Recommending Story-first games

[mr.AwesomeGameTaste]

I don't know where the concept of acceptance of Rape among adults comes from, I don't think anyone raised that point or was trying to make it.
There are nuances in everything and the concept of normalisation is very real and doesn't need to be widespread to affect individuals.The point I was making was that content that revel in sexual violence runs the risk to normalise and therefore desensitise individuals that would be exposed to it repeatidly (example: younger audiences searching for games on this website).



There are many nuances in how a story is told you don't have to have it all be positive to cover dark and negative topics, as you say it is part of life and will be part of many stories but there is a wold of difference between it being part of a narrative and having it being rationalised and played through the perspective of the main character. I don't know many mediums where that is done, for example there are many movies about horrific things but you rarely have a movie about such things done from the perspective of the perpetrator and where the audience is asked to associates with that POV.

I am not judging anyone for liking or playing such games and I hope that is not how I come accross, if that is what you like to play that is just fine.
I am just raising my opinion and giving my perspective on a question Tlaero was raising about such topics.
I do believe that it would be careless to dismiss the impact on normalising behaviour that such games can have, the same way any story in any medium can have. It just so happens that we are on a website about adult games where a vast array of people access those stories and that as a relatively new medium I don't think that topic is often discussed.

Then again it's just one persons opinion vs another one, there is no harm in disagreeing so no worries

I was talking about a general issue,again,not replaying to people here. I quoted your post because you quoted mine. I didn't say the story approach you proposed would have to be positive and I do think it can be implemented in the dark stories perfectly.If you play as a good guy and the rape happens in the game,then yeah,it's just there to add that graphic value. However if you play as a bad guy it should be shown. It may not be popular,but it's a thing. And some people just like this,sexually. You may call them deviants,and you would be right,but that doesn't make them rapists. ( I know you didn't say it would make them rapists I am just saying it)
I think adult games are just as any other medium,and can be consumed by various people. Same with loli games and content.the absolute majority of people who play them are not actual predators but I'm sure there are predators who play them.Same with any other thing. I believe games can make someone realize they are into certain things,but they would find out about it one way or another.

 

[jufot]

Your games, on the other hand, show representations of strength, resilience and overcoming trauma.

This is a good point. Saving Chloe is about a woman who experienced horrific sexual abuse for years, but it's not gratuitous. Instead of focusing on the act, the story is about recovery, healing, and prosperity. That is the right way to include sexual violence in a story.

I'm reminded of Gaspar Noé's notorious film

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. It deeply divided audiences, and 20 years later it's still the most walked-out-of film at Cannes. The film includes a 10-minutes long, cold, harrowing scene where Monica Belluci's character is brutally raped and beaten. It seriously messed me up at the time, and led to my opinion that graphic depictions of rape are inherently gratuitous, and therefore wrong. I urge anyone who disagrees with me to watch that film (if they can stomach it) and see if it changes their opinion

 

[jufot]

jufot recently had to explain to someone that depicting sex between a MC and a completely drunk woman was, in fact, rape. Unbelievable... except that exchange actually happened in the 21st century!

And I got soo much shit for that

I think in 2022 we all are way aware of the limits between fiction and reality; and of course we can get positive inputs from media and recognize them as something good that we could try in real life, but I don't think the opposite works in the same way.

I don't know... In 2022, reality is often stranger than fiction. Everyone thought incels were just a bunch of safely ignorable losers on some forum, until one of them wrote a manifesto, picked up a gun, and murdered a bunch of people.

Is it really that much of a stretch to imagine a sex abuser in a similar situation?

 

[moskyx]

And I got soo much shit for that


I don't know... In 2022, reality is often stranger than fiction. Everyone thought incels were just a bunch of safely ignorable losers on some forum, until one of them wrote a manifesto, picked up a gun, and murdered a bunch of people.

Is it really that much of a stretch to imagine a sex abuser in a similar situation?

The point is that those ill people who actually act, who are an outlier from a statistically point of view, are going to exist anyway. You can't just put the blame on certain media content for such actions, it's a way more complex path that leaded them to that point of their lives, starting by their closest relatives and real life social interactions. We can't just put universal limits to fantasy creations according to our personal worldvision, because human fantasy has no limits. It's emotional and social education what matters, in which fiction surely takes an important role - but if a work of fiction is such an important drive for someone, then their real, personal problem was originated much sooner and their ill action could have probably been triggered anyway by any other input they would have stumbled upon, even an apparently harmless one.

