If there’s one thing we learned in the pandemic-stricken year of 2021, it’s that gamers have a penchant for powerful women who could physically break them in half, throw them around a bit, and spank them while calling them a ‘naughty little boy.’ Ok, admittedly I don’t recall Lady Dimitrescu literally folding me over her lap and whacking my bottom with a giant ruler, but it’s fair to say that that was her whole vibe, no? An eccentric auntie figure who has a ton of wealth due to some kind of fading aristocratic connection, and very particular ideas about corporal punishment.
Oh, and she happens to be a giantess, crucially. All Lady D’s traits and, shall we say, ‘assets’ coalesced beautifully,and the internet went wild.
While we had a lull in dommy villainous women in gaming in 2022, 2023 has been perhaps the best year yet, with some formidable female characters bound by a desire to inflict pain on the player while havingsomethingabout them that makes us want them to do it.
So I’ve decided to round up some of the breakout dom stars of 2023. Am I missing anyone?
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Robo-Twins (Atomic Heart)
The year’s earliest representatives of dommy women in games are Atomic Heart’s robo-twins, who I previously put forward as2023’s somewhat trashier answer to Lady D—spawning memes galore, plenty of thirsty thigh-rubbing, and I’ve no doubt some less SFW content if you go and look in the right places (though sometimes you need only look so far as the game’s Steam Community hub).
These two are the final boss fight ofAtomic Heart, but really it’s their whole ultraviolent hypersexualised aura in cutscenes that cements their legend rather than the combat itself. Modelled after a ballet dancer (who happens to be the hero’s dead wife, or something), the two use every opportunity to contort into all kinds of unnecessary technically perfect stretch poses throughout the game.
Their crowning Dom moment comes in the cutscene before the final fight, when one of them leaps high into the air, and slams down to pin you to the ground, straddling you—her inner thighs extending beyond the left and right edges of the screen—before trying to stomp you to death with her super-sharp stiletto. It’s a bit crass, and if this was the 90s I could easily imagine them adorning the cover of a fair few ‘mens’ mags’ in their metal latex swimsuits, but their simple ‘straddle and stomp’ approach to beating the crap out of you clearly struck a chord with gamers.
SHODAN (System Shock Remake)
Not every dom needs to trample on your face or skewer you with her hand-claws, cutting you cleanly up the middle and leaving the left and right half of your upper body split like an open zipper. Sometimes, a steady stream of insults is enough. TheSystem Shock remakesaw the return of megalomaniacal rogue AI SHODAN, again voiced by the brilliant Terri Brosius. Throughout your many hours on Citadel Station, she hurls insults at you over the comms, constantly poo-pooing you by calling you an insect, a rat running through her maze, “a pathetic creature of meat and bone, panting and sweating as you run through my corridors.”
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All this dialogue is delivered via a multi-layered voice that at its core sounds controlled and even alluring, but is distorted by all kinds of static and other glitches that expose its inhuman nature. She soundsincredible, and the juxtaposition between her shit-talking you and the grandiose humanity-enslaving plans she reveals in the audio logs you find throughout the station makes you almostgratefulthat she deems you—a mere mortal scurrying around her hellish cosmic labyrinth—worthy of addressing directly.
SHODAN is ceaselessly cruel and demeaning to you, yet delivers it in such a compelling way that you just don’t want her to stop. Seriously, if there was a SHODAN ASMR, then I’d listen to it in a heartbeat.
[ok, just looked into it, and it’s actually a thing, because of course it is]
Lilith (Diablo 4)
The Big Bad ofDiablo 4makes for a refreshing change of pace from the usual big red hooved demons that led the charge in previous games.Lilithis, well, a woman for a start, but while she’s the daughter of one of Diablo’s three Prime Evils, Mephisto, she takes a slightly different tact towards humanity.
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Let’s get it out the way first that Lilith’s very,verytall (got your attention, Lady D fans?). An interesting little calculation I found atPrima Gamesputs her at 8’5, which is a little bit short of Lady D’s 9’6, but still very much in the ‘giantess’ bracket. Besides, she’s stunning! That slick, swishy tail, the colour-shifting eyes, the quietly revealing dress that would make her the dark belle of a BDSM party. And what about that wingspan? It could easily wrap itself around a sizeable squad of thirsty Lilith worshippers, ready to receive her embrace.
That’s part of her appeal here. She’s giant, she possesses immense demonic power, yet her approach to subjugating humanity is nurturing. She speaks with a gentle maternal voice about how humanity is “born into evil” and how the church has kept us all chaste and god-fearing for too long. She’s inviting us to liberate ourselves morally: let your hair down, sleep around a bit, murder a few people—the Daughter of Hatred won’t judge. And the fact that she’s inviting us to be bad boys and girls while constantly reminding us that she’s mother to all of us creates all kinds of weird Freudian confusion…
So what’s the point of all this? These women kick ass, and they do it in a way that leaves you begging for me. That’s all.
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