This is fifth of fourteen essays contained within the third issue of the Adult Analysis Anthology, a collection of longform writing that seeks to expand the breadth of critical discourse around adult games and adult game culture. If you’d like to support the creation of more high-quality writing about adult games the full anthology is available for purchase on Itch! Anthology logo by Pillow!

Written By: BáiYù

There is a good chance that if you are reading this essay, you have interacted with erotic games in the past, and perhaps have even willingly sought them out before. It’s a novel idea to be sure! But stay with me on this one: imagine that, after a good 10 or so minutes of sifting through dozens and dozens of games with off-putting titles and uncensored box art which clearly goes against itch.io TOS, you find something that you’re willing to click on so you can learn more about what it has to offer. Your eyes scan the list of features — fetishes, rather — and determine that yes, you’re still willing to take it for a spin. You then either download a build or load up the browser demo, double check that your door is locked while loosening your pants, and click to begin playing, only to be hit with an early cutscene where the protagonist is very clearly protesting the concept of having sex.

Oh, you think to yourself, these fictitious sexual acts I wanted to indulge in are being framed as assault and rape. Again.

It’s not uncommon to find both Eastern and Western eroge featuring protagonists of diverse genders and/or sexualities (or more specifically, women and non-cishet-male people) who have been stripped of their agency and dignity. Compared to games told from the perspective of cisgender heterosexual men, an overwhelming number of these protagonists are portrayed as unwilling to have sex, or must be brainwashed, mind controlled, or “corrupted” before submitting to their “base desires” despite the fact that the majority of prospective players can be assumed to have sought out sexual content by mere virtue of engaging with the game to begin with. This pervasive disconnect between desires creates a distressing ludonarrative dissonance for players whose identities may closely align with the protagonist, even when the player’s kinks are otherwise satisfied by the content.

I’ve talked to enough folks who are just like me, who don’t want to compromise and are tired of not being allowed to say yes outside of a small handful of games. I’d like to present four sex-positive games with female protagonists that have been well-received by its players because it assumes that those engaging with the game are interested in vicariously experiencing sex they may not otherwise be able to have.

Case Study #1 — Cute Demon Crashers by SugarScript

“It’s spring break and here I am alone. I don’t think I’ve even been outside since it started. My parents are on their yearly honeymoon and my little brother is away at baseball camp. All I have are my textbooks and, well, my right hand… It would be nice just to have a little romantic fling…”

An erotic otome visual novel originally made for NaNoRenO 2015, I consider CDC to be a gateway game for otome players new to eroticism and looking for a safe way to explore their sexuality. While it’s relatively tame and vanilla for the most part, what still sets CDC apart from other eroge with gender diverse protagonists is its key mechanic in being able to stop the action up to a certain point in the erotic scenes with the press of the safeword button nestled in the top right; this places control in the hands of the player to experience Claire’s first time. To quote the game’s page, the keywords during development were: “Cute, Silly, Super-Short, Safe and Vanilla.”

Each of the sex demons offer a different experience to losing your virginity: Akki is a fellow virgin as a newer Incubus, Mirari is a lesbian, and Kael is an experienced lover. Orias, the last of the four sex demons, is the kinkiest of the group by delivering what I like to call BDSM 101: light cloth bondage, loose blindfold, wax play, and temperature play in a very controlled manner. Orias often checks in with Claire to see how she’s taking the new sensations before continuing or switching to something new, even though he himself has dommed plenty of humans with more demanding desires. Players who might be seeking out handcuffs and spreader bars might be disappointed, but taking into account that Claire is canonically a virgin wanting to test the waters, Cute Demon Crashers feeds one well.

Case Study #2 — Opportunity: A Sugar Baby Story by BP Games

“I thought, hey, here’s this nice guy, he’s got this thick sexy beard and this soft kind voice and these SHOULDERS I just want to sink my TEETH into… I thought, maybe, I could get ONE NIGHT where I could actually feel GOOD about myself again. And, you know, get FUCKED a little. GOD, I miss getting fucked.”

