Adult entertainment, 1987: Leisure Suit Larry

In my #FridayFlash this week, "The Grammarian vs. Laser Suit Larry", there is an obvious play on one of the old heroes of computer gaming, Leisure Suit Larry. It seems incredible to me that anyone might NOT know who Leisure Suit Larry is, but just in case:
Leisure Suit Larry is a series of adventure games written by Al Lowe and published by Sierra from 1987 to 2009. The main character, is Larry Laffer who, though still somewhat lovable, is a balding, dorky, double entendre-speaking, leisure suit-wearing "loser" in his 40s. The games follow him as he spends much of his life trying (usually unsuccessfully) to seduce attractive women.
The Leisure Suit Larry games were among the most groundbreaking of their time for Western audiences. They showed that computer games could be based around adult subjects like sex. While dating sims and hentai porn games were filling a market for Japanese gamers, in America, computer games were for kids and Peter Pans.

Even today, mainstream American games that have overt sexual themes are rare. In fact, I can't think of any. Now as then, when Leisure Suit Larry ruled the roost (or tried to, desperately), the game must be heavily leavened with humor to defang the sex.



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1 comment:

  1. Adult Entertainment is in expansion, that's for sure. I enjoy it, and i am sure everyone does..

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