Penny Arcade — Funnies — Fri, 21 Aug 2026 07:01:00 +0000
Summary
The author (Penny Arcade's Tycho) revisits the long-debated comparison between "Actual Play" gaming content and pornography, arguing performers shouldn't feel degraded by it because sex work is legitimate work and acting and sex work historically occupied the same social rung. He recounts that the modern Actual Play format originated around 2009, when Wizards of the Coast sent out a request for proposals to help sell the fourth edition of Dungeons & Dragons, and his collaborator Gabriel suggested a podcast—an ironic choice, he notes, given that edition's heavy reliance on physical components. He describes himself as "grandfathered" into the modern Actual Play scene, getting wheeled on stage a few times a year to play games. His central claim is that Actual Play shows are fundamentally commercials for games, whatever else they may be, which is why the choice of which game to play matters.
I always thought the comparison between "Actual Play" and Pornography was kind of a silly joke that had a little bit of truth in it, like all jokes which have the capacity to endure. Apparently this is something that people fought over, and were subsequently dissuaded from, all before I ever got to it. It's certainly never stopped me before. Previous interlocutors might have been dissuaded on account of their social station or desire to appease a cryptographically cycling moral framework. In my degraded state, laid low by my…. Well, by my "me," currying favor is not only beneath me it's literally impossible.
Did the performers in this space feel degraded by this comparison? I certainly hope not - it would be strange if so. I have it on good authority that sex work is an eminently worthy affair. If anything, it seems the comparison should ennoble you. In any case, it wasn't that long ago that acting and sex work occupied roughly the same rung of the social ladder. Try not to get too big for your Goddamn britches.
There are a couple examples that predate it, but the modern Actual Play space has its origins in an RFP we received in 2009 or so, entreating the recipients to help Wizards of the Coast move units of their highly experimental bordering on dubious Fourth Edition of Dungeons & Dragons. Gabriel suggested a podcast, which is ironic because not since its weird uncle Chainmail has a version of the game ever relied so much on what you might call its Material Components. They bit. Seems like it worked. The end.
I've been grandfathered into the modern space, which as a metaphor also tucks in a joke about my advanced age as a bonus. I get wheeled on stage a few times a year to play a game with My Two Dads and hang out with a bunch of people way cooler than me.
Actual Play games are commercials, whatever you may think of them, whatever else they are capable of, however furiously you might jack it. That's why it matters what game you play.
(CW)TB out.
Original article: https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2026/08/21/the-new-pornographers Source: Penny Arcade