Originally published: October 20th, 2017
This is a long post, but I think that it will be a good read. It's hopefully not boring, and definitely informative; it talks about the design of Accidental Woman.
I wanted to take a moment to talk a bit about games, and why I'm going into detail in many areas (like the PC's budget) that aren't exactly erotic. I wouldn't blame you if you were thinking something along the lines of "This is supposed to be a porn game, why is he working on X?"
A good portion of the answer lies in the nature of simulation games and porn themselves. People play simulation games--and watch porn--for different reasons, and they're interested in different things. People are interested in different kinks and different gameplay elements, and they play or watch for different reasons at different times.
The best example that I think most people will be familiar with is the SimCity series. (Pictured above is SimCity 1, play for free here!) SimCity is one of those games that makes a perfect example of how people play simulation type games. (A modern variant of the simulation genre is the sandbox game, though I won't get into detail on what distinguishes the two.) When someone plays a simulation game like SimCity, they can do it for any number of reasons, many of which they create themselves. In SimCity, some people are interested in the challenge of building a city. Some are interested in making a "perfect" city. Some people like being creative and building an interesting city, while others like testing the limits with really strange cities. The list goes on and on when it comes to simulation games.
Porn, and porn games in particular, share this multifaceted nature in regard to the way they are experienced. The amount of variation starts to get crazy when you throw in the various sets of kinks that players are into!
There's an often-unrecognized aspect to erotic games that have a wider scope, and that's detail. This element is even more critical to simulation-type games, though often players don't realize what exactly is wrong when it's missing. Freedom and imaginative gameplay demand it, but it's easy to overlook when we think of games as porn. That feeling that a game is too shallow can be pretty obviously attributed to a lack of detail, but it can also result in a game feeling repetitive, grindy, limiting, restrictive, or slow, among others.
Often in porn games we attribute this to a lack of sex scenes, or another obvious element, but I think that the root cause comes down to detail. If you've ever been playing a game, tried to do something, but found that you either couldn't or that you could but that there was no result, you've run into a lack of detail. It really takes the fun out of a game.
Erotica, particularly story-driven games like AW and countless others, has a strong element of fantasy. It gives you the opportunity to experience things vicariously, try things you wouldn't in real life, and generally just cater to your own personal kinks. This also leads to some disappointment. I'm sure many of you have played an erotic game that really grabbed your attention, but then suddenly found yourself disappointed, or wishing that there was more somehow. Even when a game lets you do parts of your own fantasies, it quickly becomes a let-down when there is no detail behind it. As an example, how many games let you get your character addicted to something, only to find out that the addiction doesn't really have any consequences or impact beyond some inconvenience to gameplay?
It's a bit difficult to recognize, in part because people's expectations and fantasies are different, which leads to a different experience of that same "missing something" feeling.
This issue has been a major part of my thought process while designing Accidental Woman. In fact, I didn't start work on planning or designing AW until I had a solution. That solution is why I've been adding detail routinely to everything. While this is also partly because different people are interested in different aspects of a simulation (some people care a lot about clothes perhaps, while others couldn't care less), the biggest factor is creating a structure that allows detail and consequences to happen.
Why do you have to clean your house? So that NPCs can notice that it has become a hoarder's nest because you've been too busy doing X to clean. Why is there a budget? So that losing your job, developing an expensive habit, being conned, etc have degrees of consequence beyond a simple "end of the month, can't pay rent, game over" bad end. These non-erotic aspects of daily life, like waking up in time for work, cleaning, bills, etc aren't there to be erotic by themselves. They also aren't there out of some attempt to be a real-life-simulator with some sex thrown in. They exist to provide meaning and detail to the erotic aspects of the game, giving them more depth and providing room for those fantasy scenarios we dream up. They also open up opportunities for other scenarios. Why else would a sane person sign up for shady drug trials if not because they need money?The important sticking point is that all this detail can't bog down play and take away the fun. That was another major part of my thought process with AW. Most of the mechanics you see are designed so that they are skippable and automatic, taking up very little time if the player isn't interested, but allowing more control if they are. The key point with my design is that most of these processes are automatic and mostly out of sight... until they aren't. And when they aren't, they're part of one of those aforementioned consequences. You won't have to give much thought to having your character go to sleep at night, until your late nights partying starts making you late to work, and your rushed mornings lead to a slovenly appearance that annoys your employer.
This sort of reward and punishment use of increasing complexity has been used pretty successfully in some mainstream games (particularly sims), but I've never seen it in an erotic game. I can't point to an erotic game and say "Look, that's what I'm doing, the concept works!" Despite that, the fact that it works in other games is a good indication that it can work for an erotic game. I also really believe that it might be a solution to that "missing element" that so many of us have noticed in other erotic games.
This kind of detail isn't easy, but I'm pretty confident I can do it thanks to all your support. For all of you getting worried about me focusing too much on non-erotic aspects of the game, you can rest assured that it's all for a very erotic purpose! ;)
