Hoo boy.

For those of you too lazy to click out of your newsreaders, here's the situation:

Someone decided to put "GLBT Friendly" (Gay/Lesbian/Bi/Transgendered) as part of their guild name in World of Warcraft. One day, they sign on to find themselves flagged with a policy violation. After firing off an email to Blizzard, they find out that having terms indicating the sexual orientation of the guild is against policy. Quoting from the article:

The response from Blizzard was, "While we appreciate and understand your point of view, we do feel that the advertisement of a 'GLBT friendly' guild is very likely to result in harassment for players that may not have existed otherwise. If you will look at our policy, you will notice the suggested penalty for violating the Sexual Orientation Harassment Policy is to 'be temporarily suspended from the game.' However, as there was clearly no malicious intent on your part, this penalty was reduced to a warning."

So, long story short: If you have a guild called "God hates fags", then you're violating this policy. If you have a guild named "GLBT friendly", you're violating the same policy.

If you have a guild named "My name is Gay. No, really, like Gay, as in the First Name, is Gay"... Hey, someone with a WoW account wanna try this? Hell, they let The Spreading Taint through.

Since I'm the only one around (updating a sex blog on a Friday night... But my mom thinks I'm cool!), I guess I'll throw in the first MMOrgy opinion:

Man, Blizzard.

WTF, dude. Seriously.

Shit like this is what turns virtual worlds into day care centers, and you're seeing why. Yes, gamers, for the most part, are an insensitive bunch of asses. I know, I'm one of them. But you try to clamp down on everyone, and ain't no one gonna be havin' a good time.

'course, you've got 5.5 million players now, you can probably pull crap like this and laugh at the 1% drop in your servers as people continue to level grind mindlessly so they can ebay their lvl 60 character. But watch as the interesting people leave due to crazy ass rules, the fun people leave due to creative stiffling, even in guild names, and see how nifty your world is then.

You'll still have players, hell, you'll always have players, but how fucking fulfilling is a world without interesting, diverse players who let others KNOW they are, and are willing to stick up for it, eh?

Other people's opinions (I'm gonna keep updating this as these come in):

Fellow Sexy Geek Jason Schultz
Cory Doctorow of BoingBoing
Terra Nova Thread

I went to the doctor and he said "Take two buzzwords and call me in the morning".

Welcome to EMERGENT MACHINIMA PORN! Woohoo! We're like, 3 posts into the category and already starting new terms!

Upskirts. God love 'um, they're skirts that are, well, up. That pretty much sums it up I suppose.

In this case, the upskirt images have been pulled from the fighting game Dead or Alive 4 for the XBox 360, and uploaded to a Japanese website.

Now, I know what you're thinking. "Wait, someone in Japan bought an XBox 360?"

Yeah, I'm as stunned as you are.

via Fleshbot

Though having one of the most cohesive player bases and in depth rule sets of any MMO out today, Sociolotron doesn't see a lot of respect from reviews. MMORPGDot sets this straight with a detailed review of Socio, balancing the technical issues with the gameplay in a way most other reviews haven't really even tried. It's nice to see a indie produced game like this get some decent press.

The Guardian has picked up our coverage on MMO pregnancy. As usual, Alecks does an absolutely wonderful job of summing up the situation, and the discussion of the topic in the comments is enlightening.

[qDot Update: From the comments... 'On a lighter note is anyone else disturbed that that avatar appears to be giving birth to a cabbage patch doll seemingly aided by Hulk Hogan?' - Seriously, Guardian Comment Threads makes this page worth running sometimes.]

Sometimes, no matter how sexy we try to make this stuff, it just doesn't come out right.

Hoo. Yeah... I... yeah. They could use a look at the Adult Text Roleplay guide. Or... something...

via Wonderland

Fellow Sexy Geek Annalee Newitz has an article on Wired about the current Machinima craze, mainly focusing on the Lionhead Studios game The Movies.

