This sex-positive indie game is basically Nintendo meets porn
Warning: This post contains images that are NSFW
Like the Shake Weight, the experience of vigorously jerking your phallic-looking Wii Remote up and down to win at Mario Party always felt a bit... NSFW.
The 2006 game WarioWare: Smooth Moves didn't help. A Wii rhythm game, you were required to beat a variety of short "microgames" with motion control challenges that sped up the longer you stayed alive. One such microgame, entitled "Spray It, Don't Say It," made you shake a bottle of champagne harder and harder — until it exploded all over the screen.
This was especially awkward when played in multiplayer mode, effectively turning a colorful game for kids into a simulated circle jerk.
That was the idea behind NSFWare (spoiler alert: that link is NSFW), a free indie game by Pierrec. Described as "WarioWare meets Pornhub," it began as a jam game for the Make Something Horrible competition. Designers were challenged to create a game in 2-3 days that combined two clashing styles. So, for example, Crash Bandicoot, but made by Quantic Dream. Or PUBG, but made by Choice of Games.
Or — in our case — porn, but by Nintendo. And you know what? It's honestly less of a stretch than you'd think.
The result of the counterintuitive mashup is a frenzied play experience that throbs with fun, frantic, unabashed raunchiness. Jumping from microgame to microgame, you're perpetually thrown into a new whirlwind of limbs and genitals you have seconds to figure out. Sometimes, the controls are explicitly stated. Other times, you just gotta fumble through it.
Sound familiar?
"I liked the idea of the player having to 'learn' sex, and learn to please themselves or their partners through trial and error," Pierrec said. "For a while, I wanted to use the catchphrase, 'I don't know about you but this game is hard.'" (Wink wink, nudge nudge.)
The opening screen starts with a girl on her laptop, her booty shaking to the beat you create through the arrow keys. Then, without warning, it smash cuts to a screen with a command, like “COME” — then suddenly you’re another lady with legs splayed open, rubbing her rosebud until she damn well chooses to finish.
Other scenes instruct the player to RIDE, PLEASE, FLEX, WATCH, TEASE, PUNISH, and even SEXT. Each scene ends just when you think you've got a handle on it, disorienting you with the next one. Every new scenario fills you with that swooping, impish joy of sexual discovery — like the feeling you get when falling in lust with a new partner, or finding out you're into a kink for the first time.
But more than just fun, the message of sex positivity and inclusivity are inherent to the game. Pierrec kept a spreadsheet to ensure he was showcasing a wide spectrum of sexuality and orientation. He deliberately avoided garden-variety porn situations (i.e. heterosexual, vanilla, maledom), focusing instead on everything else, like het femdom, gay, bi, lesbian, and various kinks — from BDSM to tickling and even cuckolding.
Aside from feeling like it was important to show diversity in a sex game, Pierrec said that, "Mainstream porn is boring as fuck. Maybe it's because I'm a mostly heterosexual guy, but porn websites always show me the same things over and over again. And I like my porn like I like my games: surprising."
The game's unique, rotoscoped pixel aesthetic (created using software called Paint of Persia) also allowed him to work in silhouettes, which left race and gender intentionally ambiguous.
As scandalous and wacky as NSFWare might appear at first blush, the biggest surprise is realizing how relatable it is. Unlike most porn, the sex represented in the game is silly, intimate, human — and, because it's played instead of watched, agency is embedded into the design.
It's a true blend of the internet's most explicit corners, mixed with the inclusive and accessible play of a Nintendo game.
So no matter who you are, or what you like, there's something for everyone to enjoy in NSFWare. And that's kind of beautiful.
Jess is an LA-based culture critic who covers intimacy in the digital age, from sex and relationship to weed and all media (tv, games, film, the web). Previously associate editor at Kill Screen, you can also find her words on Vice, The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, Vox, and others. She is a Brazilian-Swiss American immigrant with a love for all things weird and magical.
