Tag: Fm

Submissive Gaming

Yesterday’s post got me thinking more generally about the intersection between videogames and kink. Obviously using sex and fetish to sell videogames is nothing new and, like every genre of art, there have been sexually explicit examples from its earliest days. What I’m more interested in are the mainstream games that plug into a BDSM or D/s vibe. The kind that push our kinky buttons without us necessarily being immediately aware of it.

There’s a clear link between topping and playing videogames, in that both are about control, flow and mastery of the local environment. That’s obviously what Gita Jackson in yesterday’s article picked up on. From the submissive perspective it’s a little trickier. For example, I can’t imagine a videogame about being tied up would work all that well. What would the controls be like? Mash Y to moan. Hit X to safeword if pain meter fills up. Wiggle the thumbstick to move your fingers and prevent ‘Game Over’ due to pins and needles. It probably wouldn’t be a bestseller. 

There are plenty of games that involve rescuing a princess or some equivalent trophy female character, but they’re clearly not femdom. The female character is passive and helpless. There are an increasing number of games with powerful female leads, but they don’t tie to a D/s dynamic. For a game to push my kinky buttons it’d need an active and powerful female character that drives the story, but also the ability for me to have a fun gaming experience acting in support of her. That’s a tricky combination to find.

I’d guess the best place to look for examples would be RPGs. They typically have different characters working together and interesting mixes of genders and power dynamics. For example, both Final Fantasy VIII and IX had feisty female leads (Rinoa and Garnet respectively) with the male lead character working on their behalf. Hunting around online I also came across this video from the game Ni No Kuni 2, which clearly has a femdom slant to it. Does anyone have any other game suggestions? Anything that pushes both their controller and their kinky buttons? I’ve been pondering it all day and haven’t come up with much.

Medieval concepts of chivalry are an obvious dynamic for games with a femdom slant. Just as long as the Queen is the type to charge into battle and not spend all day moping around in her castle.

Unexpected Juxtaposition

I had one of those odd moments today where my kinky world and my regular world briefly crossed streams. I was waiting for my afternoon coffee while flipping through mainstream sites on my phone and totally not prepared for Mistress An Li to pop up in an opinion piece on a videogame site. 

The article in question is this one, and it’s a well written piece on the sexiness of the 2019 game Control. Sexiness in videogames is obviously nothing new, but in this case it’s less about the appearance of the protagonist and more about her confidence, power and mastery of her environment. That leads the writer into a BDSM connection and in turn to interviewing and quoting Mistress An Li (someone I sessioned with last year). I think the article does a great job of connecting all the dots together in a meaningful way, and not simply using a pro-domme or BDSM as clickbait. I was left surprised, impressed and with a desire to go play the game.

This image is from Mistress An Li’s instagram. You can also find her here on twitter and visit her professional site here. 

Black, White and Leashed

This fabulous image comes courtesy of Mistress Lucy SweetKill via this tweet. It’s a common trick to convert explicit shots to black and white in order to make them look more ‘arty’, but this has clearly been constructed from the start with a monochrome palette in mind. The elegant simplicity of the outfits paired with the blank but shaded background work beautifully. 

I particularly like the contrast between their universal body language and the extremism of the appearance. A dog walker’s attention being caught by something while the dog pulls ahead on it’s leash is a common sight on city streets. Deploying that body language here makes an otherwise stark and fetishistic scene so much more human and relatable. 

The Modern Muse

The Guardian recently published an interesting article on the modern concept of the Muse. It highlights the unequal way artistic collaboration is viewed when it involves men working with women versus men working with men. A beautiful female actress may inspire a male director, but she is typically portrayed as passive, waiting to be molded and guided by his genius. In contrast, when it’s a male star and director, like De Niro with Scorsese or Depp with Burton, then it’s typically seen as two individual talents coming together on a collaborative venture.

