Games of the Abstract: Spooky Starlets - Movie Monsters (2022)

 

Developer: MogWallop Games

Publisher: TinyHat Studios

One Player

Windows

 

Trying to cover an adult video game seriously, even a softcore one, could be seen if you are not careful as sleazy in principal. A lot of this comes with the taboo sex is in art still, but there is also the issue that, if you are going to take the subject seriously, of how one brings in the erotic even if meant to titillate first into a video game, as with all media like cinema or literature, let alone those wishing to have a more cerebral take on the subject. Games with real explicit sex, even if fictionalised, are a niche which is also prolific in their number, found even on Steam and GOG and easy to make. That presents a new problem, as with filmed pornography itself, not only of their moralities but also the quality of their presentation beyond their selling point. There is also the issue, if to be crass about this, of how the interactive nature of the video game interjects between the pornographic, as there is the likelihood that, if you make the game legitimately challenging, some would not want to play the game. This is more of a case due to that proliferation of titles, now developing video games is easier; now we are past American Multiple Industries, who produced a notorious line of pornographic games for the Atari 2600, but looked like games for that system from the eighties, or a more innocent game in hindsight like Gals Panic (1990), which just offered nude images.

We now have a lot of games which are hardcore in vast numbers, even in the more mainstream sphere, the only factor that there is clearly a restriction on real images, hence where animated characters (polygonal or drawn) are more commonplace, be it visual novels imported from Japan or other genres, even the least likely like scrolling bullet hell shooters.  It is a challenge, especially if the developers wanted to make a game with a more profound centre or at least with a sense of care to the production, when there is a glut of pornographic games cheaply made as competition, found online if not in digital stores. Spooky Starlets, on the surface, is also a card building game which is a hybrid with a visual novel, though sadly this was clearly a case, as we will get into, where there was an ambitious plan but the budget (time, resources and money) forced a compromise. This one came from that well, including outside of games for Steam and GOG, originating from the areas like Newground, a site founded in 1995 to encourage independently made short animation, illustration and games which also has an adult section, but changing considerably over time.

The premise, even without the explicit content, is enticing even if it was entirely a comedy, in which you play a faceless protagonist, with only narration, who dies but finds that the afterlife they are of us. This underworld full of ghouls and ghosts has an adult film making industry and you are a good candidate to run the lot. The adult film industry as a concept, especially as this runs closer to the "Golden Age" where theatrical films were made rather than videos for the internet, is its own complicated and moral complex entity, where that Golden Age had its issues, even running into conflict with criminal groups, and the modern day industry has a lot of issues of its own. There is thankfully work made with ethics, let alone female directors and producers making diverse work for a diverse audience, but you also get morally problematic content, morally problematic people involved and issues of stereotyping including exoticising ethnicity, which is not to be found in Spooky Starlets at all. This is a sanitised version of an industry with its virtuous individuals and its problematic ones. It is a high concept premise, as a macabre cartoon, where you run a studio where your female stars can involve an actual vampire or slime from Dungeons & Dragons formed into a woman.

Spooky Starlets was a game which went through many changes, originally closer to simple business management game where scenarios with the film shoots, the stars and sets were to be chosen from a number to get the best results¹, with there being cameo roles for female characters from other independent erotic video games¹. It is fascinating, in mind that these games, despite their popularity, can be looked down upon for their pornographic content yet they are not different in the slightest to mainstream games, even how they go through development which drastically changes their tone and gameplay entirely. There was a drastic change to this being entirely set around being a deck building game instead, simplifying the choices further. This is its own niche which has gained traction as a genre, even spinning in side genres like rouge-like deck building games, a genre based around the idea of taking real life card games but making digital games around collecting new cards, or just using those you have as in Spooky Starlets, and negotiating challenges with the right ones. Slay the Spire (2019) is an example of this genre, but card and deck building has found itself in even bigger games and spin-offs, such as Phantasy Star Online Episode III: C.A.R.D. Revolution (2003) for the Nintendo GameCube or Metal Gear Acid (2004) for the Playstation Portable handheld console.

The difference here and there is no point, if you the reader have comfortably read this review so far, to not shyly dodge around the themes of Spooky Starlet, is that the cards here including the cast and event cards meant to change the hand include sex positions in different suits as well, which you have to carefully choose. With this originally a game which included working around how to run the studio, let alone film the movies, you could probably see without any background detail that Spooky Starlets could have been a lot more ambitious in its original plan than what you get, with the potential that this was a full world to explore with its female cast of titular starlets, or that its visual novel cut scenes are that, without any of the multiple choices visual novels allow for different endings or trajectories which could have effected how the main card building game went. If you as a player were happy with the fully explicit content, this could have been a fun and unconventional game. Even as a fantasised version of this industry, imaging cards at hand such as the camera malfunctioning or location scouting being a factor would have made it a fun game, and certainly with the right tone and right attitude one which could have avoided being scuzzy.

