Comments (10)

By Hemisphere, 3 February, 2010 7:52 AM

A few days ago I was reading some eromanga, thoroughly amused at the nice mix of humor and ero, and wondered to myself why not a lot of eroges tried doing the same thing. It’s the perfect medium, after all, as eroges innately have ero with them; why not put in some humor to add to the mix? A good blend of comedy and ero will not only keep people amused, but hungry for more heroine action! Thus far, the only titles I’ve played that had the sense and level of humor I was looking for were Akatsuki no Goei, Honoo no Haramase, Doppuri Nakadashi, and to an extent, Osananajii ha Daitouryou. All those titles are mostly concerned with humor, ad while I know humor isn’t Akatsuki no Goei’s main focus, it does it so well that I can’t help but include it. Every other title I’ve covered only had sprinklings of humor here and there, which while not a bad thing, is just too little a sprinkling of humor for my taste. It might not be obvious, but I LOVE humor, and the lack of its abundance in eroges is enough to bring me to despair.

But after playing Yunibaru!, I was convinced that I was simply looking for the right games in the wrong places (or in this case, companies). This game is FUCKING HILARIOUS, so fucking hilarious that I was laughing my ass off from start to finish. The title is about Daisekai Geshuku, its owner Konoe Shinichiro, and its intriguing inhabitants, to say the least. There residents of Shinichiro’s lodging house are: Watase Megu, an alien who can use Ether; Ayakaze Kanae, a witch who uses magic; and Fu, a god who brings about various misfortunes (mostly upon herself). As for the lead, Shinichiro traveled the world far and wide during his youth, and has only recently settled in Japan, so he’s got a lot of experience in a lot of things. Which comes in handy because, due to the nature of his residents, certain organizations with to “recruit” (and by that I mean kidnap) them in order to further their agenda, and it falls to Shinichiro’s duty as the owner to protect them.

When it comes to the comedy, Yunibaru! pulls no punches. It’s akin to a roller-coaster ride, rarely hitting lull periods as the hilarity just keeps on coming. From the morning incident at the beginning of the game, to the spy incident, and then to the classroom hilarity and so on. Even when the story starts focusing on each heroine’s conflicts and their subsequent resolutions, the humor is still abundantly present. The “sweet talk” and the hitogata incident with Megu, the interrogation and the love hotel scenes with Kanae, and the church face-off with Fu, these are just some examples of said scenes. And let’s not forget the various references present! INAZUMA KIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICK!

The game’s not entirely about humor as it does have some dramatic tensions and action unfold, mostly when Shinichiro’s mother makes her appearance, but even then the comedy is still present! It doesn’t ruin the dramatic tension so much as it strikes up a nice balance, because what Yunibaru! is good at is not taking itself seriously – something that most titles do and end up causing an inconsistency with the humorous material presented beforehand, thereby creating a dissonance with their audience.

I’d love to talk about the humorous scenes that I’ve been giving praises to, but I’m afraid of spoiling the entertainment so I’d rather leave a recommendation instead and have you guys check it out for yourselves. It really IS worth your while if you’ve been craving for some good, hearty laughs.

If comedy’s not exactly your thing and you just want to gawk at the pictures of naked bishoujos willingly submitting themselves before your almighty masculine virility, though, then note that Apricot doesn’t fail in that regard as well. All the ladies are attractive, are designed VERY WELL, and I’m sure one of them is bound to be your fancy! And if you want to know how they are in eroscenes…well, I recommend looking up Newprimus’ post about SisterxSister and reading up on what he had to say about the ero scenes in that one – the raunchiness is a bit toned down, but the sheer sexiness and eroticism of each scene is still alive and kicking in Yunibaru!

See, aren’t those just DELECTABLE? Sure to tease and please any loins!

The voice’s acting very well done as well. Hitomi voices Megu, Aoyama Yukari voiced Kanae (and her performance is quite remarkable even for me), the seiyuu who voiced Tayutama’s Yumina voices Fu (sorry but I just don’t like that high-pitched tone of voice), Kazane voices Arshes, and Isshiki Hikaru voices Shion (who is just PERFECTLY casted as the attendant in a meido fuku who HATES maids!). All of their performance is perfectly well-done, helping to bring their respectively voiced characters to life. Not only that, but the way they deliver their lines speaks of such vigor that it is actually very enjoyable to hear them act out their roles, especially during certain scenes (and I’m not just talking about the eroscenes here, mind you)!