The article finishes by questioning what effect the increasing number of female directors will have on the interpretation of this dynamic. That got me thinking about the kinky equivalent. Could a male submissive be a muse in the traditional sense to a female dominant? Obviously male submissives frequently inspire sexual attraction and hot kinky fun. If they didn’t we’d be stuck with only professional dommes, all of whom would be really, really bored with their job. But what about artistic inspiration? While most scenes involve creativity, I don’t think many of them are art in the traditional sense of the word. However, there are exceptions, and BDSM can clearly be a performative act. So are their male submissive muses who inspire their dominants to new creative heights while also being passive vessels for that creativity to be poured into?

If nothing else, it’d make for a great setting for femdom fiction. The beautiful submissive who inspires a dominant to increasingly sadistic and controlling acts in the name of art. The muse who sparks a creative fire that ultimately destroys him.

This artwork is of course by the brilliant Sardax, from this post on his site showing his artistic muse as a cruel mistress. 

Fetish Pony

Fans of fetish artwork will recognize the distinctive style here of Michael Manning. He’s the creator of well known series Tranceptor and The Spider Garden. What I particularly love about this specific piece is that it’s a commission by  @DrPonyBatBond, featuring him with Mistress Michelle Lacy. In a world where content creators have to fight to get paid for their work, and erotic content is constantly being stolen, it’s great to see someone commissioning original artwork from an artist they admire. The nature of the piece and the kinks involved also fit beautifully with the artists personal style, resulting in a very memorable image.

If you’d like to commission your own piece from Michael Manning, then his commission page is here. Alternatively, you could subscribe to his Patreon here.

Happy New Decade!

I hope all my readers had an enjoyable end to their year and that the next decade will bring them many good things and new experiences. From a personal perspective the last ten years have been an amazing period of kinky experimentation and personal growth. I’m hoping I can continue that growth for at least another decade to come.

We’re now heading into the twenties, which means we’ve finally got a sensible name for our current period of history. It’s also an evocative one, given the huge cultural and social changes that happened in the previous twenties.  This image is from around that era and was a product of Studio Biederer. The clothing may be a touch more conservative than today’s typical femdom whipping scene, but clearly people’s kinky proclivities haven’t changed in a hundred years.

I find it impossible to post an image from Studio Biederer without also mentioning that the two brothers behind it were both Jewish, and killed by the Nazi’s in the holocaust. People’s kinks may not have changed in the last hundred years, but neither has their capacity for racism, violence and cruelty. Something we should all keep at the forefront of our minds as we move forward into the next decade.

A Dame To Die For

I’ve been watching a bunch of film noir over the holidays, so this seems an appropriate image to share. It’s odd that guns and knives in BDSM  are a total turn off for me, yet I’m a sucker for a deadly femme fatale. Particularly the scenes where she turns the tables on the helpless schmuck she’s ensnared, holding him at gunpoint while explaining what a fool he’s been. I think it’s because the gun in these scenes is incidental, a necessary device to give her power, rather than being a fetishistic focus. I’m actually kinking on the betrayal and the masochistic pleasure of trusting someone you know is going to ultimately hurt you.

This illustration is by Robert Maguire, an artist famous for his crime noir covers. I believe (based on this article) that it was for a novel called ‘So Cold, My Bed’ by Sam Taylor.

SMpedia

Fans of Japanese BDSM may want to check out SMpedia. Based on a machine translation of their front page it’s ‘a non-profit database established to accurately convey the process of the birth and development of post-war Japanese SM culture to future generations.’ I have absolutely zero ability to read Japanese, but the modern browser translate tools seem to do a pretty good job to convey the gist of its pages. There is an English language version known as Nawapedia, but there’s a lot less content and it doesn’t appear to be being updated.

The artwork below is from the site and by 小悪征夫, which Google translate as Yukio Koaku.

There is also a twitter feed for the site, which is where I spotted this image.

Greta Garbo

I don’t think this really counts as femdom, but it is a lovely picture. It’s from 1929 and a movie called The Single Standard, with two of the A list stars of the time –Greta Garbo and Nils Asther. Given the positioning of her in the chair and him at her feet, you can definitely project a D/s vibe into there if you choose to.  However, while they both hid their sexuality during their film careers,  in reality he was gay and she either gay or bisexual. So it’s really just two beautiful people in a beautiful shot.