Another erotic josei visual novel, this time about a single mother who provides for her two children via sex work: Opportunity is more grounded in the reality of millennial struggles, where the fantasy comes in the form of the rich ex-tech worker Roman who is willing to pay Jacqueline to be his personal sugar baby. As Jackie becomes more intimate with Roman, she explores her sexuality by sleeping with her friend’s wife, Roman’s favorite prostitute, her friend, her other friend, and eventually participates in a massive sex worker orgy. Where Cute Demon Crashers caters to virgins and the inexperienced, Opportunity is a buffet for the freaks who are ready to indulge in nasty wild sex (to a responsible degree befitting that of a parent).

Disclaimer: AAA’s very own editor is the same writer who wrote this game. Plenty of others have sung praises for Opportunity, myself included, and for good reason: Jackie is your everyday mother who loves her children and having sex in equal measure. Just because Jackie’s a responsible parent doesn’t mean she has to ignore her libido! Though this portrayal of sex work might be considered a power fantasy, you’d have to do some serious introspection if this sex-positive story leaves you feeling upset.

Case Study #3 — Succubus Stories by Outsider Artisan

“I bet 5G you give up before you even make it to the city, bitch.”
“You’ll choke on it either way.”

Continuing with the trend of venturing into kinkier territory, Succubus Stories is an interactive fiction title that puts players into the shoes of a fresh succubus (with a default name of Paige) who wants to exact what seems to be petty revenge by fucking and sucking her way to the top of society. The beginning of the game will see players engaging in prostitution for the bulk of their income and optionally working their way to running a dubious home apothecary, eventually getting to the point where wealth hardly matters. Where CDC and Opportunity stay within the realm of vanilla and relatively tamer kinks, being set in the same Earth we inhabit, Succubus Stories opens the door to more fantasy and exaggerated kinks in the form of chain sex, gangbangs, lactation, group tonguebaths, watersports, and futanari as Paige becomes more sexually experienced. If none of this sounds like your jam, the game offers rather comprehensive controls to adjust which clients you can service and the ability to censor or turn off certain content.

For a title where sex is the main gameplay loop for a good half of the story, I have to admit that the prostitution dialogue and narration quickly becomes stale after the first ten “I love your cock cheese ♡♡♡” and “GIVE IT TO ME HARDER.” It’s actually rather funny once the plot picks up and you get access to some genuinely heartfelt scenes that make you wonder how you went from taking cock in all your holes to confessing your love to one of the major characters in the story.

Case Study #4 — The Maiden’s Tale by Blue Winds

“Two days ago you were a normal woman, living your normal life. Now you’re up for sale in an Anglani market. You’d never heard of Anglani before last month, when you saw a posting on your favorite porn site. A supposedly real-life account of a voluntary sex slave.”

The final game we’re examining is another interactive fiction where an unnamed protagonist willingly submits herself to a sort of BDSM sex slave maid environment. The story opens up to the protagonist recalling all the hoops she jumped through to arrive at the auction house. Getting jostled around like human cattle is no mistake; the protagonist is there of her own volition and her master will do with her what they see fit.

I could easily recommend our previous three case studies to someone else looking for a good, lighthearted time. Not with this one though. The Maiden’s Tale is the closest we get to Dead Dove in terms of BDSM acts, and Orias would blush at the idea of his sub being strapped to a fuck machine fucking them slowly for hours on end, or being told to serve guests at an upscale party while in scant maid fetish gear. You don’t play, let alone know about, this game unless you too were looking to be degraded and objectified into a sex object. While The Maiden’s Tale has been in indefinite hiatus for several years, there’s enough variety and content to make its thick prose sexy and fulfilling to those wanting to indulge in heavy kinks.

When sex as a punishment or consequence is treated as the default for gender diverse protagonists, enthusiastic consent, or even the lack of protest, can tame even the most extreme of kinks. It’s the difference between groping versus body worship, being violently choked by a dick with a dick versus deepthroating a delicious fat sausage, or getting pounded in all your holes by a group of strangers versus revelling in endless hedonistic pleasure. Allowing the protagonist to exhibit agency and willingly engage in intercourse is the switch that changes the framing of the act from sex-negative to sex-positive.

BáiYù is a disabled nonbinary trans masc game developer who more-than-occasionally dabbles in the erotic corner of the indie scene for self-proclaimed research purposes. While they’re still getting a feel for what their signature looks like in games writing, people have described his stories as having elements of “cozy existentialism” or being “kinky, cute, and safe.” You’ll often find him doing some sort of community organizing, complaining about capitalism, or yearning for more trans masc rep in media.

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