Now while people might be intrigued to find out just what makes Shinichiro’s residents so special (aside from their obviously special natures), the special one is actually Shinichiro himself – and the game makes this clear early on with the “water tank incident”. What makes him so special? Compared to him, his residents are nothing…but I say, play it to find out!

Now, onto Yumina FD. Again.

I’ve been playing the Omake sections of the game, and while the battles are pretty tough (mostly because of the huge HP that the enemy/enemies have), the scenes both before and after the fights are very much worth it. Three ero scenes are unlocked via the Omake scenes, and via these omake ONLY. But more importantly, the omake events are goddamn HILARIOUS! From the new characters, I’d have to say my favorites would still be Rumine and Lily (don’t worry Luceid, I’m saying favorite, not waifu) for similar reasons – they’re both straightforward, passionate, and because of this they’re pretty much airheads. Rumine has her 2D complex imposing itself on various characters – Beldadia, for one, and also with Nayuta and Yumine with regards to Ayumu; Lily, on the other hand, has her overwhelmingly powerful 超無敵 focused desire for Ayumu. It’s just too bad that Rumine gets featured in three omake scenes while Lily only gets featured in one. Damn you Eternal! You guys created new characters that EVERYONE ends up gushing over! You guys better feature more of them in the future goddammit! If not, 絶対完全絶望 awaits!

Last is Kagura Douchuuki, the first title of Debonosu Works (or as some of you might call em, Studio E.go! redux). Their latest one, Kagura Gakuenki was part of the January releases, and since I wanted to try it out I decided I might as well start with Douchuuki first. It involves two mikos who were sent to a small town to investigate the recent disappearances of people (all of them ladies, of course – see where this is going?); you’ve got the katana-wielding miko Ibuki and her kansai-ben, and the naginata-wielding tsundere miko Nazuna. Ibuki’s pretty much an airhead, and she’s the source of the game’s humor via her interactions with other characters. The gameplay is fun to get into as it is an RPG, though it can be pretty grind-intensive.

If you’re into mikos kicking demon ass, then Kagura Douchuuki delivers that via the gameplay. And if you’re into mikos getting violated by demons and the like, then Kagura Douchuuki has that to offer as well! It’s just like Chouko Sennin Haruka or Kleinhasa – if you want to see your heroines submitted to degeneration and humiliation, then just make them lose the fights they get into. This game’s got more miko molestation CGs and scenes than you can shake a stick at!

Ibuki and Nazuna are just too adorable though, so I couldn’t bear the thought of subjecting to lowly demon fornication with tons of humiliation and degeneration involved. Nuuuuuuuu, not my mikos! ;_; Plus, their boke-tsukkomi manzai is always good for some laughs, thanks to Ibuki being the boke and Nazuna playing the tsukkomi.

That’s it for this post! Man, am I glad I tried out Yunibaru! – the damn thing’s got just exactly the kind of humor I was looking for. Yumina FD and Douchuuki weren’t bad themselves, as they were like the appetizers before the main course!

Next: Seirei Tenshou and some more titles! I’ve actually already played Seirei Tenshou AND finished Rur’s route, but the ending I got was meh despite it being the normal ending…so now I’m just waiting for a guide on Seirei Tenshou before I pick it up again (AND GET THE GOOD ENDING THIS TIME AROUND) just to determine what the necessary conditions for the endings are.

EDIT: FUUUUCK I FORGOT! Ikusa Megami Verita’s page updated, introducing more characters! Oh man, it’s really shaping up to be one epic, awesome game! I JUST CAN’T WAIT FOR IT AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH-

Comments (8)

By Hemisphere, 31 January, 2010 12:40 PM

This one’s gonna be about my impressions on Kiss to Maou, Yumina FD and Shapeshifter. Finished Sarasa’s route and currently in Lyce’s in Kiss to Maou, finished Yumina FD, AND completed both Nhatya’s and Ahes’ routes!

