Nightshift: The role-playing tabletop game challenging the stigma of stripping

Navigate a strip club and its oddball clientele in a TTRPG, designed by an ex-dancer, which aims to build empathy for those working in the industry

How do you work out your stripper name? According to some quarters it’s the make of the first car you owned, followed by the last thing you ate or drank.

While you ruminate on that, let me tell you this: as an autistic individual, the idea of getting a lap dance is my idea of sensory and communicative hell.

What on earth should I supposed to do during the whole ordeal? Chat about the weather? Whoop and holler? Hold my hands up in a theatrical jazz-hands pose as a way to complement the performance?

How should I construct the features of my face: smile benignly? Hold a rictus grin? Gaze reverentially?

It feels like all these answers would somehow result in me being kneed in the groin with a pointy stiletto and thrown out the establishment by a glazed-eyed, burly security guard.

So strip clubs don’t appeal. But, whoah, hold your horses! How about if instead of wandering round of an evening stag do personifying a horny walking wallet, you could be the one taking all the money, all from the comfort of your own tabletop, without getting vomited on?

Well, sign me up! Hello, boys: Vauxhall Sausage Roll has entered the building.

It’s that power-shifting role-play dynamic that Australian artist Exotic Cancer is deploying with Nightshift. A former dancer herself, her grotesque, vivid caricatures drawn from the world of pole-dancing of a rag tag crew of assorted oddball punters has gathered more than 600,000 followers on Instagram, and been collated in the book Shit Men Say In Strip Clubs.

Nightshift’s creator states it will aim “to challenge stigma and negative industry stereotypes through promoting empathy and understanding”.

How? Well, the game asks players to take the perspective of the dancers, and its in-game customer personas, mini-games and competition among colleagues are based on real-life experiences.

All with a dungeon-crawler mechanic.

While we at The Generations Games love our family games, we’re also intrigued by anything with a board that has a unique social theme, particularly one that attempts to reduce stigma. So we spoke to Exotic Cancer about the upcoming Kickstarter campaign, the “polarising” response from gamers, and the reasons for telling this tale in tabletop game format.

Who is Exotic Cancer and how did the name come about?

EC: Exotic Cancer is my artist pseudonym and business name. The name itself is a playful twist on the term ‘Exotic Dancer’, which reflects the origins of my work, centred on my experiences as a stripper. 

What kind of tabletop game is Nightshift and how did your lived experience shape it?

EC: Nightshift aims to immerse players into the role of a dancer.

The game board is a bird’s-eye view of a club, where players – using a combination of action points, dice, cards, and tokens – entice customers and earn money. Drawing directly from my experiences, the game intricately mirrors the dynamics of working in a club including trade-offs in how to spend your time and energy, engaging with customers, and being rostered on stage.

Through gameplay, I aim to highlight deeper themes such as the legitimacy of sex work, and the complex balance of competition and collaboration among dancers.