Ruin Me 0.11.0 Behind the Scenes and 0.12.0 Preview

Hello, perverts! My health is... fine. I'm doing my best to take care of myself. I don't have a strong theme for this next release, so we'll find out what it'll have together!

My Center of Attention patrons have given me some helpful art feedback: it's not worth it at this time, with my level of skill, to do a lot more art at the cost of writing, but it would be nice to have more art for scenes that are currently text-only. I'm looking into commissioning one-off artwork for certain scenes, although that would wait until my Patreon is bringing in enough to support it. That poll is still open for a while if you want to give your input, and I've also added a poll to choose the next NPC to get a play scene (this time around, it won't be a woman!).

Here are some thoughts on update 11 and my plans for update 12!

Corruption Games and Consent

Ruin Me falls into the "corruption game" subgenre, which probably grew out of Slave Maker, a parody of Princess Maker, and was popularized by Akabur's Princess/Witch Trainer games. Something I've tried for is to make the game consensual, with Theresa being an eager participant in her corruption; I doubt I'm the first developer to do this, but it seems to be something people really appreciate about the game.

But there's still something inherently exploitative about the corruption game structure: in a way, you're living out a grooming fantasy, taking someone who starts the game unwilling to fuck you and slowly manipulating them until they are molded into your sexual fantasy. It's totally cool to get off on problematic shit, but as I make it I am trying to make sure I'm doing it critically and in a way I am comfortable with.

Update 11 included some visual customizations for Theresa, and one thing that felt weird to me was the pubic hair customization. Maybe it's because body hair in America is all tied up with misogyny and body-shaming, or maybe it's because I'm someone who has to be careful with how they groom thanks to razor bumps and such, but asking a partner to change their pubic hair practices without much preamble feels controlling in a way that asking them to wear a collar does not.

I considered adding a short negotiation scene with Theresa about it, but in the end I decided to go for the expedient approach and just treat it like other customizations, with a bit of extra dialogue to make it clear that Theresa is considering your requests and making a deliberate choice to satisfy them.

Still, though, something that's in my head as I write things like this is that Theresa is a fictional character, constructed to satisfy the fantasies of me and my players. The problems don't go away just because I wrote Theresa to be willing. It's something I need to keep thinking about as I continue to write, to make sure I'm still okay with what I'm creating.

Next Update

I'm still not sure what all will be contained in this update! It may not even have a new sex scene in it, for the first time ever. The main big thing that I'm writing is the start of the Reform Institute arc, which continues your search for Byatis and brings in a lot of the gross oppressive shit that was happening in the era of Ruin Me.

The interwar period was a time of sexual revolution and liberation, but there was a corresponding force of social control and medicalization that I want to explore. I hope it turns out well!

I also want to start putting together little pieces of art for the various curios you collect, to go along with the art for the Mica Sign. Given that the encounter in the Moaning Hole has little else visual going on, I'm going to start with the crystal you pick up there.

Beyond that, I dunno! The above might be all, although I do have an idea for a new exploration site in the mansion I might try out. We'll see!

Thanks, as ever, for believing in this project enough to give to it. If you have any thoughts, please share them in the comments, a PM, or an email to: phanes@phanes.me