And when I say the lamest Maou ever, he totally is. Sheesh. Kiss to Maou to Darjeeling is Marmalade’s latest offering, and it’s got the most uninteresting typical harem lead there is. Basically the whole game’s about the lead (who is so dull that I already forgot his name) who decides to take a rest in an underground coffin only to wake up, go back to his dormitory room, find out that the student council president’s waiting for him there, calls him “Maou”, and promptly stabs him later when he refuses to believe her. Yeah, it’s just one of those days, it can happen to anyone.

Don’t try to make sense of the plot, because I sure as hell didn’t. First and foremost is that this is a character game, much like Lyrical Lyric, so unless you like the gorgeous ladies (or the trap), don’t bother picking up Kiss to Maou. The “Maou” element in the story is pretty much a convenient plot device, much like Lyrical Lyric’s “Tuner” concept; and much like the “Tuner” concept, the “Maou” concept barely gets used in an interesting manner. Which was too bad because I expected more from the whole thing, seeing as it’s about a MAOU and all: see the Maous of Eushully’s games, now those dudes don’t fuck around. Well, they do, in order to gain mana mostly BUT THAT’S NOT THE POINT THE POINT IS Kiss to Maou fails the Maou aspect too, so if you were intrigued by that, then know early on that this game hardly makes use of the Maou thing to its full potential – or, for that matter, barely any potential at all.

But hey, if you want some sweet fuckans with some gorgeous heroines, then Kiss to Maou delivers! Somewhat. While the sexy action’s all got nice CG working out for them, some of the CGs are pretty lazy.

Next is Yumina’s fandisc, Yumina FD -ForeverDreams-. There’s not really much to it. Did you wish you could enjoy the company of those goofy classmate in Yumina via more events and? Then you get more events! Wanted to put them in your party too? There you go! Want some new interesting and delishuz chaarcters? No problem? Want these characters in your party too? FUCK OFF! Which is a damn shame, because I know I’d like to see more of Rumine, Eru and Lily, really…

Chapter 1 might just be all about the election rematch, but once that’s done, get your butt ready for GRINDANS, GRINDANS, GRINDANS AND MORE DUNGEON GRINDANS in Chapter 3 onwards. Did you really think that just because its a fandisc, that this one would take up less time? HA! Still grindtastic like the original! And just like Yumina, the events with the various characters had me laughing pretty hard. GO DO-M NO AYUMU! And the Graham Aker reference, among other things, is awesome.

Lastly, Shapeshifter. The progression for Shapeshifter is similar to Owarinaki Natsu, in that you follow a common route (with subtle dialogue differences depending on which options you choose) up to an event, after which you follow your chosen heroine’s route up to her ending. You’ve got around 5 to 7 chapters for the common route, I forgot exactly, but they didn’t seem that long to me. Then again Itsusora didn’t seem that long to me either when I was going after my beloved San-nee back then, so…your mileage will definitely vary. The plot for Shapeshifter isn’t as dramatic or melancholy as Owarinaki Natsu was, though it contains more humor and definitely tons more action. Me, I liked seeing the action as well as the love comedy; thanks to phi-age’s cinematic presentation, the action easily comes to life unlike in other eroges. Plus, hey, it’s bishoujos with weapons, what else could make me happier?

All the characters are pretty likable, and I know that I went nuts with Nhatya just from what I’ve seen of her in the two trials that phi-age released back then, but maaaaan. I wasn’t expecting Ahes to be that…that…moe. She is just way too awesome; her weapons, her clothes, and more particularly her attitudes and behavior. WAIFU 発見! Plus, her seiyuu is the same one who voiced Ai in Owarinaki Natsu, and hearing her voice a kuudere is hilarious (as she voiced a tsundere in Owarinaki Natsu) as well as downright ridiculously irresistibly adorable! Of course, it’s a given that I still have dibs on Nhatya!

Next on the list: Kagura Gakuenki, Seirei Tenshou and Yunibaru! Till next time, SARABA AND ADIEU!

