Saturday 14 October 2023

Leisure Suit Larry 6 - Risqué Business, or (Forced) Sex on the Beach

by Alex


As you can likely tell from the opening image, this post is going to get decidedly non-family friendly. You’ve been warned.
Actually, this is something I’ve agonized a bit about when covering Leisure Suit Larry games, especially this one, which is a bit more ribald than the others. My general blogging approach is to not swear, not make gross sex jokes, and use more innuendo and subtle humor. And yet, I started this post with a censored picture of a dress-wearing man’s giant erection, which is not exactly the height of subtlety. I didn’t exactly erect a façade of tumescent effort in order to make sure this opening did not become too turgid. I should have engaged in more foreplay before pounding you with such vulgarity. My sincerest apologies.

So yes, I have defenestrated these concerns, if not all the way then at least part way, in my discussion of Leisure Suit Larry 6, in a way I didn’t even when writing about Freddy Pharkas: Frontier Pharmacist. To be fair, that game is nowhere near as explicit as this one, but still: horse farts.
I will never stop referencing this screenshot.
My point is this: if the readers and moderators of The Adventurers Guild ever feel like this is all a little too much, too gross and explicit, please let me know and I’ll tone it down. If this were my personal blog, things would be different, but it’s not. It is our blog. Or more precisely, I am a guest writer. As such, I will defer to my hosts’ rules.

With that out of the way, let’s get on with the show. This was a very raunchy session, featuring lots of sexual encounters both bad and, well, bad. So yes: consider yourself warned.

I left off last session having just taken a shower. In the game, silly, not in real life (though I did that too, in the interim). In that post, I lamented that I didn’t even try to pee in the shower. So this time, I did. Sadly, you can’t. I mean in the game, not in real life. In real life you can pee all you want in the shower; it’s your life, pal, and I’m not here to tell you what to do (but don’t do it; it’s gross). But I did have the brilliant idea to hop in the mud bath and the sauna wearing only a towel.

So yep. Larry can hop in the mud bath (1 point) and sit there. And fart. Because this is a classy, classy game.
Or maybe clASSy.
Instead of melting to death, yup, Larry sits in the mud bath. Nothing else to do but hop and wow! Larry is covered in mud! Who’d’ve thunk it? Is there going to be another blackface/black . . . uh, body gag like in Leisure Suit Larry 5? I sure hope not!
Never forget.
I mean, it would be on-brand for Al Lowe and Co.’s unique brand of humor, but sometimes a man just doesn’t want to engage in any racially charged tomfoolery. He wants regular tomfoolery. Colorblind tomfoolery. The kind of tomfoolery Dr. King would have wanted.
“I have a dream . . . that adventure games will be judged by the content of their jokes . . . and not the color of their protagonist!”
I shower Larry off before I have to find out (3 points) and hop into the sauna. I don’t melt this time either, but there’s nothing doing here, and yes, I did try to pee on the hot rocks. To no avail.
Did this happen in Leisure Suit Larry 4?
I shower Larry off again (3 points) and decide to get on with the game. I had remembered an electrical socket in the mud bath room, but an interesting thing happened in the inventory: instead of clicking the “Take” icon (the one where the hand looks like it’s holding a guitar pick) to actually grab and be able to move the icon, I used the “Hand” icon, which is usually used to manipulate items, and Larry strips a bit of the wire off at one end (12 points). This sounds a lot kinkier than it actually was.
Bob Vila would be so proud.
I plug this modified electrical cord into the outlet (7 points) and . . . nothing happened. There’s just an exposed, electrified wire just sitting there. I’ll bet it’s for a future puzzle, but I’m not worried because this game, so far, is really good at not putting the player in a walking-dead scenario. It seems to only trigger certain events when you’re ready. It’s the anti-King’s Quest, or better yet, the anti-Jim Wa . . .

Whew! I almost uttered . . . that name again. And no, I won’t use that picture again (*jimwallsindoor.jpeg*). I’ve heard about it enough, thank you very much.