Funny thing is, we're mentioned as the "Alternative"! From the article:

Fans of machinima porn are advised to look elsewhere [Ed. Note: That's US! We're ELSEWHERE! Wheeee!] for their fix, because The Movies players just aren't making any -- at least, not for public consumption. Molineux won't allow any machinima to appear on The Movies Online that might be perceived as obscene. "If somebody tries to remake Star Wars and has Han Solo doing something disgusting, that's a problem," he said. Modder Ashton echoed Molineaux's sentiments, adding that anti-video-game attorney Jack Thompson's lawsuits have him spooked. "Our mods won't let you do anything explicit, like create naked characters," he said. "It's all very proper."

Interesting reasoning for why there's no lovin' features in the movies. Don't understand why Thompson's lawsuits scare them though, those have all been on violence (I'm sure war movies will have no problems on The Movies site).

Make love, not war, people!

Holy crap, I sound like a hippy.

Leaving the comfy world of MMO Sex Theory, we're now scouting out into new, uncharted territories... That we've actually charted into before, but, well, we didn't have a category for it then, and we do now.

So, look to MMOrgy for upcoming stories all about polygonal nudey films and pictures. Hawt!

Ever wonder about those guys who need a guiding hand?

Do you see them scamper by in the Underground, half dressed with a come hither look and a lilt in their walk?

Is there fear in their eyes as you screw them with a giant pink monster, but only because you might stop?

I caught one recently... fairly easy thing to do, considering he bent over so easily.

Continue reading "Pretty in Pink" »

Note: This entry is by one of our new authors. However, I'm having some problems adding new authors tonight, so until qDot can fix it, please note that the correct author isn't listed on the post.

How much sex can a girl have in a virtual world in 30 minutes?

Fortunately for you, I happen to have exactly 30 minutes to kill, and I’m about to find out. Before I head into Second Life looking for love, first, let me tell you a few things about me. I’m a woman, a long-time gamer and in my sexual prime. This means that I’ve probably done it all, and what I haven’t done, I either plan on doing or have already decided against. I’m super comfortable with sex, my sexuality and talking with men.

How this will transfer to a cyber world? It’s anyone’s guess.

Continue reading "Or Your Money Back..." »

We're opening a new category here on MMOrgy, called Experiences. It's something both qDot and I have been trying to avoid, trying to keep the blog a place for news and interviews. However, it seems like we're really missing out on the view of the most important being in virtual world, the user.

So, why, as a user, would anyone be interested in writing a blog? I certainly tried to do it myself, but time isn't exactly abundant due to life, so my personal journal has consisted of one post since November. We've also been eagerly watching ApogeeVR, as they're off to a good start as one of the first MMO Sex Blogs.

Even though my blog hasn't seen the attention I would've liked, I'd still like to go into the reasons I decided to start a sex blog in the first place, so that others might pick up new ideas and start their own. To say that we here at MMOrgy launched a million Anais Nins would certainly be a gold star in my book.

qDot has even been nice enough to write up an overview of the current state of Real World Sex Blogging for us, to give those of us that are "reality-challenged" a head start.

Continue reading "MMO Sex Blogging" »

My head is not a nice place sometimes.

Sure, I come up with neat things like hooking video games to sex toys, and exercise bikes that play games. But then there's shit like this that comes up, and I really start to wonder about myself.

This time around, it's Teledildonic Conception.

So, join me and the bottle of wine that I'll be taking pulls off of frequently throughout writing this, and together let's explore one of the most deeply emotionally impacting, gut-wrenching (at least, for me) MMO game design ideas I've come up with in my stint as whatever the hell it is I am these days..

Continue reading "Teledildonic Conception" »

At the moment, most press/blogs are concentrating on virtual economies, i.e. real money spent on virtual objects, or virtual money turned into real money. But what happens when we combine those two, ending up with virtual money spent on things meant to be used outside of the virtual world?

So, to update, qDot (and possibly other MMOrgy authors) will be speaking at:

• South by Southwest Interactive
• March 11-14, Austin, TX
• "Secret Life of Sex in Games" Panel
• Game Developers Conference
• March 20-24, San Jose, CA
• Speaking as part of Brenda Brathwaite's Sex In Games talk
• Sex In Video Games Conference
• June 8-9, San Francisco, CA
• Lecture on Adult Video Game Hardware
• Panel on the player's point of view

Wheee, conferency goodness!