Now, from the narrative point of view, I personally agree with what it's been said in this thread. If you're picturing an explicit rape the same way you are going to depict a consensual relationship, all while your text is focusing in the victim's trauma, then you're not doing a great job, because that's going to create a heavy dissonance - and I'd say that most of F95 devs aren't going for that feeling on their readers, just aren't fully aware of what they're actually doing (you can't just consider a 19yo kid tinkering with DAZ having the same level of maturity than an adult woman as Tlaero). On the other hand, if your game's focus is the evilness of the rapist, well, glorifying rape is not well considered anywhere, but it might have a pass narratively speaking.

As I said, I personally don't find any difference between playing a shooter and a game in which you rape people. I feel pretty disgusted by both genres. I guess most people find the difference in that rape is not a headshot and done, but a torture. And I think most of those who play violent games aren't comfortable with their characters inflicting torture either, although I'm not sure how many games that depict tortures are out there and if they could be compared with sexual games depiciting rape in a 'normalized' way.

 

[jufot]

You can't just put the blame on certain media content for such actions, it's a way more complex path that leaded them to that point of their lives, starting by their closest relatives and real life social interactions. [...] if a work of fiction is such an important drive for someone, then their real, personal problem was originated much sooner and their ill action could have probably been triggered anyway by any other input they would have stumbled upon, even an apparently harmless one.

I'm not saying these games are solely responsible for these people. But they do contribute. An avalanche is a collection of individually harmless snowflakes, after all.

We can't just put universal limits to fantasy creations according to our personal worldvision, because human fantasy has no limits.

I'm not trying to I never said these games shouldn't be made, or that people shouldn't play them. I simply responded to Tlaero's prompt with what I think about it.

I personally don't find any difference between playing a shooter and a game in which you rape people. I feel pretty disgusted by both genres. I guess most people find the difference in that rape is not a headshot and done, but a torture. And I think most of those who play violent games aren't comfortable with their characters inflicting torture either, although I'm not sure how many games that depict tortures are out there and if they could be compared with sexual games depiciting rape in a 'normalized' way.

On this, we'll just have to agree to disagree I think these are not directly comparable, and I elaborated on why here.

 

[Raife]

And I got soo much shit for that

You reacted well and calmly. I was so cross-eyed with rage when some idiot accused you of 'crying rape' that the staff probably would have booted me off the site if I posted in that thread. My wife literally sat on me, because she knew that I was on the verge of doing something dumb.

To get back to story and resonance: we all bring something of ourselves to the art we encounter, and a really great story creates a strong resonance... a feeling that echoes in our own hearts, and filters through our experience. It creates something unique and personal... because it is not just a mirror of the creator's intent.

Sometimes art is horrible and gruesome... not in order to titillate, but induce a revulsion that makes us think about ourselves a bit differently, filtered through our unique experiences. Take _Medea_, for example... some great art, and some great games, explore very, very dark themes. And that's OK.

That said... per Tlearo's original point: I think you are right that the web brings together certain communities who deliberately seek out content -- like non-consensual content -- which, while not harmful to a healthy adult, could be very unhealthy for someone with a diseased mind. And that does worry me. Per the example above, people sometimes post things on this site that indicate very, very unhealthy behaviours and attitudes, which are reinforced by some posters and devs. Creators should probably keep that in mind... not to censor themselves, but as they ask what resonance they are seeking to achieve, and with whom.

 

[jufot]

Take _Medea_, for example... some great art, and some great games, explore very, very dark themes. And that's OK.

Medea as in Greek mythology? I can't seem to find a game or a developer with that name.

 

[Raife]

Medea as in Greek mythology? I can't seem to find a game or a developer with that name.

Sorry, yes -- as in the play by Euripides. Ancient Greek tragedies didn't pull any punches!

 

[Jaike]

Kind of a fraught topic, but I'd in general advise to watch out with kink shaming. Odds are that most people who like this kind of porn are not at risk of becoming rapists. Any link like that is probably like way too understudied to make any scientific conclusions. And then there's the replication crisis in social science.

I think that one potential value of depicting rape in games is that it can be used to challenge common rape myths. Show most types of rape as acquaintance rape instead of stranger rape. Include an explicit link between war and war rape. Treat things like noncon sleep sex, incapacitated sex and blackmail sex as rape and not as something innocent. Retire the trope where a rape victim ends up loving being raped. Make rape about power instead of sudden lust. But that isn't done often in practice, to be honest. And while rape can be presented in a non-sexualised manner, people who consume it as part of their kink will want the sexualised version.

