This new video game lets you cruise for sex in public toilets
By Will Stroude
A new X-rated video game that simulates the experience of cruising for sex in a public toilet is causing a stir after being made available for public download online.
Aptly-titled The Tearoom, the steamy new game from Brooklyn-based designer Robert Yang sees players attempt to cruise men at a public urinal while avoiding detection by the police.
The sexually-explicit title – which is available to download for Windows, macOS, and Linux – is set in 1962 in a public toilet in Mansfield, Ohio.
The town was the site of an infamous police sting which saw the local police department set up a hidden camera behind a two-way mirror and secretly film men who met for sex there over a three-week period.
The resulting footage was used to obtain the convictions of over 30 local men on charges of sodomy, and the game’s creator says he hopes the politically-charged nature of The Tearoom’s premise come across in the finished game.
“I am interested in the politics of sex ― who is allowed to have it, where, when, how, why,” Yang told HuffPost. “In real life, many police… bend rules, mislead you, accuse you without cause, and detain you for whatever reason they like.
“Gay men, especially gay minorities, know this well, because we remember it in our community histories.”
Sexual liberation isn’t the only statement being made by The Tearoom: In the game, characters’ genitalia has been designed in the shape of guns to bypass censorship restrictions around male nudity on the website which hosts it.
“I have swapped out any pesky penises in my game for the only thing that the game industry will never moderate nor ban – guns”, Yang says.
“Now, there’s nothing wrong with guys appreciating other guys’ guns, right?”
Check out a preview of The Tearoom below:
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