Comments (18)

By Hemisphere, 21 January, 2010 8:04 PM

And that, my friends, is HUMOR! I don’t know about you, but I found my romp through both Akatsuki no Goei and Tenkuu no Yumina memorable thanks to the hilarity in both titles. While the former had the Kaito x Tsuki comedy dialogues as its highlight for humor, the former had wacky high school hijinks and a bubbly heroine who can be just as goofy as she is serious. Ah, hilarity, how I’ve missed you so much. ;_;

Yumina FD‘s ADV trial starts off with the fight between Yumina and Nayuta ending in a stalemate, with both sides evenly matched in votes. Nayuta, with the right to vote as student council president and therefore break the tie in her favor, puts forward a proposal instead: that in exchange for her voting right, they have a rematch instead, during the summer holidays. Attached to her offer, however, is a condition: that Yumina’s club must surrender Akashima Ayumu to the Student Council! Ayumu is shocked, while Kirara and Ai decide to leave the decision to Yumina. Surprised, Yumina finds it hard to choose between the rematch or Ayumu…

…Until she remembers that it was his fault that she got into this whole mess in the first place, and that if she forfeits this chance then she’ll have to repeat the year. NO CHOICE THERE, so off Ayumu goes! And thus begins a new life for Ayumu, with the Student Council.

The trial ends once the full 8 days preparation before the finals have passed, and Ayumu has done all the recruiting he can do. My thoughts? Omg, I loved Nayuta the moment she appeared in Yumina – there was just no way in hell I could resist Shizuka Ito + tsundere character combo! – so seeing more of her is definitely a BIG plus with me. I also liked the miko sisters a lot, so more scenes involving them were yay!

From what I’ve seen, Nayuta is DEFINITELY gonna be my heroine pick come Yumina FD. Ah, Nayuta~ That, and I’m hoping for more Beldadia and Eupushira (WHAT THE FUCK ARE THEIR ROMANIZED NAMES?!? I DON’T KNOW!), because more of them is ALWAYS good.

On to Akatsuki no Goei’s next installment’s trial. It starts off with something pretty serious, then shifts to Kaito, then the trial goes on until you see this bloodied girl with a sword voiced by Shizuka Ito, then it ends. Talk about an enlightening summary of the trial, eh? Well that’s because I pretty much prioritized the scenes with Tsuki over anything else, mostly because I missed the humor that abounds from such scenes, and also because I needed to hear more of Tsuki’s sarcastic exchanges. TSUKI IS BEST!

Oh yeah, and the trial hints at some pretty serious stuff that’s about to happen, and various shit is about to go down. Tons of foreshadowing, you know how it goes, though personally I’d rather not get too intrigued and involved seeing as the release for this one is FUCKING APRIL. I CAN’T WAIT THAT LONG YO. So I decided to instead have my fill of Tsuki from the trial. YAY PRODUCTIVITY!

Also Syangrila’s still got that “all you foreign IPs are blocked from our website hahaha go fuck yourselves” thing, just like Yuzusoft, so I can’t exactly link to their site and shit. What I can do instead is link you here, to the title’s getchu page, where you can download the trial yourself! Wheee!

Last, but not least! Ha! Bet you didn’t see this coming. Demo trailer for Ikusa Megami VERITA! IKUSA MEGAMI VERITA, MOTHERFUCKERS.

Thoughts? FUCK YES!

The main site also updated, so go check it out! It’s also slated for a 4/23 release…HOOOOLY SHIT APRIL IS GONNA BE EPIC. Check out the Character page! Check out the System page! Check out the Sample CG page! And the Download page! HOLY SHIT JUST CHECK IT OUT, GODDAMMIT!

I wanted more Ikusa Megami ass kicking, and this looks like it’s gonna fulfill that desperate itch, and then some MORE! And widescreen too! OHGAWD THIS IS JUST TOO EPIC *faints from sensory overload*

Comments (7)

By Hemisphere, 25 August, 2009 1:59 AM

So I haven’t updated for a while now with anything even remotely eroge-related. Time to remedy that little thing. And what better to post than my favorite thing – LOLIS mahou/henshin heroines! Or however the fuck you categorize them. Even I get confused by that sometimes, but it doesn’t diminish my totally uncontrollable raging fetish total love for them!

