Acclaimed LGBTQ+ developer Robert Yang releases explicit game about an angler catching hogs, critiquing modern dating and overfishing

Acclaimed LGBTQ+ developer Robert Yang has released another explicit game, this time a commentary on fishing for dates.

Rainbows Are Carnivores is a gay fishing and “aquaculture romance” game, in which a hunky fisherman fishes for nude men in the sea. Or, as Yang puts it in the game’s accompanying blog, it’s a game about “using your pole to catch some high quality hogs”. Hog, incidentally, is angler slang for a big fish.

Yang has released plenty of controversial games, but is perhaps best known for The Tearoom: a commentary on ’60s sodomy laws and video game censorship, in which men stand at urinals with guns for penises, while avoiding undercover cops.

Rainbows Are Carnivores instead includes full frontal male nudity. It’s a free web-based game on itch.io, with the “fisherman daddy” grading his catches until finding the perfect mate – though it doesn’t quite work out how you might expect.

As well as a commentary on modern day dating, the game is a homoerotic play on male stereotypes, as well as criticism of overfishing. As Yang puts it: “There’s never been fewer fish in the sea (so far).”

The game is also inspired by French film Stranger By The Lake (2013), which “artfully mixes sex and violence”, explained Yang. Here, Yang portrays overfishing as its own type of violence.

“Maybe it’s a commentary on dating and romance in the app era,” said Yang. “If we are the ‘plenty of fish in the sea’, we’re also using technology to overfish ourselves – industrialising romance just like we’ve industrialised fishing, with diminishing returns. Dating pools enclosed by dating apps are like artificially abundant lakes where most relationships die off by the end of the season like farmed trout.”

If you’ve ever attempted dating apps, you’ll surely sympathise with that sentiment.

Earlier this year, Yang announced his forthcoming sports RPG Tryhard. Set in New Zealand, players will manage an underdog rugby club, combining management sim elements and turn-based gameplay. Presumably, there’ll be some sex too owing to Yang’s oeuvre, though Tryhard is looking decidedly tamer than his previous work.