Off to solve some outstanding puzzles: I can indeed inflate the beaver float (14 points) with the taco truck’s leaky tire (what a strange sentence!):
Larry, you scamp.
I then make the mistake of trying to use the float without a bathing suit, and plummet to my death.
This leisure suit is deadly! First the mud bath, then the sauna, and now this? Was “death by leisure suit” really a thing in the 70s? Can some old-timer please shed some light on this vital chapter in American history? The people need to know.

Why Larry can’t just sit on the float and push off without going into the water, I don’t know, but then again, I don’t design adventure games! What do I look like? A retired California Highway Patrol man-turned-legendary adventure game designer/sex symbol? Please. I’m no James Room Divider (you notice I didn’t say “Jim Walls”?), that’s for sure.

So swimming is out, and I can’t even put on Larry’s sweet stolen shades because Larry is not wearing a bathing suit. Kind of a weird rule, but okay game, I’m in your world now. I then start to do that classic adventure game thing: revisiting every area to see what, if anything has changed. Leisure Suit Larry 6 has already established that this is a gameplay mechanic, so who knows if some item I’ve picked up has triggered something else to happen, or if these changes are timing based?
I head back to the Blues Bar and find Burgundy, a country singer, warbling a tune that is, no joke, about a cop in Lytton who arrests a prostitute and then falls in love.

I’m not making this up:
The song is called “Cell Block Love,” and it’s about high-school sweethearts Sonny Bonds and “Sweet Cheeks” Marie. After graduation they drift apart like many young lovers. He becomes a cop, she becomes a prostitute. These fateful choices send them on a collision course with destiny. If you recall in Police Quest 1, Marie gets arrested, and Sonny agrees to spring her if she will act as his hooker while Sonny disguises himself as a pimp to infiltrate a high-stakes poker tournament to take down the Death Angel. Truly a love story for the ages: Romeo and Juliet . . . Luke and Laura . . . Sonny and Cher . . . Sonny and Sweet Cheeks. Which cheeks? Why, the sweet ones, of course.

While I didn’t get enough screenshots of all the lyrics, here they are reproduced in full:
The boys could find my number written by the telephone,
The sort of girl a Lytton man could take, then leave alone.
In high school I was voted Miss Congeniality,
But then I asked myself, "Why am I doin' it fer free?"

I knew when you grew up next door, you had a crush on me.
You'd been the high school quarterback, then joined the LPD.
That night you caught me hookin' and you hauled me off to jail,
You wrapped your arms around me and you held me without bail!

Chorus
The lifeline that you threw me were the handcuffs that you used.
You left my heart locked up, and my wrists a little bruised.
You brought me down for questioning, I had to say, "I do!"
Your kisses sentenced me to life in Cell Block Love with you.

I sit alone and cry when you refuse to wear your vest.
I never know if you'll come home or take one in the chest.
I sit and stare when you won't wear your firearm like you should.
I know someday they'll find you, dear, flatlinin' in the 'hood!

I pray you're just unfaithful when you don't come home 'til two.
Perhaps I oughtta go back out and hit the streets like you.
We sure could use the extra cash, for bills we've plenty of,
And you could run me in, like on the night we fell in love!

Chorus
I waive my right to silence, here's the statement that I'll sign:
I do confess to lovin' you and wantin' you fer mine!
Is it so wrong, a workin' girl who loves a man in blue?
I hope I never make parole from Cell Block Love with you.

It's never solitary here in Cell Block Love with you.
My prison address, darlin', is in Cell Block Love with you!
My friends, I’m being haunted. There’s no other explanation.
“You can run, Alex . . .”
Burgundy won’t talk to Larry because she’s singing country in a blues bar, so I do what I did when nobody was singing: click “Hand” on the microphone cable and trip over it (10 points), thereby knocking out the power and forcing the bartender to call in Gary to fix it.