I try not to usually just publish Press Releases here, but this is important (and not just because it involves me :) )

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Evergreen Events Announces the First Annual Sex in Video Games Conference

Seattle, Washington - January 11, 2006 - Evergreen Events is pleased to announce the upcoming Sex in Video Games Conference: Exploring the Business of Digital Erotic Entertainment to be held June 8 and 9, 2006 at the Nob Hill Masonic Center in San Francisco, California. The conference is the first of its type and will be an annual event.

The unique conference will focus on the design, development, and technology of sex in video games from a national as well as international perspective. In addition, this conference will also have a strong focus on business matchmaking and networking. During the conference’s two day run, it will feature numerous lectures and keynotes, a machinima art show (erotic art and movies derived from video games) as well as panel discussions with leaders in video game and adult video game development.

Currently announced lectures include “Sex in Games: Where are We Now?” by Brenda Brathwaite, Game Designer and Founder and Chair of the International Game Developers Association’s Sexuality SIG, “The Future of Sex and Technology” by Dave Taylor, Game Producer and Game Consultant, and Programmer on DOOM and Quake among others, and “The Making of the SeXbox: Applied Hardware” by Kyle Machulis, a robotics engineer and founder of Slashdong.org and MMOrgy.com. Panels include “Designing Successful Online Erotic Games,” “Creating a Massively Multiplayer Online Erotic Game,” and, focusing on the international success of the hentai market, “Integrating International AO Success into the US Market.”

Continue reading "Evergreen Events annouces Sex In Games Conf" »

The Escapist is all about addiction this week, an issue that is dealt with quite often in the intersection of sex and the internet. Despite All Our Games discusses the matters of brain chemistry behind game addiction, explaining the biological matters of why we get hooked.

As anyone who talks to me with any frequency knows, I'm all about using events to harness brain chemistry for immersive player experiences, but just like any proper mad scientist project, something can always go awry, and this article shows one of those times. Of course, it's not as bad as say, snorting coke, like some people would have you believe. But, it can still crush parts of your life pretty badly (a war story most players have experienced at one time or another.), and adding sex to the mix just makes the solution even more volatile.

Just got an email about this, and we've gotten enough referals on SL that maybe, just MAYBE one of you is from Toronto and wouldn't mind being a celebrity...

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An upcoming CBC radio segment on the virtual world of Second Life needs one more Toronto resident to feature in an interview:

"We are still working on our radio show about Second Life for CBC Radio. We are short just one person in Toronto and we're coming to the city next week! So if you live in or near Toronto, and you wouldn't mind showing us around Second Life for a few hours, send me an e-mail. Because it is radio the interview is simple and comfortable (no cameras!) and we can be discrete about your real-life identity. If you can help us out please e-mail me at lindsaymotorcycle@gmail.com"

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Text via Clickable Culture

Nick Yee's Daedelus Project has just released a new set of demographics for MMO users. Some of the findings that are interesting to sex in games developers:

• For every single woman in an MMO, there are 10 single men.
• The romantic partners of female players are about three times more likely to play the MMO they play than the romantic partners of male players.
• Most of them didn’t stick with text-based gaming, but women were a lot more likely to stick with it than men.
• The more a player chats and socializes in an MMO, the more likely they report having fun.
• The more players chat and socialize, the lower their likelihood of quitting.

How these statistics will follow up in MMOVSGs are anyone's guess. The 10:1 ratio certainly doesn't bode well (though in a world that doesn't involving grinding to get anywhere, this will probably even out), but the satistics on chating and socializing are very promising.

via IGDA Sex In Games Blog

Last week was busy in terms of press, both good and bad.

On the good side, features on sex in MMOs from Germany's Der Spiegel and Wired Japan. Having covered two of what are considered to be the most sexually concious countries on the planet in the same week, we feel like we've done our job..

Back on the homefront, there's been some interesting developments in the discussion of Sex In MMOs. Mainly, it seems that few want to. Terra Nova's usually comment heavy posts went pretty light on the conversation, and Hamlet Linden's survey returned results showing that articles on Sex and Relationships were the least liked by readers.