On the other hand I don't believe that the idea that "it's just fiction" always flies. Fiction can shape people's beliefs. A lot of fiction, including porn games, reinforces existing beliefs. I expect that most rape games play the rape myth tropes entirely straight. A lot of "shemale" porn uses the negative trope where the trans woman is deceptive, you also see that in some futa porn games. I'm a history nerdette and you wouldn't believe how much stupid nonsense that people believe about history derives from fiction. But if people realise that a certain element in fiction is not true, I'd hope that there isn't being a reinforcement effect. So I think that attacking the myths is more effective than attacking the fiction. But fiction that doesn't use the myths is better.

We should remember that fiction may not have an uniform effect on the entire population, too. People with some traits may be influenced in different ways. Often rapists have psychopathic or sociopathic personalities. Some people say that violent games have different effects on different groups of people. I don't know how reliable that is, but it is something that could be true.

Another thing to keep in mind is that ravishment fantasies are a thing and that demand isn't ever going away completely. These are articles by the same author about the prevalence of

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and

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fantasies. They are not peer-reviewed and not surveys, but they are based on data with big sample sizes.

I explored these questions in my book,

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, which is based on a survey of more than 4,000 Americans’ sex fantasies. Among the many things I asked about were fantasies about being forced to have sex. Previous research has found that these fantasies are common among women; however, I found that they’re actually quite common among people of all genders. Here are the numbers:

• 61% of self-identified women had fantasized about this before, while 24% said they fantasized about it often.
• 54% of self-identified men had fantasized about this before, while 11.5% said they fantasized about it often.
• 68% of
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  participants had fantasized about this before, while 31% said they fantasized about it often.

I surveyed more than 4,000 Americans about their sex fantasies for my book

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and, as part of this survey, I inquired about whether people had ever fantasized about forcing sex on someone else. Here’s what I found:

· 20% of self-identified women had fantasized about this before, while 4% said they fantasized about it often
· 38% of self-identified men had fantasized about this before, while 7% said they fantasized about it often
· 38% of non-binary participants had fantasized about this before, while 9% said they fantasized about it often

What's obvious from this is that the direction of the ravishment fantasies correlates with traditional gender roles for men and women. So maybe emancipation can decrease or remove the difference in percentages? But the level of submissive ravishment fantasies are quite a lot higher than the level fo dominant equivalent, even among men.

The author also says that a lot of the underlying factors are the same. But some factors only have a link to one of the directions:

That said, it’s important to note that there was a moderate correlation between fantasies about forcing sex on others and fantasies about being forced to have sex, which suggests that some people fantasize about both, such as those with active imaginations and sensation seeking personalities, as well as those who identify as BDSM switches (persons who go back and forth between dominant and submissive roles).

However, it’s also clear that some people only fantasize about one role—and there appear to be some factors that uniquely predict having one type of fantasy, but not the other. For example, having more relationship power was linked to fantasies about forcing sex on others, whereas low self-esteem, attachment anxiety, and sexual victimization were all linked to fantasies about being forced to have sex.

There is an issue however between catering to ravishment fantasy and challenging rape myths, because a lot of ravishment fantasies are about settings where the victim "actually wants it". Maybe that puts realistic depictions of rape at a market disadvantage. That's bad news for people like me who want those stereotypes to be challenged.

I also see that there's often an assumption that the people who create and consume rape porn are male. This is clearly not true in the strictest sense, although the creators and consumers may be in the majority or disproportionally male. The developers of Rainy Day and The Last Enchantress, both games that have rape porn, are female for example. I think it is better if we hear more from female fans of rape porn but they may be pushed away from discussions if they feel marginalised.

Finally I think that people engage differently with empathetic fiction (people use empathy) and violent or pornographic fiction (people use it for escapism). I don't believe that the response to one type is the same as to the other type.

Sorry for the very long post.

 

[jufot]

Ancient Greek tragedies didn't pull any punches!

Oh, definitely! It's interesting to see how attitudes towards violence (particularly sexual violence) have evolved over time. For example, Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus is widely considered to be his most hated play, precisely because of the graphic violence surrounding the rape of Lavinia. It was popular initially, but was entirely derided less than a century later.

Today, you couldn't find a theatre audience for a new play with such brutality.

 

[jufot]

[a long and very insightful post]

I think we broadly agree. I definitely did not mean to shame rape in a kink context. Between consenting adults, anything goes.

But I don't think it's exactly relevant here. Rape kink is something you only engage in with a partner you trust completely, and feel entirely safe surrendering to. It requires someone who is hyper-aware of your boundaries and is willing to stop at the slightest signal.

That is sooo far from the act we're discussing here, they might as well be apples and oranges

 

[Raife]

Sorry for the very long post.

No need to apologize -- I thought it was an excellent post. You've better articulated some of my views and lent them empirical support... in addition to pointing out that we neglected to discuss the role fantasy and escapism in rape porn. You're also right that women who like non-consensual scenarios might have an important perspective we are missing.