That’s right: nobody can figure out that you just have to . . . plug it in.
Before Gary comes, I talk to Burgundy.
Nice dress!
She’s a good ol’ country gal singin’ and playin’ until some big fancy high-falutin’ record exec wanders in and hands her a big ol’ record deal. Larry can’t help her with that. But her immediate need, what she really wants right now, is a drink. And none of those, uh, “faggy” non-alcoholic beverages served up by La Costa Lotta.
Her words, not mine!
Obviously, some of the humor hasn’t aged all that well. As I said in the introduction to this post, if readers would overwhelmingly prefer a more bowdlerized write-up, let me know. My intent with these posts is to capture the flavor of the game (gross as it may be), raise a few laughs, and maybe make us all think about the nature of humor, comedy, and how to view works of art and entertainment that come from different eras. I’m not trying to shock or offend anyone here; I’m merely trying to stay within the spirit of the game as I detail both my playthrough and how Leisure Suit Larry 6 stacks up as a game-qua-game. Did you think you were going to get Latin in this post? Cogito ergo sum! E pluribus unum! Gesundheit!

Larry offers to buy Burgundy a drink (2 points), and luckily he’s toting some alcoholic beverages right now. Six, in fact. Larry hands over the beers (6 points), which Burgundy immediately begins to chug, belching every now and then. Charming. This whole game is charming. Burping, farting, peeing, boob jokes, dick jokes, it’s a never-ending parade of class and dignity. Like a Mel Brooks movie. In fact, this game has a very seventies comedy vibe, although it was made in the 90s. I think it’s, at the risk of using a Very On Line term, Boomer humor. As in, made by people from that generation. At least, this is the impression I get as someone between Gen X and Millennial (b. 1981). Your mileage may vary.
So Burgundy downs her beers, Gary comes in and fixes the problem, Burgundy goes back on stage, and . . . nothing happens. I wondered if there was something I was supposed to do while Burgundy was drinking, but I couldn’t even talk to her. I also was unable to go into the backstage area while Burgundy was around, either playing or just sitting on stage, but I’m not worried because I’ve already established that Larry can just get a few more beers (see the previous post). I decide to leave and stop off in Larry’s room along the way. As I walk, I go to the outside area, thinking I can pick some of the flowers up for Rose near the stairs that lead to the beach, but no such luck.
Ah well.

Back in Larry’s room, it looks like the maid did turn down the bed . . . and left Larry a present.
What would a Larry game be without a little rubber humor? I take the condom, obviously (4 points), and examining it reveals that it’s “Spartan” brand, sized extra small. Sick burn, Al Lowe!
“Wow, Larry has a small penis! What a novel joke!”
Anyway, I also try to grab the flowers on the table, thinking that I might have just misclicked in my earlier attempt, and yup: you can just grab them (4 points).

I head into the bathroom, because why not? This is a Larry game. And Larry’s not alone.
This here’s Mark, the plumber. He’s fixing the clogged toilet Larry filled with toilet paper, just because, during my last session. What a gross looking character!
When you click the “Zipper” icon on him.
Larry comments about Mark’s toolbelt just sticking out there, so I click “Take” on it and lo and behold, Larry swipes the monkey wrench from him (8 points). Perfect! I’ll bet this’ll come in handy to fix the cellulite drainage machine!
I recall the game telling me some screws were loose on that red thing in the center, but Larry couldn’t undo the bolts by hand. Well, he sure can with his—I mean, Mark’s—wrench (5 points). Now, Larry can lift the cover and remove the filter (4 points), which is clogged with some disgusting viscous white substance that smells like spoiled seafood. Nasty! This needs to be cleaned, and the Narrator tells me that Larry’s hand soap won’t do the trick. No, it’ll take something “industrial strength” to get rid of this. I have an idea, but first, since I’m near Rose, I figure I’ll give her the flowers she longs for.

There’s also a hose in the cellulite drainage machine that’s broke (see the yellow thing in the middle-left of the screenshot) that I can’t fix now, so I note that for later.