Gauging by our technorati stats and hit statistics, Sex In MMOs still seems to be a interesting topic, though it does make me question how many people see it as a positive one. So, what do you think? Are readers just here for the shock value, are we on to something, or, once again, is it a little of both?

The tale of House Gallant is a short, unfortunate one. Originally started under a different name – /Taraes os Varol/, or ‘Master of Passion’ – the leader, Maeka, sought to create a guild in World of Warcraft that catered to a different style of play: that of Domination, Submission, and open slavery amongst its membership.

However, in the same month it started, House Gallant disbanded (due to internal conflicts, I was later told). But, Maeka agreed to talk to me, and tell me a little bit about what it was like to run a guild unlike any other in WoW.

Continue reading "Discussion with a Dominant" »

As we've been getting quite a few Second Life referals from the page (and again, thanks to everyone who signed up and used us as a referal, your money will be well spent on poseballs), I thought it might be appropriate to post a client optimization thread over on our message boards. This should help anyone that's been having to enjoy their bumping and grinding animations at .3 frames per second.

We'll try to keep this updated as new versions of Second Life come out, an event that always changes the rules of what makes things go fast.

Naughty America, one of the new MMOs coming out this Spring, has taken the precautionary step of adding opt-in background checking to their virtual world. Sentry is usually thought of as an online identification verifer for corperations and financial services, and this will be their first foray into the world of pixel sex.

While searching around the web for information on this new feature, we actually found a comment from some of the staff at Safe Escape, the company behind Naughty America.

"Cheers mates, my name is Dusty from Naughty America! I just wanted to comment a little on what I am seeing. Basically, I get the sense that y'all feel this will be some sort of on-line orgy. Not the case. We have taken some serious steps to ensure user safety w/credit card age verification and background checks thru Sentry. You have to understand that this is a dating and networking realm, not unlike those w/o any "game-like" features that we have implemented. The "sex" is optional and must be agreed upon by both parties. There will be a sense of realism here unlike the 'without remorse or consequences' sentiment of some of the other games out there."

After seeing this, I think it's safe to take Naughty America out of the MMOVSG list, since they don't actually seem to be concentrating on it. It seems like they're trying to take over the market currently held by places like Match, or, more likely, OkCupid. I see NA as trying to approach real dating through a virtual environment, meaning that it'll be the sims with hook up features.

How well this will work is questionable. On one end, it does provide an interesting environment that will be a little more friendly than a non-real-time-interactive webpage. People will be able to talk in av form before they talk in webcam/audio, but the world will have both ready and available for whatever people want.

This is where the Sentry issue comes in, though. If someone has a Sentry gold star on their profile, does that make them a star-bellied Sneech? Will this become something of an unwritten social rule within the world? What about all the plain-bellied Sneeches, cast into the same caste as criminals, rapists, and everyone else in the world that Sentry hasn't sniffed the privates of?

So, congratulations, Safe Escape, you beat the rest of the development community to the first implementation of Gattaca. A dating service where customers will be
(possibly unwittingly) concentrating on what they don't know about a set of people that are missing a piece of flare doesn't seem like a good idea.

I'm interested in hearing other people's views on this, since I'm rather biased. Would having this feature make you want to use the world? Is this the end of anonymity in mainstream worlds? Please tell us what you think.

In the region of Eventide sits a fairly innocuous shopping mall. Yet beyond its nondescript doors lies the nexus of Second Life sex and the home of Xcite! interactive genitals.

I recently interviewed the spokesslaveman of Xcite to get the low down on the hard on.

Continue reading "The Xcite Phenomenon" »

Ren Renoylds at Terra Nova (the blog choosy acadmics choose for their MMOG news) has a post up with predictions on the success of upcoming MMOEG/MMOVSG titles. According to Ren, the outlook for the current line-up seems a little bleak, with everyone getting something right, but no one getting everything right. Will MMOEGs take off, or will mainstream companies bend to the will of the horny consumer?

Boy, it's gonna be a fun year to watch.