I’ve noticed that there are generally two directions that lewd art will take. they either:

1. focus on eroticizing body parts, the mechanics of sex, sensations, textures, appearances, or other physical things like that
2. or, they focus on eroticizing personality traits, power dynamics, psychological states, or other mental things like that

for an example of #1, there’s a lot of porn on places like rule34, danbooru, or e621 that feels very mechanical to me (I’m obviously extremely biased) - it’s about a big cock going into a tight pussy and rubbing against its slick walls as the pussy copiously drips onto the floor, while a huge ass and breasts bounce and jiggle with each thrust

so the exaggeration and focus happens on the physical level: the pussy is incredibly slick and tight. the cock is incredibly big and throbbing. every body part or physical act has been dialed up a few notches from reality. and there is often very little focus (if any) placed on who the characters are, why they’re fucking, what each of them is getting out of the sex, etc.

but then there’s the #2 category, which can be about sadism, manipulation, fear and anticipation, D/s, etc.⸸ for example a dom inflicts mind-breaking pleasure on their sub just to watch them squirm and writhe and beg, only to deny them release at the last moment for the pleasure of basking in their helpless whimpers. here, the exaggeration and focus is on the mental states of both characters (the dom inflicting exaggerated pleasure as if it were pain, denying the sub’s emotional need for release) and the dynamic between the characters (the helplessness of the sub who has willingly submitted to the dom, and the dom’s aggressive, self-indulgent exploitation of that helplessness). notice that I didn’t mention how the pleasure was being inflicted, or any specific physical acts at all, because in this kind of erotica it doesn’t matter

⸸ of course it can also be something sweeter and more wholesome like comfort-sex, gentle dom, patiently and lovingly guiding someone through their first time while showing them what their body is capable of feeling/doing, etc. the important part is that the emphasis is on psychological things like personalities and mental states

I think I’ve been trying to express this distinction for a while, because I feel like a large majority of porn that I find falls into the #1 category for me, when that is generally a mild turnoff to me. like the vast majority of porn games fall into this category from what I’ve seen - or at least they tend to greatly exaggerate physical attributes (like breast size) which makes me think that they’re going to go in that direction

of course this is a spectrum: I think of it like a one-dimensional spectrum, with “physical” on one side and “mental” on the other. so it’s possible for erotic art to equally emphasize physical and mental aspects of the story, and I’ve seen that too. but the spectrum does feel pretty lopsided to me - I’ve seen a lot more erotic art leaning heavily onto the physical side than I have on the mental side

I think I tend to gravitate toward audio-only erotica or erotic stories because it’s much harder to emphasize physical things in those mediums, because you have to go out of your way to describe them. and I think images and videos are the opposite, where it’s difficult to establish mental factors (you have to use dialog boxes, voice acting, or be very careful to add context through things like body language and expressions) but very easy to show physical things like body part sizes or sex positions