It Was Me — I Played One of ESRB’s ‘AO’ Games

Here’s a fun question for a Friday evening. Have you ever played a game hit with the “Adults Only” rating by ESRB?

I did. In fact, I distinctly remember the weekend I played my first AO game, because I nearly got caught. Before I did, oh, what an amazing adventure. It wasn’t the first game in this genre that I ever played. But it quickly became one of the most memorable — in part because I was obsessed with this AO title’s story. It was a thrill every time I booted up the .exe.

What hellish game could I be talking about? Cancelled sadomasochistic fighter Thrill Kill? Gory murder simulator Manhunt 2? The version of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas with hot coffee’s unfinished data? All good guesses, but no. I was playing a game that was the de facto reason for the ESRB’s “Adults Only” rating in the first place: porn.

You see, I had pirated a copy of eroge visual novel X-Change, one of the rare hentai VNs to get an official English-language localization in the early 2000s. I loved the game so much, I woke up early on the Saturday after I downloaded it to keep playing. Obviously, seeing a 14-year-old wake up at the crack of dawn to play an anime visual novel was insanely sus, so my folks interrogated me about my laptop-based activities immediately. Thus, I had to delete the game before finishing it, just in case my parents dug through my laptop and found it.

But, man, I did love that X-Change game. Years later, I made up for my act of teenage piracy by purchasing a copy of it at Anime NYC. There, I got the idea to let’s play it as an anime VTuber, and my VTubing career was born. Thanks, X-Change! And thanks, ESRB, for the AO rating that sparked it all?

Hm. Maybe let’s not go that far.

‘X-Change’ and the ESRB’s ‘Adults Only’ rating

As a young gamer growing up in the 1990s, I knew the ESRB by heart. I never touched an M-rated game, and even T games felt oddly intimidating to me. But those K-A titles? They were my bread and butter. I followed the ESRB religiously, fearing that my first M game would traumatize me. Flipping through PlayStation Magazine and learning about Thrill Kill, I shuddered to think what “AO” even meant. Adults Only? That rating was certainly reserved for the most ultra- of ultra-violent titles. Luckily, my parents were the ones who decided which games I could play, they would protect me from all the awful and nasty violence out there on my PlayStation 1!

It’s so funny looking back. My child brain never would have comprehended what “AO” actually meant. I mean, yes, a couple incredibly violent games snagged the AO title. But back in the day, the AO rating was basically the “sex game” rating. There’s no way I would have known as a kid. LOL.

Now, to be clear, I had already popped my eroge visual novel cherry in 2007. Before I was a trans lesbian, I was a teenage yaoi fanboy, and I decided to go hard with my first-ever 18+ video game: noncon VN Enzai: Falsely Accused. At the time, boys’ love fans would joke about it being one of the most hardcore games you could ever play. And while Enzai was my introduction to eroge VNs, X-Change was the first game I ever played that landed the AO rating. I didn’t even know that at the time, ironically enough. By then, the ESRB was just a meme to me, a far cry from my feelings as a young kid.

Originally released in Japan in 1997, CROWD’s X-Change made the jump to the U.S. in 2001 thanks to eroge localization company Peach Princess. The game follows high schooler Takuya Aihara (confirmed to be of age in the English localization), who ends up accidentally turning into a girl due to a freak chemistry mishap. Everyone then begins to lust after Takuya thanks to her body’s transformation. Even she realizes how gorgeous her body is, after which she begins masturbating over it. You can probably see why I fell in love with the game. A boy turning into a girl? And then everyone finds her attractive? I wasn’t out as a trans woman yet, so gender transformation (or gender TF) kink was right up my alley. Takuya’s story made me excited over a fantasy I didn’t realize I even had.

I haven’t returned to X-Change since then, partly because, well, there are much better gender TF stories out there. And also because of the, you know, uh, high school setting (even though all the characters are aged-up for the English localization). But the game still has a soft spot in my heart for many reasons. Yes, it was an early sign that I had gender dysphoria and all that. But also, transforming into a cute girl and having sex? Fun.

AO, the goofiest rating

X-Change aside, the AO rating remains fascinating to me because it kind of… doesn’t matter anymore? The Entertainment Software Rating Board was founded by the Entertainment Software Association in 1994 in response to U.S. senators panicking over games like Mortal Kombat and Night Trap. Once upon a time, every single game developer wanted to stay below the AO rating so they could make money off their games. It was the de facto reality that, unless there was a very specific good reason to sell an AO game, titles hit with the AO rating would not be sold at gaming stores IRL. But now? GameStop is dying! No one buys anything physically anymore! God is dead! And with Him went the AO rating.

I mean, yeah, Sony, Xbox, and Nintendo do not want adult content to proliferate on their first-party platform stores. Don’t get me wrong. But first-party platforms are likely to review a title in the first place and make the call whether a game is right for their storefront. It’s not like ESRB holds the power there. The games industry just doesn’t work like that anymore. The gaming retailers that still hold influence are digital storefronts like Steam, Epic, and DLSite. And they don’t give a fuck about the ESRB.

Case in point? There are hundreds of games distributed on Steam that receive the storefront’s “Adult Content” rating. Some of them, like VR Kanojo and Koikatsu Party, have received widespread press coverage. Meanwhile, indie gaming site itch.io is famous (arguably infamous) for its vast amount of adult games. The proliferation of NSFW content on itch.io is so iconic, Apple even brought it up in court. 18+ games blossomed on digital storefronts during the late 2010s, and yet the vast majority of lewd games available from these retailers have never received an AO rating. They likely never will. The advent of the digital storefront has eroded the original mechanics of censorship that existed in gaming before.

Don’t get me wrong, of course. It still matters what’s in your game. Sony, Xbox, and Nintendo have opinions about adult content. Developers regularly note issues navigating 18+ content on the Steam Store. It’s just the ESRB isn’t going to prevent sales of your futanari femdom fap fantasy game by slapping an AO rating on that bad girl. Your biggest opponent is now Steam. In other words, one mechanism of censorship has been replaced with another.

To be clear, the ESRB pretty much understands that the AO rating is irrelevant now, too. The last AO game ESRB rated was Hatred, the infamous massacre simulator. That game released in 2015. A decade later, I doubt we’ll see this rating brought out again anytime soon.