“I can’t cum anymore!… An ancient curse called the Mist has fallen on the Haremverse! It prevents all girls from cumming! We need a sex hero more powerful than the Mist, who will be able to give us orgasms. I hope he exists… And if he does, where is he?”
This monologue, accompanied by an animation of a naked woman spreadeagle next to two dildos and a condom-wrapped cucumber, introduces Hentai Clicker, a popular porn video game. One click prompts another animation of an obscured hero character holding up the shocker, and several more cue the introduction of a topless woman, who arrives on the scene through a magical portal to affirm your mission. “You have to be the One to satisfy all of our tight, wet and yet frustrated pussies. You’ll cure the Haremverse from the Mist!”
The game is simple from there on: Click on the assortment of animated women as they appear on the screen, removing their clothes, satisfying their sexual desires and saving the Haremverse in the process.
This is the kind of experience you encounter when you click on the adult video game advertisements strewn across your favorite porn website — you know, the ones that claim you will CUM IN SECONDS IF YOU CLICK!!!!!!! But since the average fapper, surely, is unlikely to interrupt their personal time to engage in such adventures, just how successful are these games? And who are they for?
To find out, I spoke with Magrat of Kinkoid, the studio behind Hentai Clicker, Gay Harem and numerous other adult games; and Geoffrey Celen, creator of ThePornDude, a website dedicated to cataloging and reviewing erotic games and other pornographic content. Let’s get nasty!
What’s the thought process behind making an adult video game like this?
Celen: The obvious answer, like many things in the world of pornography, is money. Sex sells, and it sells in any format you can roll it into. If you want to be cynical about it, you could say a lot of these games were created as a way to cash in on smut aimed directly at the gamer demographic.
One of the things I’ve noticed, though, is that fans of porn games tend to be very enthusiastic. There’s a lot of overlap between fans of sex-themed video games and fans of hentai, both of which have active and vocal communities. While traditional porn fans don’t often talk about their preferences, gamers have lively discussions about their favorite explicit games on forums and chat rooms across the internet.
Magrat: Eroticism and nudity have always had a place in video games — not to help the gameplay, but to make it more arousing and visually pleasing. The reason we decided to create adult games is very prosaic: We wanted to play something fun and sexy. We’re all manga fans, and we all love playing games. But we couldn’t find the games we wanted to play, so we created them.
Celen: Most people have no idea just how many porn games are out there: Hundreds, maybe even thousands, are released every year. The vast majority of them are created by fans of the genre — on their own time and their own dime — and are released with little fanfare on some of the bigger porn game libraries on the web. The only reason anybody would do that is because it’s a true labor of love: They love video games and they love porno — and very often, they love anime, too.
Do these games actually make money, though?
Celen: The bigger ones are free-to-play and make money off of their gacha systems. That’s just a Japanese term for what are called in-game purchases in the world of non-pornographic games. A game with a good gacha system is winnable even without shelling out a cent, and they won’t ask for your credit card up front. This is standard across the world of video games, and I don’t consider it too scammy. Those scammy, spammy ones, however, make it through deception and trickery, obviously.
I think most people would be surprised to find out a lot of the small, unsung, independent porn games turn a profit as well. The hentai and adult video game communities are very enthusiastic and tightly intertwined — most of the indie sex games are developed by individuals or tiny teams who are active in these communities. While it can be hard to get your typical porn addict to shell out 30 bucks a month for HD lesbian movies, there are plenty of sex gamers out there willing to straight-up donate funds to their favorite developers.
Some of the more popular ones, like Summertime Saga, are making a killing on Patreon, which tells you a lot about the quality of the games. When’s the last time you donated to Sony because you loved a PS4 game?
When the video game porn ads are so cheesy and scammy-looking, how can you be sure you’re not going to get a virus?
Magrat: You might not last five minutes, but your credit card details will last for months! Most of these advertisements are just high-quality animated clickbait. Shady companies put a lot of resources to make this one amazing advertisement just to get your credit card details. If they seem too good to be true, they most probably are.