I really don't disagree with anything you say, at all... you've just substantially improved and broadened the discussion.

Let me be clear (as I think jufot has, as well): I do not intend any kink shaming. Non-consensual scenarios are not my thing... but there's nothing at all wrong with them for healthy adults. A healthy adult knows fantasy is fantasy. Nor, as I've said several times, do I think they cause unhealthy behavior. Watching _The Terminator_ is not going to inspire shooting sprees.

 

[Jaike]

I think we broadly agree. I definitely did not mean to shame rape in a kink context. Between consenting adults, anything goes.

But I don't think it's exactly relevant here. Rape kink is something you only engage in with a partner you trust completely, and feel entirely safe surrendering to. It requires someone who is hyper-aware of your boundaries and is willing to stop at the slightest signal.

That is sooo far from the act we're discussing here, they might as well be apples and oranges

Let me be clear (as I think jufot has, as well): I do not intend any kink shaming. Non-consensual scenarios are not my thing... but there's nothing at all wrong with them for healthy adults. A healthy adult knows fantasy is fantasy. Nor, as I've said several times, do I think they cause unhealthy behavior. Watching _The Terminator_ is not going to inspire shooting sprees.

Yes, I think that the fact I was more responding to themes instead of actual quotes didn't do justice to all the participants in the discussion.

But I believe that people who have ravishment fantasies form part of the "support base" of rape porn with those stereotypical myths. Yes, they may go for roleplaying in real life (if they have a partner who's up for that) and that's entirely their business, but I suppose that some are likely going to supplement that with hard noncon fiction.

I think the line of thought about how pornographic or exploitative depictions of rape affect young people and desensitisation is interesting. For me the first frequent encounters of fictional rape were the books of George R.R. Martin that I began reading when I was sixteen and although there is a lot of gratuitous rape in those books, it is portrayed as something horrible and not as eye candy. Game of Thrones is a lot worse in that respect with more "blurred lines" bullshit. And in certain porn genres it's almost everywhere.

I should admit that I'm rather self-interested in my complaining about rape myths. "Rape her till she loves it" is a huge, really enormous turnoff for me.

Oh, definitely! It's interesting to see how attitudes towards violence (particularly sexual violence) have evolved over time. For example, Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus is widely considered to be his most hated play, precisely because of the graphic violence surrounding the rape of Lavinia. It was popular initially, but was entirely derided less than a century later.

Today, you couldn't find a theatre audience for a new play with such brutality.

That's interesting, because Titus Andronicus is from the end of the sixteenth century, but in the Restoration period casual nudity on stage was normalised. Not very surprising if you think of the lifestyle of Charles II.

But I have read that critics have become a lot more positive about Titus Andronicus in recent years.

 

[jufot]

But I believe that people who have ravishment fantasies form part of the "support base" of rape porn with those stereotypical myths. Yes, they may go for roleplaying in real life (if they have a partner who's up for that) and that's entirely their business, but I suppose that some are likely going to supplement that with hard noncon fiction.

OK, that's fair. A few other people effectively made the same point. I'll concede that the harmful effects of rape fiction does not negate the fact that it can also be a normal fantasy tool for healthy minds.

Game of Thrones is a lot worse in that respect with more "blurred lines" bullshit.

Oh, definitely. I lost a lot of respect for the show after Sansa's "wedding night"

I should admit that I'm rather self-interested in my complaining about rape myths. "Rape her till she loves it" is a huge, really enormous turnoff for me.

As I imagine it is to most people.

But I have read that critics have become a lot more positive about Titus Andronicus in recent years.

I did some reading after your comment, and this does seem to be the case. Interesting... I've also found a nice summary of the play's "

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" on Wikipedia, which is worth a gander.

 

[Tlaero]

This is a great discussion with a ton of illuminating posts from everyone involved. I've appreciated all of it, but there's too much good stuff for me to go back and find the parts to quote.

One part that really stands out is out to me is jufot's and Raife's conversation about how having sex with a drunk girl is rape. It's especially interesting to me when we talk about how attitudes and morals have changed over the years (and centuries!). I say this because I've been making erotic games for something like 15 years now, and I've seen that change in just that short amount of time.

What actually got me to start making games is that a developer (who I adore) had a mechanic in a popular game where you had to find the right amount of alcohol to convince the LI to have sex with you but not so much that she'd pass out. I saw a lot of games copying this mechanism, and it made me uncomfortable. So in order to combat that, I started writing my own games, where alcohol wasn't part of the equation.

