The objective is to suck 8 different kinds of dicks – replaced by guns in the game in order to keep it from being banned from certain indie game distribution networks – without getting caught by the dicks. The game recreates the cruising risks that come from police targeting gay men. The men in the footage were later arrested.
The originals of these tapes also included homophobic slurs from police officers. The game is named after a piece of art that was made of real footage from cameras that police set up in Ohio to record men having sex in public bathrooms. Plus, while amusing conceptually, it also addresses the real risks faced by men at the time (and still today). Created by indie game maker Robert Yang, it recreates 1960s gay cruising in a public washroom. “The Tearoom” however, paints a more familiar scene. A fantasy land or a dystopian future where you need to fight for survival against monsters or other players. Video games often take you into another world.