Rose is very happy to get flowers from Larry (5 points), and promises to give him a little something for his troubles. This begins another very classy sequence, emphasis on the “assy.”
She asks Larry to look at the painting on the left wall.
Then she lubes up and asks Larry if he’s ready for a good time.
Rose asks Larry to drop his pants and grab the handles on the wall, which he does.
Larry wonders why Rose doesn’t turn off the lights, shortly before he is given (sigh) a colonic.
Forcibly.
I guess ramming things up dude’s anuses without their foreknowledge or consent is funny? Interestingly, this isn’t the only example of forced sodomy in this session. What a game.
After enduring the colonic (comedy!), Rose gives Larry a beautiful orchid for his trouble (15 points). I’m not sure what this is supposed to symbolize, but a quick internet search informs me that orchids represent “thoughtfulness, refinement, fertility, beauty, charm, and love.” In other words, everything Leisure Suit Larry games do not. I’d also be remiss without mentioning that the word “orchid” comes from the ancient Greek word “orchis,” meaning “testicle.” According to internet sources, eating the tubers of the orchid was thought to increase male fertility. My guess is that the modern Greek word for testicle, “archidi,” comes from this root.

That’s right: I may not speak Greek fluently, but I know all the good words. And look at you: Latin and Greek in a post on The Adventure Gamer about a freakin’ Leisure Suit Larry game. That’s me: classin’ up the joint.

Ha ha. “ClASS.”

At a bit of a loss, I head back to Larry’s room, thinking maybe he needs to take a shower after the colonic. But look: Mark the gross plumber is still there, this time grossly fixing Larry’s sink.
Seriously: Such an unappealing character.
The game mentions that Mark looks uncomfortable lying down while wearing his tool belt, so I click the “Take” icon on him again, and this time Larry swipes a file (8 points). So I think I get it now: You’re supposed to call the number for maintenance to get Mark to come fix the sink so you can get the file, and then at some point clog the toilet with toilet paper to get him to come fix the toilet. I think I did the toilet paper part out of order, because, as you’ll see later, you can make Larry drop a deuce, and when he wipes up, the toilet paper clogs the toilet, thereby prompting the player to make Larry call maintenance in a more normal sequence of events. What a disgusting puzzle, when you stop and think about it. So let’s do what one really should do while playing a Leisure Suit Larry game and don’t think.
When you leave the bathroom, Mark comes out and vacates the premises, his work done, so I guess he’s one of the few actually useful people at La Costa Lotta. I go in and have Larry wash his hands with the hand soap and the not-brown water. And yup, Larry washes his hands. I use the washcloth on Larry next, and he washes his face before keeping the damp washcloth (6 points). I’m sure this’ll come in handy for a puzzle, but which one has so far eluded me.

Speaking of puzzles, Leisure Suit Larry 6 does something I like that old adventure games were good at—the well-written ones at least—which is making the player need to use the clues in the descriptions to figure things out. The constant references to Mark’s toolbelt when looking at him are one example, but so was the reference on the maid’s cart parked outside of Larry’s room to the stuff Larry can see on the front of the cart. Something I missed in my first session is that you can find different stuff if you look on the back side.
Ha ha, “the back side.” Al Lowe’s got me seeing butt references everywhere.
Whereas Larry took the hand crème, toilet paper, towel, and wash cloth from the front, here he can take dental floss (4 points) and a toilet seat cover (2 points). Now, maybe Larry can finally poop!

Yep, he can poop.
Aren’t you glad you’re reading this post?
You get points for using the toilet seat cover, aka ass gasket (2 points), for using the toilet paper (1 point) and washing Larry’s dirty hands (2 points). Of course, there’s also a really gross game over you can get while Larry’s sitting on the can.

Remember that brochure we picked up on Gary’s desk? Remember the hand crème? Yeah . . . I’m apologizing in advance.
So then you use the hand crème, and . . .
The sound effect during this sequence is truly disgusting.
I’m so, so sorry you had to see that. However, the gag that there’s nobody watching until Larry starts whacking it is a pretty good one.

