For those of you who like incest: what is it about incest that you like? The close relationship it presupposes? The taboo aspect it adds to the relationship? Or simply the fact that it’s not terribly prominent outside of bishoujo games, and thus seems novel? Do you like only certain types of incest, such as younger sister, older sister, mother / son, father / daughter?
I played and cleared Itsutsugo ~Lovely Quintuplets~ last night. It was a little more interesting than I imagined at first, but pretty much degenerated into H scenes. Main heroine + best character is the tsundere (Mitsuki, ??, because she’s the third sister, get it? >_>), which I guess I sort of appreciate, but she breaks to dere too easily and it’s not really satisfying. It was fun seeing her reactions after finding you sexing her sisters early on in the game, though.
Tentative 40%, not really recommended even if you like twins or incest =P It’s still a better game than ??? though. That’s in 10% territory, only surpassed by atomic landmines and really HORRIBLE doujin soft.
I’m an incest fan, although I’ve never really thought about what exactly it is that attracts me. The taboo aspect is certainly a thrill, but I think the close relationship is a more important part of it. My ideal romantic relationship is one where the people involved are so close that they really don’t need anything in the world apart from each other, and of course, members of the same family have an element of closeness that can never be matched in a relationship between unrelated people. The relationships I’m interested in are brother-sister (preferably younger sister, although older will do in a pinch) and father-daughter, and I find that in the examples that most strongly interest me there’s a strong element of protectiveness by the male towards the female. Indeed, it’s often this protectiveness that comes first and develops into a romantic relationship. On a biographical note, I should mention that neither I nor any of my friends growing up had a sister, and so I always found the brother-sister relationship to be particularly mysterious and intriguing. Considering I have no interest in mother-son scenarios, I have to wonder if I’d have any interest in brother-sister either if I’d actually had a sister growing up.
Whats not to like about incest anyway? To be honest I haven’t given it much thought. Thrill maybe one reason, but the biggest reason why I like incest is because it sounds so taboo. In this worlds we suppose incest to be bad, because that’s how the society evolved. What if the society itself was based on marriages within the family?
Oh and I like brother-sister incest. Incest between parents and siblings is too… gross
Wow, I guess I get to talk about this in-depth. There are multiple aspects of incest stories that attract me. I suppose one of the most fascinating of these reasons is in the aspect of the self-imposed walls we create in our lives. What exactly is this barrier between family members? Is it biological? (If I recall correctly, there are instances of people ending up in a relationship with someone they didn’t know was a close relative.) Is it societal? (Depending on the society and circumstances, an incestuous relationship may not be looked down on.) What is it that stops a family member from acting on a sexual attraction to another member of the family, while a few do give in and act on it despite the massive taboo on the act in most societies? While entirely fictional, the identical opposite sex twin scenario is especially interesting, given that it would kind of be like looking in a mirror. Would such an incestuous relationship be real love, or a warped form of narcissism? In short, I think that incest stories in eroge are an interesting look (even if they are fictional stories) in to one aspect of one of the great mysteries: the human mind.
As for what kinds of incest stories I like, I’ll quote myself from an old thread:
(On a side note, I did finally play through the aunt by marriage scenario in CSMT2, and I was right about it being handled well.)
I could do adopted daughter if it were handled well and the daughter was adopted at a sufficiently late age… Princess Maker adopts the girl too young for my tastes, I find the father/daughter marriages there to be CREEPY. But if you adopt a teenager because it’s the only way to get her out of a bad situation and she develops entirely non-familial feelings for you, that could be an interesting story. Step-daughter, though, I can’t think of any way where I wouldn’t find that inappropriate. Even if she were your EX stepdaughter I’d raise eyebrows.
For some reason I’m okay with twincest as a fantasy even though I’m turned off by standard sibling incest. Perhaps because I have a sibling, but not a twin.
Being an incest fan, I’ll try to offer my brief opinion. (oh, and unlike some of you, I do have a little sister) I think it is a combination of things, as others have said - certainly there is a major part of it which comes from the taboo involved.
There is also the aforementioned sense of intimacy which you can rarely obtain anywhere else … you generate a powerful and similar intimacy with sexual partners, but if you’re family member is both, then it should only deepen.
Safety is also part of it - here is someone you know really well, who will always be around and isn’t likely to leave you or even ever stop loving you. When storms rolled in when you were kids, she may have come to your bed and curled up in your arms knowing you would keep her safe … that kind of feeling never goes away for a big brother …
The connection between siblings is a powerful thing, and if they care deeply for one another they will often spend time with each other - becoming something almost best friends, though more because they are family. They can read each other well, and often know what the other is thinking. Because they are siblings they are used to teasing and fights which blow over in time, and with the knowledge that you have weathered problems and have to tools to survive that sort of thing comes that sense of safety and belonging again.
I think Kana does a fantastic job of modeling a situation in which a big brother might fall in love with his little sister … I don’t think I’ve seen that done remotely so well in any other game.
