Overwatchand pornography

ABlender-rendered model ofMercy,depicted in a swimsuit. She is often cited as one of the more popularOverwatchcharacters in fan-generated porn,while Blender is a commonly used tool forOverwatchporn animators.

Blizzard Entertainment's 2016 video gameOverwatchinspired a notable amount of fan-madepornography.The game's distinct and colorful character designs drew the attention of many online content creators, resulting in sexually explicitfanart.Character models wererippedfrom thebeta versionsof the game and subsequently spread, edited, and animated on the Internet.

Animated pornography shortsandsexualized imageryfeaturing official character models constitute the main content ofOverwatchpornography. Original pornography fan artists (animators and illustrators) are most commonly based on social media platforms such asTwitter,Reddit,andTumblr,while they upload their works tofile hosting serviceslikeMEGA,Gfycat,Webmshare, andGoogle Drive.Pornographic content is created primarily throughValve'sSource Filmmaker(SFM) andBlender.

Overwatchpornography usually consists of short pieces of video featuring characters such asTracer,D.Va,andMei.Blizzard initially issuedcease-and-desistorders to some prolific creators through an independent security firm, though the game's director described the situation as "an inevitable reality of the internet in 2016." Video game journalists have described the abundance of (pornographic) fan works as a positive indicator for the game's longevity. Pornographic works of the game remained a topic of discussion long after that game's release, with artists making content of the game's post-launch characters, andOverwatch-related search topics continuing to be popular on porn websites.

Overwatchand its pornographic community has inspired various groups and companies to produce adult content related to the game.Brazzersproduced a "porn parody"based onOverwatchin September 2016. The website Overpog started producing aPlayboy-style magazine about the game in late 2016, until they were forced to stop in February the following year.Overwatchhas inspired both sexualized cosplay and pornographicvirtual realityworks.

Background and history

Overwatchis amultiplayeronlineshooter gamedeveloped byBlizzard Entertainment.The game sports a cast ofvarious characters,each with a unique design. Pornographic fan works of online multiplayer games likeOverwatchhas always been relatively common: according toPornhubvice-president Cory Price, the most popular video-game related search queries on Pornhub wereMinecraft,Halo,Clash of Clans,andCall of Duty.Aoife Wilson ofEurogamerasserted that a cursory search on websites like Pornhub reveals pornography inspired by many high-profile video game franchises.

Overwatchentered aclosed betain late 2015, during which time various peoplerippedthe character models ofOverwatchfrom the game and spread them over the Internet.In early 2016, Blizzard also encountered some controversy with the design of a victory pose for the game's cover art character,Tracer,which was criticised by some fans as "[reducing her] to just another bland female sex symbol."When Blizzard made anopen betaofOverwatchavailable on May 5, 2016, Pornhub registered a spike of 817% in searches for pornographic material related to the game. Searches forOverwatchpornography originated somewhat evenly worldwide, thoughSouth KoreaandBelarussearched for such content the most. According to Jeff Grub ofVentureBeat,websites such asTumblrwere overflowing with sexualized fanart of the characters at the time.

The game managed to become iconic... before it had even been released, and it's thanks entirely to the game's indelible character design andsui generisartistic flair. There is more fanart for this game than you could even imagine.

—James Stephanie Sterling

Nathan Grayson ofKotakustated thatOverwatchmakes for "good porn" because of its colorful cast of characters with distinct visual styles. Grayson pointed out that the game features a higher-than-average number of female characters, many of which wear skin-tight clothing. Grayson wrote thatOverwatchpornography is relatively easy to make withSource Filmmaker,the community of which is built around the sharing of assets, including nude models. Many people who create and watchOverwatchpornography have not actually played the game.Blender,another "free, open-source 3D computer graphics creation tool" is also used by such animators, with one being cited byKotakuas stating, "Overwatchmodels are, for the most part, readily available for Blender, and some of them are very beginner friendly. "Some artists have achieved popularity within their online communities, being able to capitalize on their SFM or Blender art and use it as a source of income viaPatreondonations.

OverwatchdirectorJeff Kaplanstated in an interview that he and his team have purposefully kept the romantic relationships and sexual identities of their characters vague in order to not "pander" to the audience. Kaplan described the porn scene as "an inevitable reality of the internet in 2016."WhenRandy Pitchford,CEO ofGearbox Software,tweetedabout the existence of pornographic content based onOverwatch's competitor gameBattleborn,he was immediately mocked andtrolledby fans of the more popular game. Pitchford was accused of "desperately trying to put the spotlight back on his game", and theRedditwebsite he linked to was flooded byOverwatchreferences.