MOVING ON.

I have an idea to clean that filter. The kitchen with the taco truck had a dishwashing machine next to the sink. In the summer of 1998 I washed dishes at the Bridgeside Diner in Holderness, New Hampshire, and used one of these things extensively. While the game didn’t describe it earlier when I used the “Eye” icon on it, the Narrator’s statement that I’d need something industrial strength stuck with me—another of those textual clues I mentioned—so I try clicking the clogged filter on the sink, and son of a gun, it worked (10 points).
With the filter now clean, I replace it in the cellulite drainage machine (4 points) and tighten the lid (3 points), but the machine still doesn’t work when I turn it on. There’s the hose, and Larry notices that that the shaft on the left side is dry. So, looking through my inventory, I try using the lard on it, and it works (6 points).
The jokes, they write themselves.
I’m still stumped on the broken hose though, and the game actually calls me out for just trying to click anything on it, which I think is pretty funny. I’ll come back here later.

I figure I might as well snag more beer and try giving it to Burgundy again to see what I missed.
Well, she takes the beer (8 points) and instead of going through the whole “calling Gary” scenario, Burgundy asks to use the sauna, so Larry invites her there to have that little date with Cav. So Burgundy leaves, before slipping out of her dress, which I find in the backstage area (13 points), solving another puzzle, as this is what Shablee wanted.
Theft: It’s an adventure gamer’s bread and butter.
I get Larry into his towel, and try wearing Burgundy’s dress just for fun.
Nice little shout out.
So the sequence with Burgundy and Cav in the sauna (10 points) goes exactly how you’d imagine: the two ladies are super-interested in each other, ignoring Larry who’d have found Burgundy more than willing to get it on if he’d just not invited Cav. Oh well, can’t have a comedy game without the comedy, but this scene goes on a bit too long. Kind of like this post.
Latin, Greek, AND French! TAG givin’ you an EDUCATION!
Eventually, Larry comments that the sauna needs more steam, but like a dope he trips and knocks the entire bucket onto the coals, really fogging up the place.
Predictably, Cav and Burgundy are gone when the steam clears, but Burgundy left her silver bracelet behind, which Larry naturally takes (12 points). I try to take the bucket, figuring I can get ice, but the game says Larry doesn’t need it. Hey game, you’re an adventure game. Carrying useless stuff is part of the whole experience. I spent how long carrying a stupid beaver float, and you’re going to tell me I don’t need a bucket? What gives?

Ah well. At least I have one other puzzle to solve: Shablee! She’s obviously happy to get the dress (14 points), and tells Larry to meet her on the beach that night for some fun.
So Larry heads down to the beach, leading to what I’m guessing is one of the game’s more controversial gags.
Shablee is wearing Burgundy’s dress, sitting by a fire, with a bucket of champagne and two glasses. Larry chats her up, puts his hands on her, and eventually they start making out pretty hot and heavy.
Things are going well . . . too well. Eventually, Shablee asks Larry if he has a condom, which he does. Are things finally going to go Mr. Laffer’s way? He gives her the prophylactic (13 points), but instead of putting it on Larry . . . well . . .
So yeah, she’s a he. Larry crawls away as Shablee approaches, the screen goes black, and we hear Larry howl as Shablee presumably has his way with him. So some of the offense people might take is that this joke is transphobic, but I don’t see it that way. For all Shablee knows, Larry knows and is really into him! Also, I thought there was a difference between a transvestite, what was called a cross-dresser back in the day (a man who dressed up like a woman) and an actual transsexual (someone who has had the surgery and whatnot), but I could be wrong. I’m no expert.

Like I said earlier in this post, this is Mel Brooks-level humor. Guy thinks he’s with a girl, he’s with a guy, which is not what he’s into or what he bargained for, ha ha, jokes on him! Except here . . . the implication is that Shablee, well, that Shablee raped Larry. I mean, Larry screamed, right?
This becomes clear later the next morning when I return to the beach to see if the champagne is still there, which it is (6 points) and Larry says that he earned that champagne.
So he earned a bottle of champagne by being forcibly sodomized against his will? That’s funny? It’s the way that apparently men getting raped in prison is funny too. It’s offensive to the trans community and to men. I don’t know, friends: This whole sequence doesn’t really land in any respect, but your mileage may vary. I expect the comments to be wild on this one.

Hopefully next time Larry can have some adventures that don’t involve things being inserted up his dumper without his permission. The worst part of this entire session, though, the most disappointing thing, was that I found nothing else for Larry to pee on, in, or around. I thought this game was supposed to be fun!

OUTSTANDING PUZZLES:

  • Fixing the brown water
  • Fixing the cellulite drainage machine for Gammie
  • Finding a girl to go to the sauna with for Cav
  • Finding batteries for Char
  • Finding a dress for Shablee
  • Finding handcuffs for Thunderbird
  • Finding flowers for Rose
  • Getting the handcuffs from Daryl
  • Get a receipt marked PAID IN FULL to get past Daryl
  • Find a bathing suit
  • Use the high dive at the pool
  • Blow up the beaver float
  • Get ice from the ice machine
  • Use the elevator
  • Use the dumbwaiter
  • Find more stuff to urinate on, in, or around
Session Time: 1 hours, 35 minutes
Total Time: 4 hours, 30 minutes

Total Points: 417

Inventory: Cav’s badge, inflated float, silver bracelet, brochure, champagne and bucket, file, dental floss, hand crème, random key, room key, lamp, match, orange, orchid, sunglasses, little cloth, ass gasket, toilet paper, towel, damp washcloth, wrench

Things Urinated On, In, or Around: 4 (In the room key return box, behind the taco truck, in the fountain in the towel room, in the toilet in Larry’s room)

Things Rammed Up Larry’s Butt: 2 (Rose’s colonic machine, Shablee)

21 comments:

  1. First, I would say that you should keep the entries as NSFW as you choose, as long as it is below the jump break. The game is what it is, and the humor is, as you say, the same level as a Mel Brooks' film, which can be seen any night on a public TV station. Instead of breaks for "words from our sponsors", there will just be blog posts about less interesting games.

    Your query in the post left me scratching my head. Has anyone ever been killed by a leisure suit? I'm sure some people in the disco age were killed for them, just as kids a couple of decades ago were killed for their "kicks" (sneakers, for those in other cultures.)

    It is indeed possible for polyester leisure suits to kill people in a controlled, scientific setting but I found no evidence in my searches for actual occurrences by the end users. But my Google searching also found me a sweet Halloween costume that's sure to get all the ladies giving me their treats.

    As for the Shablee stuff, I've commented before that my problem with people angry with the joke is that Larry was a victim here. Shablee failed to do the most responsible thing: tell the potential partner that she wasn't what he was expecting. Instead, she kept it a secret, and sprung it on him (ahem) at the last second.

    The gargling in the bathroom isn't from sodomy. Even as a teen, I understood that was just from Larry having unknowingly been kissing a man, against his preferences.

    Did he earn the champagne? I never took it as rewards from being assaulted, but rather as something good coming out of a bad evening where he was victimized and deceived. While the scene would definitely be written differently these days, the issue was always the deception.

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  2. Al Lowe probably intended the Shablee situation to be just a mutual misunderstanding that leads to wacky hijinks; a stock sitcom gag since the 70's. But it's hard not to see this trope as transphobic nowadays; people have killed over this in real life.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_panic_defense#Uses_of_the_trans_panic_defense

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    1. Yeah, "gay panic" is what comes to mind for me now too. Really kind of sours the joke.

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    2. It is very upsetting that we don't just completely dismiss transphobes out of hand when they are simultaneously insisting that trans women "are really gay men trying to trick straight men into gay sex" and also "are really straight men trying to trick lesbians into straight sex".