PS. Oh and don’t even get me started on Twincest … there is another can of worms there, rolling down some long psychological roads. (by comparison with the rest of the subject matter in the thread which would make a grad student looking for a thesis giggle with joy)
I think my liking incest stories in ero games basically just comes down to my preference for love stories where the couple needs to overcome some hurdles in order to stay together, and society’s condemnation of incest relationships is a pretty steep hurdle to overcome, making for a rather dramatic story. It’s also a fairly different flavour of love than the usual fare, at least in the “proper” blood related incest stories. That said, I’ve hardly played any such games because most games involving incest (by blood or marriage/adoption) in English mostly happen in dark titles, which I don’t normally play. Yosuga no Sora was an awesome romantic (tw)incest story that sadly was in Japanese so much of the nuance was lost to me, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying it immensely.
Like Kimuzukashii MEIJI, there’s also the aspect of the human mind, society and our self-imposed taboos that fascinate me and make me think about human nature and why we do the things we do. Incest is a fascinating taboo because genetically speaking, siblings mating doesn’t carry a particularly higher risk of birth defects in the offspring compared to non-related couples (I think it’s in the area of 2-4% higher for siblings). However, incest normally takes form as a parent sexually abusing their minor child; it’s extremely rare to find incest relationships between consenting family members. And even if it was consent, it’s hard to dismiss that such a parent-child relationship would most likely be a result of a parent “using” their dominant position to spur it on. This taboo carries over to siblings as well, I guess. I believe incest between consenting adults is legal in some US states, but not in most, which is an interesting thought (if it is correct).
Anyway, I just find the subject of incest and the taboo attached to it fascinating, since I’m sort of a “where’s the harm” kind of person who believes that almost anything goes as long as no one is hurt. Which is what makes the incest in Yosuga no Sora kind of fun when you see the reactions from the people who find out; you’d think the poor siblings had brutally murdered someone the way people react. Culture and taboo is a very fascinating thing for me, not just when it comes to incest, but either way it makes for an interesting romance drama, and I like that in erogames 
Oh, and for the record, I have a sister (older though), and I can’t imagine ever feeling anything but family relationship with her. Which makes sibling incest an even more fascinating subject. I wonder where our biological inhibition towards incestuous relationships stop and our cultural ones start. I think that given time and a lack of “proper” alternatives, most families would be inclined to turn to incest on a biological level.
Biologically speaking the danger isn’t from one generation of siblings breeding, it’s over multiple generations that the likelihood of deformity, retardation, and genetic disorders become an issue. On a simple level all people have one half of the genetic material to produce all inheritable disorders, when we mate there is the chance that the chromosomes from one parent will match up with the other half of the pair in the second parent and the child will be born with a genetic disorder. In most pairings this is a fairly rare phenomena, however when we are blood related to the other individual the chances increase, each new generation in which this occurs the chance only improves as there is less diversity in the genetic blueprint of those involved. Humans could not decide to start interbreeding to preserve themselves for very long or their offspring would become inviable and they would die out.
Now, I don’t have the exact percentage increase for each generation on hand, but taking your “it’s only 2-4%” statement into consideration, you have to realize that 5% is a 1in20 chance … do you really want to be playing with odds like that?
Besides which, I doubt many people who fantasize about or commit incest plan on having children with their sibling, child or parent.
Incest can be used to produce good traits and remove bad ones: selective breeding is proof of that. On the same token, too much genetic diversification can produce catastrophic results and dilute a gene pool with negative traits and diseases it would have never had. Of course it’s morally reprehensible to force humans into a breeding program to produce a desired kind of offspring, as well as deny someone from having children with someone because of their genetic makeup, so we ignore this.
On a side note: some mindless doctor rapefest from 2005 that had twins in it.
Since we’re talking about incest…
See? Incest is so evil it’s up there with rape and matricide.
Incest can be used to produce good traits and remove bad ones: selective breeding is proof of that
Even in selective breeding you want multiple families to use as crop - you simply hand pick those families for certain traits and avoid those with other, less desirable elements.
And diversification is not the same as moving into a new climate/cultural region and being infected with diseases you have no resistance against - you can have plenty of diversity within one nationality so long as the populace is large enough. Besides which, introduction to those contagions weeds out those who can’t resist and makes for stronger, resilient children in the surviving bloodlines - ultimately making for a stronger species.
Ideally, in selective breeding there’s no or very little incest occurring; you take multiple organisms that have little overall genotypic similarity but are chosen for one or more phenotypic traits. Too much inbreeding will however undermine selective breeding, as seen in various strains of inbred dogs that are predisposed to certain health conditions.
Who was it that asked “if he turns into water and she an elephant who sucks that water into her trunk … is that incest?”
look, one more post and this thread is 1000 posts. I am expecting something special Narg, to celebrate this joyous occasion.
I have to talk for 5 minutes this friday, about motivation. Instead of talking about Maslow and Herzberg, I should direct people to this thread :lol: