can fog a mirror.
And Crom help me, when I finished... sigh... Fetish Locator Week 1, I actually cared enough about some of the characters to buy the next one.
The point is, some of these games have more depth and value than I'd been led to believe, and I wouldn't have known that if the censorship thing hadn't started that chain of events. So congrats censorship people, and honestly thanks, I guess? Completely the opposite of your intended effect. Task failed successfully.
I believe the only reason adult games aren't as popular in Western countries as they are in Japan (and I think elsewhere in Asia?) is because there's a stereotype that they're low quality, which came about because of the ESRB (not sure about other countries' rating systems) basically making it so there was no money in it in a pre-digital download world.
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I was disappointed by Fetish Locator; I wasn't into any of the included fetishes, so I rapidly got to the end, and missed all the content. Got an ending screen suggesting I should go back and try something, but like, no thanks! Still, at least it was free!
You do kind of have to buy into it. Most of the engagement of the story is locked behind the various options there, and it can really be surprisingly good beyond the adult content.
Maybe don't explore anything that's a full on ick, but I would second that, if there's something you're at least neutral on I'd recommend giving it another shot.
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I do appreciate the time and effort you put into the comment, but I am not arguing against what you are saying.
Since Kinsey &co and the summer of love, the movement didn't evaporate, it perforated society and mutated. I don't think I'd be going too far by stating, that the sexual revolution couldn't have happened without the suffragettes. I see the queer movement as a spearhead in the same direction.
I only had qualm with you saying anything has been undone (sorry if I'm paraphrasing). Yeah, using 'woke' as a pejorative for anyone craving progress is a thing now, but that doesn't mean most of us want nothing more than to love each other freely.
Mmm, I get what you mean. So often, I find myself in conversations (not ours but in general) that have certain presumptions that have been addressed by movements such as these that I feel like there's this gap in knowledge that shouldn't really exist but…
I think your point's a fair argument, though; I'd certainly prefer that, at the very least.
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He's the main love interest, not the protag, but have you seen Haunted by Femboy? A little on the silly side, but I enjoyed the demo.
I did see that but haven't gotten around to playing it
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Kinda, I'm actually polyamorous myself and most of my social circle still is. But I've heard of what you described. In my circles it's been a lot more women lead and queer though. I think a lot of people jumped in without breaking their mental monogamy as well. Polyamory can be difficult, and for a lot of people especially those who jump in without thinking or who began their relationship monogamous it can be a spectacular shitshow, much like many relationships where incompatible desires are present or where people go in without knowing how to do it well.
I once had a relationship that I think a lot of my ex's friends probably see as exactly like you described. We began monogamous, it was my first relationship and it was in the mid 10s, and within a year I realized monogamy wasn't for me. So we opened up, then did full poly, got engaged, and she realized she couldn't do poly. She pressured me into monogamy (I had been willing to call it quits) and I hated it. It was an ugly breakup that she likely blames on me pressuring her into polyamory. Funny enough a few months after the breakup when I wasn't looking for anything serious I met someone else who'd recently had a breakup over wanting to stay poly, and we're happily married with a clear mutual understanding that neither of us is open to closing the relationship.
wrote last edited by [email protected]Well thanks for the interesting perspective and I'm very glad to hear it wasn't so one-sided everywhere, and that you've seen a lot more positives! Everything you said about causes of strife makes perfect sense to me and I would imagine those feature heavily for folks who try it out due to simple curiosity or pressure from a partner.
I would imagine, too, that sexual trends exhibit regionality and that they diffuse across regions over time and at uneven rates, much like any other cultural trend. Though of course a lot of cultural diffusion has gotten effectively instant thanks to tech - I remember "back in the day" you could travel from a (US) coast to the Midwest and find everyone basically 10-20 years behind cultural trends, from slang to hairstyles, to dress.
I wonder if relationships and dating and such, being a much slower process in general than changing styles of dress or speech, still have some of that interesting old-school slower diffusion, or more regional pockets anyway.
Anyway, enough baseless speculation from me - cheers and have a good one!
(Edit: I hope it didn't sound like I'm calling your chosen romantic style itself a trend - I would never, when I call polyamory a "trend" I am referring exclusively to folks who did behave exactly as if it were any other fad that came and went, just with way heavier consequences)
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Please note that this is mostly an American thing, in European TV and books we have naked people and (not too explicit detail in TV, books differ) sex.
Some of us are always wondering about this. Something 18+ might be sex or gore related.
Kinda funny to see it in Canada as well, especially when you throw Quebec culture into the mix (things seem a little more sex positive over there compared to other parts of the country, which is neat to think about sometimes).