In January 2017, Pornhub announced that "Overwatch" was the 11th-most searched term on their website in the previous year, beating out searches for words such as "anal"and"threesome".Pornography featuring the game's characters has remained popular years after the game's launch. D.Va, Tracer, and Mercy, ranked as the top three video game characters by number of searches on Pornhub in 2017,and the game was the most searched on the platform in 2019.Post-launch additions of new characters to the game's playable roster, such asBrigitteandAshe,propelled spikes in related searches.After Ashe debuted, searches forOverwatchin general more than doubled on Pornhub.In 2022, Chinese internet users circumvented the state's ban on pornography by using awallpaperapp, withOverwatch-related porn being among the most popular on the platform.Media outlets also continued discussingOverwatchporn in 2022, ahead of the release ofthe game's sequel.

Pornographic content

Many of theOverwatch-related videos on Pornhub during the game's open beta featured the official models of the characters with some slight alterations to show more skin. Amateur animators then used the freeSource Filmmakertool byValveto animate sexual activities. The characterTracerwas by far the most commonly searchedOverwatch-related subject during this time, followed byWidowmakerandMercy.Futanariimagery was also popular among Pornhub users.After the release ofOverwatch's competitive mode at the end of June, the query "MeiOverwatchRule 34"became the most popular search target related to the game. Mo Mozuch ofiDigitalTimescalled the popularity of Mei significant, noting that she initially wouldn't seem as a likely target and that much pornography of her is fairlybody positive,describing exaggerations of her form as "moreVenus of WillendorfthanBarbie."On September 12, pornography websiteYouPornrevealed that Tracer was the second-most searched female video game character on the site, behind onlyLara Croft.In January 2017, Pornhub released a list of topOverwatchcharacter searches over the previous year, revealing that Tracer,D.Va,Mercy, Widowmaker, and Sombra had been the top 5 most popular female characters on the website, and thatLúciowas the most popular male character on the website.

MostOverwatchpornography is only several seconds long and intended to loop indefinitely. Since the game's official release, various creators have experimented with longer and more elaborate story content. Though the characters each have a personal backstory, there is still a lot not known about them. According toKotaku's Grayson, "by design, they can’t be fully fleshed out. There has to be room for player identity."The personalities of the game's characters have been noted to be taken into account in some pornographic animations.Most short character clips take known character traits to a sort of "logical conclusion", such as showing formerpro gamerD.Vamasturbatingwhilestreaming.The superpowers and symbols of agency of the female characters are usually not integral to these fanworks, though Emily Gaudette ofInversenoted that Tracer is an exception to this rule, stating that this character "has achieved something not many other female characters in porn have: a unique personality that only adds to her sex appeal." Gaudette further stated that the majority ofOverwatchpornography is "vanilla",suggesting that it is intended for a straight male audience.Kate Gray, writing forKotaku,noted that the scenarios found in such pornographic animations "are pretty basic."

Commenting upon the pornographic content available on the Internet, Aoife Wilson ofEurogamersaid that some of the videos are of surprisingly high quality, though she criticized that female characters were commonly portrayed in a submissive manner unless they are depicted with apenis.Grayson stated that most of theOverwatchpornography is bad, featuring unsettlingly rigid movements and amateurish camera angles. However, he also described good content as "legitimately sexy." Grayson also noted that there exists a lot of comedy in theOverwatchporn scene, with people creating humorous videos or writing silly descriptions.In 2019, Gray also commented on howOverwatchpornographic animations focus on women, rather than men, but praised the quality of these animations, opining: "sure, the boobs might be overly jiggly, and some of the gasps of pleasure are a little too close to sobs, but the animation isamazing—subtle movements of flesh and hair, detailed fabric simulations, lifelike surfaces, realistic lighting. "Gray, however, was also critical of the culture surrounding the creators of such content, writing that the genre has "a lot of the same issues as the porn industry as a whole." She elaborated that "It's clear that the people making these videos are into a very specific, predominantly white, and almost always skinny version of women," citing changes made to some characters (such asPharahandBrigittebeing portrayed as whiter and slimmer, respectively, than in-game), as well as an under-representation of others.Sashacakies, an animator in theOverwatchpornography scene, also criticized the lack of diversity in the such content, but was unsure if its artists or consumers are to blame.