Celen: I know the ones you’re talking about: You’ll see a sidebar advertisement with an animated loop of anime schoolgirl intercourse, along with a message saying something like, “Bet you won’t last 10 seconds!” There are tons of similar ads on the free tube sites. In general, they’re actual games, not viruses. You still need to be careful about them, though. If they ask for a credit card number for a “free” game, something may not be on the up and up.
Once you go through all the selection screens upfront and you create a user, they’ll ask you to verify your age by entering your credit card details. They’ll have some kind of box somewhere, with pre-checked charges, that will charge your credit card after a few days, unless you untick that. But if you enter your credit card information and you untick that, there isn’t a problem.
You can see the charge is over €120. Being charged €120 or more after a few days while pretending the service is free is shady.
Do most people play these for the gaming experience, or because they’re horny?
Celen: These games have a ton of variety, but all of my favorites have a nice balance between playability and sexiness. You have to figure, nowadays, you can basically find endless amounts of free porn without much effort. Nobody’s going to grind through hours of a boring game just to see some naked cartoon breasts.
Like gamblers, gamers tend to appreciate the pornographic rewards these games have to offer: Kill some monsters, watch a sex scene; rescue the princess, get her to clean your, um, sword. The game designers need to balance the gameplay just right to make it worth the effort, and they know just how particular gamers can be.
That said, there are a lot of games out there that are just quick, sloppy cash grabs. I’ve seen more than a couple that were half-hearted Final Fantasy clones put together with minimal effort and decorated with the cheapest hentai they could buy. These ones usually reveal themselves as garbage pretty early in the game.
How do developers seamlessly combine sex and gaming?
Magrat: Just like with good sex, it takes at least two… teams. We have our talented and inspired art team to provide plenty of sexy content and a gifted team of game designers to balance it. And just like with sex, communication is very important, not only between the two teams but with the players, too. We often ask our players what works for them, what doesn’t, what they want more of and so on.
What are some community favorites?
Magrat: It seems that people are enjoying idle clicker games [such as Hentai Clicker, where the game is played by simply clicking and watching] a lot. Again, these are the games that don’t take hours to play — they’re something to do for a couple of minutes to relax and stimulate your senses. It’s way more enjoyable than scrolling your newsfeed, and there’s no danger of getting into a heated discussion. Despite the popularity of clickers, our visual novels [such as Hentai Heroes, where the game follows something of a text-based narrative] have a loyal and constantly growing player base, too.
Celen: It depends on what kind of mood I’m in. There are sexualized versions of any genre of video games. You can find pornographic puzzle games, intercourse-themed RPGs, dating and hook-up simulators and even first-person shooters, where it ain’t bullets you’re firing. Some games have a social element, letting you interact with other real humans, while other simple games can be played in a background tab while you’re working on spreadsheets or emailing the boss.
Hentai Heroes is probably my favorite of the burgeoning sex RPG genre. It’s as well-developed as any similar G-rated adventure, plus it includes a lot of explicitly sexual hentai images. You build a character, level them up though battles and adventuring and build a harem of beautiful, willing women you find throughout your travels.
As far as dating and sex simulators that get right down to the good stuff, I’d recommend Booty Calls to newbies of the genre. The general object is to seduce women, but I can’t really get into what happens next unless I get really NSFW.
LifeSelector is a good one if you like interactive video, and I’d dig into 3DXChat if I was looking for cybersex with another user. HentaiClicker takes the incremental clicker formula and adds a ton of naked anime babes, and there’s always Booty Farm if you like farming games, but wish they had more porn.
Like I said, it really depends on my mood, like it does with non-sexual, non-porn video games. Luckily, my clicker finger and forearm stamina are both ridiculous, but that just comes with the territory.
Ian Lecklitner
Ian Lecklitner is a staff writer at MEL Magazine. He mostly writes about everyone's favorite things: Sex, drugs and food.
