Playing Dirty: Going head to head in bed

by Bonnie Ruberg { May 10th 2007 at 4:48PM }

Every other week, Bonnie Ruberg contributes Playing Dirty, a column on sex and gender in video games:

Like every good story, a good game needs a conflict. Sometimes the conflict is obvious (aliens are attacking Earth, you're trapped in a haunted mansion, someone is trying to kick your ass). Other times, it's less obvious (blocks are falling from the sky, the timer is running out, if you don't collect enough cherries you'll never get that bigger house). Whatever the conflict is though, the goal of the game is always the same: to resolve it. Maybe you kill the aliens, or kick his ass, or fit the blocks into perfect rows. The important thing is you win by overcoming conflict.

My question is this: What kind of conflict is there in a sex game?

First, let's talk about sex itself. What kind of conflicts does sex normally present us with? Well, there's the conflict of the chase, of finding a suitable partner and convincing him/her to jump into bed. For some people, that's definitely a challenge to overcome. Then there might be a moral conflict. Should you sleep with this particular someone, or shouldn't you? There's also the simple conflict of desire. You want something, and you have to do X, Y, and Z to get it.

Still, all those things have to do with the moments (or days, or weeks) before sex, not the sex act itself. We could definitely apply them to dating sims, or even online social "games" like Second Life. But what about sex sims and other sex-based games, which cut out the pre-moments entirely? Take Virtually Jenna, for example, a sex sim franchised with porn-star Jenna Jameson. There's no need to convince Jenna–or any of her sexy friends–that they should take off their clothes. Players jump straight into the action, where they've given total control.

Talking about control brings up another potential candidate for conflict: orgasm. Maybe the obstacle to overcome in sex is making someone (or yourself) come. There are certainly a number of games that take that approach, like Heather Kelley's Lapis, or a whole range of "poke the doll" flash games. Orgasm equals success.

But what if we look at sex itself as a conflict to be "won"? We could almost call it a symbolic kind of fighting. Maybe not in real life, but in our games, at least. What if we had sex games the same way we have fighting games, where participants with special skills would go head to head and battle it out... sexually. Would it work? Who knows. In that case, how would we even determine a winner? One interesting model to turn to might be a game like Lovechess: Ancient Egypt. Lovechess is just like normal chess, except that the "pieces" have sex to take each other off the board. Does being the penetrator mean you win? Or maybe the person who orgasms?

The idea of sexual conflict definitely goes against our normal understanding of sex. We associate sex with peace, with "making love not war." But maybe a little more conflict is just what our sex games need: to give them structure, purpose, and the sexiness of achieving a goal.

Bonnie Ruberg is a writer, researcher, and all around fangirl with a big crush on games. Find more of her work at The Village Voice, Gamasutra, The Onion A. V. Club, or her blog, Heroine Sheik. She can be reached at .

Tags: conflict, fighting, playingdirty, sex

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

clo1_2000 @ May 10th 2007 4:52PM

This has already been done in Hentai, it is called the La Blue Girl series.

Next-Gen-Gamer @ May 10th 2007 5:00PM

"it is called the La Blue Girl series"

I lol'd.

Keif @ May 10th 2007 5:00PM

of course there is conflict. hymens are evil and you are on a quest to destroy them.

Dustin @ May 10th 2007 5:06PM

lol @ Keif

Maybe the only reason people play sex games is because they fail utterly at the real thing, so in their virtual reality they would rather have no obstacles to prevent them from what they desire.

I mean, what would be the point of leaving the real world to go into a less graphically enhanced world just to fail as bad as you did in the real world.

... also, lol @ sex games in general.

sheppy @ May 10th 2007 5:08PM

Something I've been saying for years about the sex games. Once they get done making them actual games, THEN we'll see a drastic improvement in quality.

Cronotrigger913 @ May 10th 2007 5:28PM

Like sheppy says, once they resemble an actual game, one withe rules, sex games might actually be more successful in the industry. If they don't give the game any sort of structure or progression, the game will stay with those people that don't want to "overcome" a sexual relationship, making the sex genre an extremely niche one. So yeah, I understand what the author was trying to say.

Scipio Africanus @ May 10th 2007 5:53PM

Sounds like Bonnie is a fan of Battle Raper, not to mention the critically acclaimed sequel, Battle Raper 2.

So is this "hey guyz i'm a girl writing about sex" gimmick ever going to get old?

Dan @ May 10th 2007 6:00PM

This is a non-issue when you consider the fact that these games probably won't sell particularly well or make any significant kind of money.

