Q&A: July 23rd, 2025

Kelvin Kuang Asks
Do you think there are games that had storytelling - where it's cryptic in narratives and the twists mind bending (or as Mandalore experienced, mind melting) that manage to somehow stick and gets away with it? For instance, Marathon Infinity, made amids the abundance of Doom/Quake clone being recognized for the gameplay and technology, had lore and details that gradually make sense (and ends up being super meta at the end). It's executed in way that there hasn't been a definitive answer and to this day, has been discussed by the well knowledge few who seem to be well aware of the conspiracy of it's legacy beyond Halos (both Bungie and 343i in a loose extend) to Destiny. It's a rabbit hole, but a interesting one that holds much staying power of mystery and mystique for this long not only in gaming circles, but even internet ARGs.

I'm not entirely certain I understand the question. You have certainly provided perhaps the prime example of a cryptic mind melting narrative in gaming. I can't really think of another title that's taken people some 20+ years to "figure out" and even then, we're still not 100% certain.

I do think however that these kind of narratives are able to get a whole new appreciation these days because of the modern internet and all it entails. Reddit threads, deep-dive essays, meticulously cataloged wikis, etc.

Part of what makes Marathon Infinity so unique was that it's overwhelmingly in-depth narrative was done during the age of Doom & Quake, IE, a time when a whole genre was defined by the nerdy programmer that likened video-game narratives to pornography.

(Jokes aside, huge respect for John Carmack).

There's also the question of how much Infinity's narrative was a product of its limitations, would a Single-Player Marathon even with the same quality of Greg Kirkpatrick (unlikely as that is) be as cryptic in an age where we can do far more than sprite-based characters, splash-screens, and text-logs?

OzarkTempses Asks
What is your take on NSFW games? I feel like this is an aspect of games most people interested/talking about the medium understandably talk little about.

They kinda remind me of Racing Games.

That genre has a quality problem in part because it's core-players, the gamers who will be in it regardless of its state, are there for one reason... to vroom vroom in pretend cars.

From what I can tell, NSFW Games have a similar problem where in part, the gamers who will be in it regardless of its state, are there for one reason... to skeet skeet over pretend hotties.

Mainstream games have always been extremely self-conscious - and kinda rightfully so - about actual portrayals of sex. In the early 2000s, I think for a pretty simple reason, most video-games still weren't capable of creating characters that even remotely resembled people, and the idea of a first-person sex scene was just as likely to make people throw up as turn them on.

That's certainly changed, but many big games are still very hesitant of portraying any kind of intimacy, and in the Western world where sex is still very much treated as taboo compared to violence, there's an open door for NSFW games to go the places mainstream games can't, whether for serious or for excess.

But I'm not seeing that.

Maybe it is happening, it's not exactly a genre I've seen beyond friends and peers in that space on Twitter, but what I see surfacing to the top of Steam and GOG is the usual array of Ren'py harem adventures, and bad overscoped UE5 Action games with nude characters.

Even something like Subverse that has way more production value and funding behind it, seems notably behind what's being done with blender and even 2D NSFW animations. There's some genuinely near-AAA smut out there, and Subverse kinda just seems like a basic Sci-Fi game with random B-Grade porn snippets...

That or it's JJ Abrams porn.

Now, there is an obvious difference between these two genres.

Racing Games have had multiple decades of professional-grade talent at the helm with millions of dollars. Long as porn and erotica have been around, they're mostly low budget efforts often facilitated by less than three people, and NSFW Games are very much an extension of this.

And because people's ultimate draw to these is to fap, the desire for them to be better animated, richer in context, or more interested in player engagement, seems to be a bonus, not a demand. One that'll take a long time to advance due to the few number of people able and willing to attempt it.

Although... considering Subverse's success, and how quickly OnlyFans and Rule34 have advanced compared to the multi-decade established Porn Industry, perhaps Racing Games will have to start taking notes in the near future.

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