RPG gay sex games

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While role-playing gay games have long been popular, they have struggled with representing gay themes. Gay characters often came off as campy or annoying and their inclusion was often a matter of political correctness rather than genuine representation. The publisher GURPS did introduce some gay content in its source books, such as a closeted homosexual homophobe in their superhero supplement GURPS Supers Wild Cards (1988). However, this was far from a standard feature for the RPG gay sex game.

Tabletop RPG Source Books

Although some role-playing gay porn games were attacked in the past as subversive and dangerous, they are actually great vehicles for social change. They are not only games where people can let their imaginations run wild but also where they can talk about real-life problems and find solutions for them. In the 1990s gay characters started to appear in RPG gay games, mostly thanks to the GURPS system and its many supplements that dealt with setting-appropriate themes such as homosexuality.

Initially the gay content in these games was very subtle and matter-of-fact, without making a big deal of it. In the superhero game supplement for GURPS Supers Wild Cards (1988) you could play a closeted gay homophobe called Mack the Knife and in the first Clanbook of Nosferatu (1993) you would find that gay men can have disproportionately high amounts of Appearance points compared to other members of their clan.

As HIV/AIDS became more and more common in the 1980s and influenced all kinds of cultural texts, RPGs also adapted. In some fantasy games like Rolemaster: Shadow World (1996) you would get a description of the church that does not frown on sexual orientation and in the HarnMaster 2nd edition (1996) you can even roll up a character with a 10 per cent chance of being gay. In other genres, such as horror or cyberpunk, the gay content was quite blatantly present.

Digital RPGs

For gay gamers who prefer to play in virtual worlds, RPGs are a great way to explore an aspect of themselves that they may not feel comfortable addressing in real life. This is why RPG gay sex games have become a very popular form of social support for LGBTQIA+ people. However, the gaming industry has not always been very accommodating of the needs of these communities.

In the 1990s we saw some progress in this area, especially with the roleplaying gay game publisher White Wolf. Their Vampire source books often included homosexual characters but they were portrayed in an unpleasant way. They were usually the victims of vicious rape or brutality, and they had fetishistic, voyeuristic or necrophiliac tendencies. These were considered to be terrifying dark sides of character which should be suppressed and rechanneled into healthy desires.

However, in their second part of the Gothic series they took a step forward. Women were able to talk in the gay RPG game world and played a minor questing role but they were still mostly seen as decorative objects for male players. They were also very stereotypically depicted as having reproductive work and fighting. There was a not too subtle allusion to homosexuality in the game world with a place called Bengar’s farm, where there were no women but only men.

During the 1990s we also started seeing more and more representation of sexual diversity in some RPGs. This was particularly noticeable in the Cyberpunk genre. One example is the roleplaying game Cyberspace: Sprawlgangs & Megacorps (1990). It includes a gay gang that randomly assaults beautiful female models with knives.

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Indie RPGs

The indie gay RPG porn game movement, inspired by the success of games like Apocalypse World and the popular design framework Powered by the Apocalypse, has provided new opportunities for queer gamers. These are games published by individuals and small-press publishers, often through crowdfunding models like Kickstarter. They provide a platform for authors to tell stories that might not get the attention or distribution of mainstream games.

In the 1990s, gay characters started to appear more frequently in role-playing gay sex games. This was especially true for cyberpunk titles, with the gay male gang in Cyberspace: Sprawlgangs & Megacorps (1990) being one of the most memorable examples. In this gang, members randomly assault beautiful women in the streets, cut their faces with knives, and then tell them they are prettier than them. As a bonus, they get extra Appearance points!

Fantasy RPG gay games lagged behind, with only a few early mentions of homosexuality in RPG source books. These were often presented with awkward wording or in a tame context, such as a description of a brothel in the adventure Theatrix Presents: Ironwood (1995). There are even claims that some publishers, such as Dungeons & Dragons publisher TSR and Games Workshop for Warhammer, had rules prohibiting the depiction of queers.

However, around the turn of the millennium things started to change. Queer representations began to become more varied and prominent in RPG sources, particularly with publisher White Wolf, whose superhero game Aberrant (1999) included several major gay characters, some of whom were also tied into the metaplot of the game.

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Microgames

Despite moral panic around HIV/AIDS in the 1980s, hints of queer themes were beginning to make their way into gay role-playing games. The early representations are mostly inspired by mythological or specific fictional texts and seem to be included for the purposes of comic relief.

After the turn of the millennium the representations started to become more varied. Some publishers (e.g. Green Ronin, White Wolf) started to see queer people as a part of their audience and incorporated homosexual themes into their RPGs. This was especially true for the cyberpunk genre. For example, in a source book for the game Cyberspace: Sprawlgangs & Megacorps (1990) a gay male gang called “Models” randomly assaults and beats beautiful women in the streets. However, they don’t stoop to prostitution because it would be against their pride.

It was also during this time that the positive attributes started getting attached to gay characters in WoD. For example, in many WoD source books, being gay grants a character more Appearance points than the average player.

The darkest representation of homosexuality in a gay porn game RPG at that time came from the publisher Task Force Games with their Central Casting (1988). In this game being transsexual, asexual, gay, bisexual, fetishistic or voyeuristic was seen as a horrifying dark side of personality and was considered a severe psychological disorder.

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