The developer (who I still adore) remade the game and took the alcohol out. I don't know how much I influenced that and how much of it was changes in society, but this isn't the ancient Greeks. This was less that two decades ago.

So, I guess from the start I've been trying to induce good behavior in people with my games. Just makes my love for violent shooters all the more questionable. Not that I'm going to stop.

Tlaero

 

[jufot]

What actually got me to start making games is that a developer (who I adore) had a mechanic in a popular game where you had to find the right amount of alcohol to convince the LI to have sex with you but not so much that she'd pass out. I saw a lot of games copying this mechanism, and it made me uncomfortable. So in order to combat that, I started writing my own games, where alcohol wasn't part of the equation.

OK, forget everything I've said about rape-game developers. If their mere existence can inspire more developers of your calibre, then I'm all for it

 

[Tlaero]

The important thing was, I'm 100% sure that this developer wasn't trying to write a rape game. Alcohol was one of a large number of necessary components, and the rest weren't "rapey." I think people just weren't thinking about it that way, "back then." And "back then" wasn't that long ago. There's a lot of room for debate on this whole thing.

Tlaero

 

[Raife]

The developer (who I still adore) remade the game and took the alcohol out. I don't know how much I influenced that and how much of it was changes in society, but this isn't the ancient Greeks. This was less that two decades ago.

You are right, Tlaero: society and social mores were different in the rich world 20 years ago (and they are still different in many other places). There were a lot of things that went on then that society (and, especially, the legal system) would see differently now. It wasn't long ago.

But...

I was an adult 20 years ago, and we _knew_ that forcing sex on a dead-drunk woman, or deliberately plying a woman with booze for sex, were wrong. We had different names for it... although rape was definitely one of them, even if prosecutions were rare.

• There were some bars -- and some men -- that were 'safe' and others that were 'not safe.'
• 'Taking advantage of' someone was a euphemism for impaired non-consent. When we went out together as a group, that was something that always worried some of us at the end of the night... I hated the fag end of parties, when I often found myself extricating friends from uncomfortable (or very, very comfortable) situations. It was no win for me. I felt like a paternalistic jerk, at times... but... it was the right thing to do.

So... again, I agree with you... social mores and the legal system have changed in many countries -- mostly in a very positive sense -- over the past 20 years. But the 'wrong' of it... was always there. We knew. You knew... which is why you influenced your friend (the other dev) that way.

 

[Raife]

In other updates: what does the thread think of the latest episode of Rebirth?

I mostly thought it was great: Sharon confronting the fact that the MC's creator is basically a vampire god/godzilla; the MCs moral choices about how to use the bloodbags/thralls (if you don't share your thralls with Calisto, she kills the bloodbags... but if you do, your thralls -- including your girlfriend -- get 'marked' and fed upon); and Calisto's super hot body. The dev is particularly good in depicting how an essentially all-powerful being would behave: she's easily bored, has a short attention span concerning minutiae that don't interest her (including things that are extremely important to everyone else) and she is bad at empathy because she has a hard time feeling anything.

But... I'm not sure that I like the change in the power dynamic between (the wonderful) Sharon and the MC. She has realized that, while she is the MC's mentor in the vampire world, as Calisto's offspring he is probably vastly more powerful that she is _already_. jufot, remember when you were whinging at poor Pandaman for altering the power dynamic between Maria and the MC in Price of Power (although, in the end, it was a bit of a head fake)? I think I have the same qualms about the latest developments in _Rebirth_.

 

[jufot]

In other updates: what does the thread think of the latest episode of Rebirth?

I'm glad that Sharon has finally stopped being sarcastically dismissive of MC's concerns about Calisto.

The dev is particularly good in depicting how an essentially all-powerful being would behave: she's easily bored, has a short attention span concerning minutiae that don't interest her (including things that are extremely important to everyone else) and she is bad at empathy because she has a hard time feeling anything.

Definitely. Mortality is a deeply underappreciated gift. The fleeting nature of it is what allows us to enjoy life, down to the minutiae. If I were to become immortal, I would undoubtedly be overcome with ennui, and eventually turn into Calisto

But... I'm not sure that I like the change in the power dynamic between (the wonderful) Sharon and the MC

Agreed, and I've been feeling that way for a while now. For the past several chapters, Sharon has been saying "we are the Archon of this place," and it grates on my nerves. Why does her position need to be defined in deference to her inexperienced male sidekick? MC is a decent guy, but he still has little to no idea how this society (that he has just been introduced to) works. Why would he be allowed any say in leadership matters, and why would Sharon so easily surrender her own agency? It's lazy writing intended to stroke the reader's ego by undeservingly elevating the MC.