Erotica

BothInverseandKotakusuggested that the majority ofOverwatch's Source Filmmaker pornography community consists of straight men. However, both websites noted that users onTumblrand variousfan-fictionwebsites produce large amounts of romanticerotica.These communities consist in large part of women andLGBTpeople more interested in emphasizing the existing bonds of the characters.James Grebey ofInversecalled Tumblr "perhaps ground zero for extremely good fanart, heartwarming comics, and other steamy user-generatedOverwatchcontent. "Tumblr describedOverwatchas "rife forshipping"due to its 20 unique characters. In May 2017, the website sifted through its data in order to determine which character pairings was the most popular on Tumblr, revealing thatCassidy(formerly called "McCree" ) andHanzo(McHanzo) were shipped 35% of the time.

Major works

Overwatchbecame the subject of a "porn parody"created byBrazzersin September 2016. TitledOversnatch XXX Parody,the video features Danny D asReaperand Aletta Ocean as Widowmaker. The parody presents a "grudge match" between the two characters in an abandonedstrip club.Oversnatch XXX Parodywas the first time Brazzers produced a parody of a video game, but they went on to do more afterwards.

After producing several mockPlayboycovers, staff of the website Overpog decided to create anOverwatch-themed,Playboy-style magazine under the titlePlaywatch.This magazine does not include any nudity, some of the images being cropped or edited in order to remove nudity where it otherwise would be. The magazine also features fictitious articles and interviews withOverwatchcharacters, as well as real-lifecosplay.Overpog completed the first issue ofPlaywatchin November and it drew a large audience fromReddit.Overpog toldPVP Livethat the sexual images inPlaywatch"were intended to titillate and impress with artistic intent rather than overtly sexual," and that the magazine was first and foremost a parody of the famous magazine. In February 2017,Playwatchwas shut down through acease-and-desist orderissued by a copyright firm hired by Blizzard Entertainment.

In 2017, cosplay artist Stella Chuu started a group effort of sexualizedOverwatchcosplay under the banner "Underwatch". Chuu drew up cosplay designs of eachOverwatchhero and got to work with a group in order to present the work atKatsucon2017. This cosplay meetup was highly successful, drawing a large crowd, and the group was asked to leave or cover up by Katsucon staff about an hour in, at which point they moved to a suite in the local MGM Grand for aphotoshoot.Chuu toldKotakuthat "many of the cosplayers approached [her] afterwards to express how confident [the event] made them feel."

Cosplay pornography companyBaDoinkVRplanned to release multiple virtual reality pornography projects based onOverwatchin 2017. Producer Dinorah Hernandez stated that "inOverwatch,people get attached to the characters as they play them and the way they're designed amplifies sexual attraction. "

Reactions

When asked about the pornographic fan content, lead designerJeff Kaplanstated that as someone who is "creatively responsible" for the franchise, he is concerned and hopes people realize many children play the game despite the T-rating. Regardless, Kaplan stated, "Nobody’s trying to step on anybody’s freedom of speech or any of that, like totally love people’s creative expression."

AsOverwatchpornography primarily makes use of official character models with appendedgenitalia,varioustakedown noticeshave been issued to creators of such content. These notices have been issued by security firm Irdeto, which, according to news outlets, may have been hired by Blizzard to clean up unwanted fan content. Blizzard itself has not yet commented upon the largeOverwatchporn scene. After one creator posted a screenshot of one such takedown notice on aRedditmessage board, other creators started to come together in order to pressure Blizzard to stop.

Prolific video game porn developerStudio FOWstated that it would not createOverwatchpornography after the studio got acease-and-desist orderfrom Blizzard in 2015 for theirWorld of Warcraft–related projects. Writing in a blog post, the studio stated that "it's not a process I'm happy to repeat because I have better things to do than argue semantics all day with jumped up, tiny, hypocrite attorneys... there are more important things in life such as looking out for my team and feeding families."

BothJim SterlingandVentureBeat's Jeff Grub described the abundance of fan works ofOverwatch,pornographic or otherwise, as a good sign for the game's longevity.The influx ofPokémon-related pornography shortly after the release ofPokémon Gowas compared to that ofOverwatch.

See also

• Cartoon pornography
• Doujinshi
• Pokémonand pornography
• Tijuana bible