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  3. I would observe, regarding that certain subject, that Larry isn't the worst game talked about on this blog in regards to that. If you read it, Gram Cats, among likely other future games from the glorious nation of Nippon, isn't hiding it's rudeness under the guise of comedy. Just be sure to dance around certain subjects and don't be surprised if cuts are made.

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  4. I'm really disappointed that you not only didn't see the transphobia, which is absolutely blatant, but partake in it by misgendering Shablee.

    Shablee has a feminine name, wears feminine clothes and makeup, and has a feminine voice. She even has breasts. There's every indication that she wants to be seen as a woman and has gone through a lot of effort to accomplish this. It's not for a drag performance; she's like that even when just hanging out at a health spa. And she expresses interest in a man who clearly sees her as a woman. She just happens to also have a penis.

    There are two ways to interpret this. One is that Shablee is just a straight trans woman, existing. The other is that Shablee is actually a man, willing to give up his status and masculinity, endure a dysphoria-inducing transition, and put a lot of effort into attempting to look like a woman, all in order to trick and sexually assault straight men. One describes something that exists and has existed throughout human history. The other is only a paranoid fantasy held by transmisogynists, but which serves both to legally justify murder (see that trans panic link above) and as the basis of legislation intended to exclude trans women from public life.

    Even though Larry was attracted to her and consensually kissed her, finding out that she's trans causes him to react in disgust. That's textbook transphobia. And the player is supposed to agree with Larry. The game follows a basic pattern of "Larry think he's going to have sex with a woman, but something gets in the way", so the player should agree here that Shablee being trans is enough of an obstacle. While Larry isn't a good person, it's clear that being revealed to be a transphobe is intended to be compatible with his "lovable loser" persona in a way that, say, being revealed to be a racist wouldn't. Just try to imagine a hypothetical game where Larry kissed a white-looking woman but then gagged at the realization that she was actually mixed-race.

    After Larry's reaction, the game then takes it step further, with the implied rape. Consent can be withdrawn at any point, for any reason. That can include not wanting certain types of sex. It can also include just not wanting to have sex with that person anymore, no matter the reason. And yet Shablee proceeds even though Larry definitely no longer consents.

    So we first have Larry being disgusted at having been attracted to a trans woman, then we have the game saying that actually yes, that paranoid fantasy really is right, and trans women really are just sexual predators. It really is vile.

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  5. FWIW I never pictured the Shablee incident as actually involving nonconsensual anal intercourse. I figured that Larry bugged out and ran and that the scream was merely from seeing the, er, equipment, not because he was actually raped.

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    1. My view also, at the time and now, and the evidence I'd use to back that up is that if he had engaged in that activity, we would see the same death scene we saw with Gary in the previous post.

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  6. Also, I thought there was a difference between a transvestite, what was called a cross-dresser back in the day (a man who dressed up like a woman) and an actual transsexual (someone who has had the surgery and whatnot), but I could be wrong. I’m no expert.

    There can be differences between someone who cross-dresses either just because they like the look, or for sexual gratification, and yet nevertheless considers themselves to still be the gender usually associated with their bodily features; and people who are actually transsexual, or as is now more usually said, transgender. Some people make a distinction between "pre-op" or "non-op" and "post-op", reserving "transsexual" for people who have actually made physical alterations, but tl;dr surgical procedures are not required to be "really" transgender. Al Lowe was probably not operating on this level of seriousness and subtlety and if I had to guess was probably thinking of Shablee as "just" a transvestite and not actually a transgender woman as we now understand the idea. But still, to the 21st century viewer who has hopefully grasped that some women have penises, this whole joke can come off very... 😬 , yanno?

    That said, yeah yeah it's a comedy and Larry is a loser that it's "okay" to abuse, but for sure in real life this is something you'd address before actually arriving at this kind of sexual activity, yeesh.

