Earl's Musings: Choices and Customisation

So, recently I played the Scandalous Scarlet Moon. It's a pretty good game, and the author is kind enough to shout me out on his page, so I'll include a link back to him at the end of this for those of you who want to check it out. On top of being a good game, it's also an amazingly customizable game, letting you pick the genders of most characters you encounter through the game. You can choose at the beginning to have the game automatically set the gender of character's based on their role, if they're the spanker or spankee, or as I do it, you can simply make up your mind on the fly, with the game warning you which each character is going to be as they appear. It's a clever feature that works really well given the spanking-focus of the game.

The game also seems to go out of it's way to provide the player with choices about scenes you'll encounter, with an emphasis on letting you avoid what you don't like. This isn't something new to this game, I've played a few where the sex is almost entirely within the players control. And this is something I'm not a fan of. I'm a big fan of avoidable sex scenes. I'm not a fan of easily avoidable sex scenes, which is, in my opinion at least, a common problem with games where sex is avoidable. Whenever you're presented with a series of choices, one of which dodges the sex, and one of which provides you with "unwilling" sex, they're usually very clearly labelled. "Perform wise decision" is the first option. "Act like an idiot" is the second. I get why you might think this is a good idea, but to my mind it feels like a wasted opportunity. To me at least a porn game needs some degree of difficulty so you can actually fuck it up. Getting "punished" when I couldn't really not choose to fail isn't the same.

And this is where an interesting thought arises. If you're including any customization, why not weave that into these sorts of scenes. Why not make the decisions you're faced with when it comes to how to avoid sex actively difficult to make, or include options that, while obviously leading to sex, feel like the safe way to avoid other problems. And then, in the options at the beginning of the game, provide a way for your players to turn on content tips. So each choice is labelled as leading to sex or not. Or turn on advanced options, which tells you the kind of sex you'll be experiencing if you go down either route. Or you could just do what I do and do nothing to indicate what will lead to sex and what won't half the time.

As a quick aside, I should note that obvious player choice for consensual scenes makes perfect sense. If you're getting a choice if you fuck a character, you the player should be the one making that choice. It's when the consequences of your actions might lead you to unwilling sex that there should be a bit more ambiguity, to allow you to actually fuck up. Also of note, for those wondering, yes, I do intend to include customization for Shield High, largely in the form of difficulty and early game stats in the future, though customization for other parts of the game is something I'm considering too.

Anyway, that's it for today. Sorry I've been absent on the work front for a little bit, I've been re-adjusting to life back home after my schedule had been severely fucked by everything. I'm still sleeping at some weird times to try and get work done for Shield High.

Pudding Earl

P.S. Forgot to actually link to Scandalous Scarlet Moon. You can find it, and the guys other stuff here: http://www.spankingrpgs.com/