pornochromatic

As the MPAA is to the NC-17 rating, the ESRB is to a little-known rating called Adults Only (or AO). The rating is almost never used for a number of reasons, all of which having to do with companies being afraid to get near sexual content with a 10 foot pole (gratuitous violence, on the other hand, remains perfectly acceptable). Retailers won’t carry the games (Wal-Mart and Best Buy have policies against them) and console manufacturers like Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony won’t allow AO games onto their systems.

Enter the Silicon Xtal Corporation. They’ve registered the name SexBox in the US with the intention of creating a “video gaming console comprised of computer hardware with unique controls which plays Adult Only rated (AO) video game software titles.”

Nothing else about the company or the product is really known, but the concept itself seems fatally flawed to me for two reasons:

1) People do not want to buy expensive porn-specific hardware (see also: FyreTV)
2) No one has figured out how to make a pornographic game that doesn’t suck really bad

You name the crappy sex-themed video game, I’ve played it. From Leisure Suit Larry to Sextris to Red Light Center to the wide variety of shitty Flash-based games floating around the interwebs these days. They’re all terrible. Maybe the people who are good at making games are busy doing it for money, or perhaps it’s because the characters of any halfway playable game are located squarely in the uncanny valley, but I’ve never seen a sex video game that was hot or fun.

Much like chocolate and pickles or polyester and fire, I think porn and video games are really best left separate pleasures.