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    1. I cannot find it now, but when "Rocky Horror" was remade in 2015 (with Frank played by transgender actress Laverne Cox), there was some talk of changing the lyrics to "Sweet Transvestite" because the term "transvestite" had taken on a much more negative connotation. I know that Cox argued to keep it in and I suspect that if I could find her comments now it would be helpful... but I cannot. If anyone else wants to Google-fu, please do.

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  7. As far as "how NSFW is okay" for the posts, I agree with Michael: anyone who clicks past the break probably knows what they're getting into, and it's fine to be on the same level as the game itself, which really isn't much more than PG-13.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. As the guy that opened up a can of worms by covering "Drive-In Adventure" here, I fully agree that there is no solid line or even good guidance on how NSFW is okay in posts, before or after the break.

      Our primary concern must be ensuring that we are not flagged as a NSFW blog which will have a large impact on how often we show up in searches. We don't get enough new commenters as-is and I think we'd prefer not to be harder to find.

      I don't think any of us here are prudes, but we have to be at least minimally cautious because we are a single site that covers both "Pepper's Adventure Through Time" and "Gram Cats"

      Delete
  8. it is sad that Larry didn´t pee on more stuff

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 1. The game isn't over yet.
      2. It's because he was traumatized in LSL1 when the dog peed on him, so now he has to return the favor whenever he can.

      Delete
  9. I can't believe, after all this time, that I never noticed that the "gate" guard was named Daryl. Almost definitely a reference to Daryl Gates. Al would up his game of celebrity naming in the next installment, but this certainly can't be a coincidence.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This is a bit off (but not entirely) off topic, but I've been reading and enjoying entries from your z97 blog today. Al Lowe, from your interview, struck me as a remarkably insightful person.

      Almost all of his observations about the industry were spot on, from seeing the bubble the dot com companies themselves didn't know they were in to diagnosing that the reason adventure games were beginning to fade was because their USPs were being absorbed into other genres.

      Delete
  10. I'm not sure what the cross-posting policy is, but it might interest readers to know that The Digital Antiqurian has just published an article about (horrors!) porn in computer games.

    https://www.filfre.net/2023/10/a-digital-pornutopia-part-1-the-seedy-rom-revolution/

    ReplyDelete
  11. I'm finding playing the game a bit of a mixed bag. The whole thing has so much personality which is wonderful, but La Costa Lotta isn't a very entertaining place to explore. Navigating around it takes some effort (although it's becoming easier as I start to understand the layout).

    The gaudy art style is causing me to miss a lot of objects on the screen as they get lost in the details and colours.

    ReplyDelete
  12. I have been playing along, but haven't got round to posting until now. Got to say, I really don't think much of this game. The resort itself - you've explored almost everything there is to it in the first post. Then the entire game is a bunch of fetch quests for the various women.

    Ok, it's a Larry game, shouldn't expect much more than that, but the complete absence of any story or development was disappointing. After your first walk around and conversation with the women, you know where everything is and what they need, then the game is nothing more than a bunch of pretty easy fetch quests (I struggled with one puzzle that you haven't got to yet, so won't mention until you post you've solved it) with almost nothing new to unlock or see apart from the 'humourous' sequences where Larry gets abused for getting the item the woman wants.

    Perhaps the humour has aged poorly, but the third or fourth time I completed a woman's task, to be rewarded with an animation of Larry being variously physically and mentally abused got pretty old, and the first time wasn't particularly funny anyway. It's just a series of variations on the original 'gag' from LSL1 with Fawn.

    Completely agree with the posters above about Shawnee and the transphobic elements of that sequence. I guess that was a product of the time (I remember more than one sitcom with a similar '"joke'' about how a guy kisses a trans woman and then is horrified and spends the next sequence in a panic trying to clean himself), but it comes off awfully today.

    Definitely would not recommend this one.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Shablee not Shawnee. Stupid autocorrect.

    ReplyDelete
  14. I've finished the game now, though I'll save my thoughts for when you're done too.

    ReplyDelete

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