Mandingo Chief @ May 10th 2007 6:02PM

The challenge of 'overcoming a conflict' in a sex game? This whole article sounds like a dialogue between the detectives that you would hear at the stationhouse 20 minutes into an episode of Law & Order SVU.

spike @ May 10th 2007 6:06PM

"Does being the penetrator mean you win? Or maybe the person who orgasms?"

how about, the person who orgasms is the loser, i.e. reward 'stamina'

this idea can even extend to other game mechanics. perhaps a goal can be to bed as many as possible in a set amount of time. orgasm leads to post-coital exhaustion, which leads wasted time.

how about a porn-star sim (shudder), where the ability to orgasm on queue is one of many positive stats.

randomshagz @ May 10th 2007 6:12PM

"My question is this: What kind of conflict is there in a sex game?"

Well they could forget to program the girls in it. That for start without the girls so you have to wait for the expansion.

dustandechoes91 @ May 10th 2007 6:15PM

there was good article about those in wired a few months back. I still really dont get what people see in hentai and that stuff, who wants to see little anime girls naked?

Odds Bodkins @ May 10th 2007 6:18PM

The wife and I used to play "Strip Mortal Kombat", but since the baby was born, we haven't been doing it as much. (MK's just too violent for the the little one to see)

axt113 @ May 10th 2007 6:50PM

Play the Raidy Thunder Fighter Series, that's what a sex game should be

Mister Disco @ May 10th 2007 6:36PM

As some have already pointed out, you obviously have never played Japanese hentai games. They can often be incredibly challenging.

mark @ May 10th 2007 6:38PM

"What kind of conflict is there in a sex game?"

are you serious? did you not play "general custer's revenge"?

Rubang B @ May 10th 2007 7:16PM

There's that one hentai game where you have a mansion and three maids, and you're sexually training and torturing them and making them clean the house. The difference is that it mostly plays like a Sim game, in that each maid gets skill points at each cleaning act and each sex act. Unfortunately almost all the sex acts are humiliating, like making them act like a dog and using weird medical devices on them.

And then there's stuff like Water Closet. Uhh... look it up.

Jackson Pritt @ May 10th 2007 7:44PM

HAHA OH WOW.

What a truly terrible article.

KiwiLord @ May 10th 2007 8:48PM

"I still really dont get what people see in hentai and that stuff, who wants to see little anime girls naked?"

It's about fantasy, that's it. Things you can't, or don't want to see in real life. It's the same with pornographic games. It's all just about fantasy.

Spakkle @ May 10th 2007 9:00PM

I'm pretty sure that Bonnie hands-down wins "Most disrespected as a journalist" award for Joystiq. I have seriously never seen a professional blogger/journalist who gets mocked and laughed at in her comments as much as Bonnie. This article, like all of hers, is the usual childishly written fluff piece I think we all come to expect from Bonnie.

kt @ May 10th 2007 9:34PM

Bonnie has potential, but she needs an editor. The Club Penguin column wasn't a bad idea, but when she filed it, there was no story there - someone should have caught that and helped her. I get the sense that Joystiq doesn't supervise its writers. Is it just kind of a big group blog?

This column's another example. There's a seed of an idea here, but it feels like she finished it five minutes before it ran.

As for the "girls making sexy talk about games" thing - I think the Bonnie's tendency to get published because she's a girl who talks dirty is balanced pretty well with the tendency of posters to bash her because she's a girl.

Roflgoat @ May 10th 2007 10:03PM

@Odds Bodkins

Odds Bodkins? That guy is awesome. Best storyteller EVER.

Oh, and by the way, awesome.

Megaqwerty @ May 10th 2007 10:11PM

"how about a porn-star sim (shudder), where the ability to orgasm on queue is one of many positive stats."

I have just received some random inspiration for the most awesome Neverwinter Nights mod ever. Be back soon.

wackychan @ May 10th 2007 11:43PM

"Wow! sex games! I cant wait for a multiplayer one!"

Now thats just sick...

Morose @ May 11th 2007 6:14AM

I always looked at sex games as a sort of interactive pornography, focusing not on overcoming some conflict to reach a goal so much as using a game-like format to make something more engaging than the sort of porn one would just sit and look at.

Why, if someone wants interactivity, wouldn't they just go for the real thing? Maybe they have medical concerns that get in the way of conventional sex-seeking, or maybe they just want some sort of quick-fix sex-based entertainment rather than the more involved process of convincing someone to have sex with them (aka maybe they're bored), or maybe they're just shy.