The game, barring one curious choice of a horny tree, to its credit never feels scuzzy. It says, unfortunately, how much of the material on Steam by itself causes me to want a restraining order separating me from it, as this game is probably a rare one which, to the right people, is wholesome and defendable in its sexual content. Its world and its female cast, if you were to step away from the sexual content and the cast being figures that are meant to play archetypes of lustful figures, are distinct as characters just in their designs, and it is telling that over the development changes, they were never altered in the slightest. Especially as the visual novel story itself is effectively playing a faceless agony aunt, a person there with the right words for this cast who have their own hang-ups and concerns outside of their work, even for the male cast in one or two cases, there is a fascinating cast here to work with if more production time was possible for this game. One figure named Suzy Stitches could be seen as problematic, as she is a Frankenstein woman built literally for this job, but she is an energetic woman wishing to have a life more outside of sex, even if she is enthusiastic about that still. There is a were woman Redd, whose rowdy attitude is contrasted by her jaunts into the moral world like a bull in a  china store; Vivian, a spider woman and veteran, whose esteemed male admirer, a goblin who we would categorise as a twink,  eventually melts her demeanour with his respect for her career; Rella, a goat demon whose difficult to express herself is a concern for her demon boyfriend; Francine, a vampire living under the shadow of her elder sister, who wishes to overcome this by entering a literally sex Olympics; Drusilla, an Egyptian mummy whose class status, faked, is revealed and creates a personality crisis; and Lucy, a fitness demon who is struggling with her body image.

There is also the main story, focused around your senior, a demoness, who wishes secretly to participate in filming, and Blibby, the slime girl who is blissfully at peace with herself, whilst it is a male co-worker, a porn actor on strike, who is more concerned with her constant attention for him, especially as his libido next to hers is dwarfed. None of this is dramatically complex, and is all a pretext for the sexual content, with some animation and voice acting for the female characters, but considering the hard work put into designing and fleshing these characters out, with even distinct silhouettes to them, they present a diverse and likable set of leads for a lot of comedy and melodrama. Aesthetically, there is a huge step up next to many of the games you can find previewed on Steam in terms of erotic games, embracing the cartoonish with the supernatural, literally a cartoon show if made for adults. This does admittedly present a potential acquired taste if you do view it as erotica - it is very cartoonish and the cast do include explicitly inhuman figures, such as Vivian being an actual spider woman with four limbs, before if you factor in how it may be a divide for some to find animated characters arousal, something in mind that Steam, for their liberalness, have a noticeable lack of live action erotic games on their digital shelves².

A bigger issue in the end, however, is that with its bright and colourful, even having a main musical theme, that the game is short. The one thing that is of focus when playing this game is its sexual content, which is defendable, next to material with uncomfortable streaks of sexism, non consensual content or just bad presentation just in their Steam pages, but that is juxtaposed against the fact that the gameplay to get to this, even next to a visual novel which would have a lot of routes to choose from, is slight. Once you figure out the basics - certain combinations of cards, in different suits, are needed to reach certain goals - there is only a few challenges repeated, such as over 24 points in value, and it does not vary at all beyond this to get each chapter for each starlet's story. The visual novel element has no alternative paths as mentioned, and there is no additional content beyond the "Creative" mode which is getting unlimited access to cards to make scenes with, which is not for everyone as that was clearly a mode emphasising this as erotica. There is a sense, as an independent production published by TinyHat Studios, who specialise in erotic games, the ambition from its Newground days to its newest form was too high for the resources, and the game's creators felt that by 2022, they needed to bring the project home or it would have been stuck endlessly updated with no true final version.

The hope, which is a reach sadly, is that this has enough fans to have a follow up, as even if you jettisoned the erotic content, it entices with its distinct characters and its kooky premise. Considering the low bar into this area of gaming too, where it comes from a place of cheap games churned out with people commenting on their playing erotic games in their main Steam account, just the idea is interesting enough. Even if the erotic scenes here are still the selling point, one which bothered with an aesthetic, one which is actually something you could comfortably play with a significant other, and of macabre friends in underworld adult movies, deserves a revisit or a sequel. More so as the idea it was originally meant to have, card building game meets visual novel meets erotic game, is certainly one of the most idiosyncratic you could get.

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1) Though it is censored, I will warn anyone this still qualifies as NSFW in the truest sense, but the original template for the game, preserved on a Reddit thread from 2018, still exists in the wild. It gives you an idea of how this changed over the years, linked to here with just the chart by itself.  Then there is also the one for the guest character from another character here.

2) Sadly I do have to point to a game in this review which radiates sleezy from its aura, a work from a "professional" pick up artist named Super Seducer 3 (2021), where the two first games were available on Steam but Valve refused to publish this third game. Alongside how the culture of the "pickup artist" is its own problematic beast, with these games meant to teach a player this culture for their own use, the issue was Valve's refusal to release a game with sexually explicit images of real people on their Steam platform, which suggests that the free nature of Steam in terms of sexually explicit content does draw a line with the non-real, the drawn and the animated acceptable. Even then, there is likelihood moments where Valve will have to even be brought in to question and consider some of the titles they will and will not release on the store even with this clear divide, and I am surprised in fact there has not been any real trouble, as for GOG, with some of the titles they have had with moral campaigns still. Taken from Steam will not sell pickup artist game Super Seducer 3, written by Jonathan Bolding for PC Gamer, published on March 20th 2021.