First off on the list is Eternal’s Nega0. I, uhh, don’t have much to say about this one because I just checked it out now and didn’t bother going into the finer details like story and stuff am terribly reminded of Yumina with this one because it pretty much uses the same battle system, despite a few minor changes. You can check out the download for the trial here, and check out the gallery here or below! Your call.

Yeah, you’ve probably noticed by now the vastly different art over the one featured in Yumina. DON’T ASK ME ABOUT THAT ONE OKAY. All I know is that they have a different artist on board for Nega0. Personally, the new look takes a while to get used to.

Then you’ve got Triangle, who’s decided to take a break from their Mahou Senshi series for now, but is coming out with Kleinhasa! It’s got delishuz bishoujos in armor, and…that’s all the reason as to why I’m all fawning over it, really. I mean, come on. They’ve got stuff like:

Which is enough to send me into a frenzy. <3 them mahou/henshin shoujos. They don’t have anything much on their site at the moment, but I DO love the CG samples available. So much.

Yeah, I don’t really know why but I love Triangle’s stuff. It’s just totally appealing to me. For some reason. Yeah. Let’s go with that.

Then there’s LiLiM’s upcoming Ai Kyan, or あい☆きゃん…look, fuck the romanization of that. It’s got the same artist behind Houousenki Maimu and Shouryusenki Tenmu, though this time around I’m having reservations about this one thanks to how Tenmu was. Sure it had hot CGs (and Tenmu was adorable, in my opinion) but the game was just a mishmash of things from Maimu with some crap added in, and I don’t think I’m really up to going through Maimu v.3/Tenmu v.2 a third time.

Maaaaaaaaaaan…if it’s any consolation, you can at least look at the CGs below.

And last but definitely not the least…MOTHERFUCKING IKUSA MEGAMI EPISODE 4 VERITA.

THAT’S RIGHT MOTHERFUCKERS.

IKUSA MEGAMI.

EPISODE 4.

Site’s here btw.

Man, there’s totally a lot of titles I’m looking forward to now.

PS.

ALL HAIL EUPHORIA-CH-wait that’s not her FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF-

Comments (21)

By Hemisphere, 23 November, 2008 6:33 PM

Man I haven’t done this in a while!

AliceSoft’s updated their Toushin Toushi 3 with more visual samples for a brief peek at what the game has to offer in terms of CGs. Like I said before – once the game’s out, I’m going to be all over the pink-haired bracon ninja. For some reason she’s really got me intrigued. Well, that and she’s voiced by Sakakibara Yui, so I’m looking forward to see how she’ll be doing this one. Aside from that, what is there to say about the CGs other than “your usual AliceSoft quality”, which is to say, absolutely gorgeous? At least to me anyways, I don’t know about you guys but I love the artists in AliceSoft’s team.

Next up is Dungeon Crusaderz 2, just to keep up with the eye candy motiff. Because, to be honest, that’s really the only thing I’ll be going for in this one. Take a look at the characters and visuals to see what I mean. And if the site looks messed up to you, then don’t worry because you’re not the only one. Alternatively, you could also check out their recently-released 400+MB demo here – which really doesn’t have a lot of things to show for it despite its size. Once I get this title, I’ll be all over Ende, Glycine Lufthauser, Regina Nogea, and fucking Nada. Also Ruffin, if possible, because even though she’s just a sub-character, DAMN SHE’S HOT! Yes. Obviously I have my priorities right regarding Dungeon Crusaderz 2. Atelier Kaguya’s hot women > anything else the game has to supposedly offer. Fuck their names, man, if I can put up with BUDDY, then nothing else can faze me!

Third is Kimi ga Yobu Megido no Oka de, Leaf’s upcoming 3D RPG eroge which was delayed to a December 26 release and is set to drive me to despair because of much-needed HD space. There’s been some updates on the characters and other stuff, but the most noteworthy thing is that a benchmark is available for download so you can go ahead and see if you’ll be able to run this baby, before you decide to get it! YEAH BITCHES, IN CASE YOU MISS IT, BENCHMARK IS OUT SO GRAB IT AND TEST IT! 61 FUCKING MB DUDES WHATTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT. Also, FUCK YEAH BUDDY! BUDDY IS SO GOING TO BE THE BEST CHARACTER IN THIS GAME EVERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR AND FUCK YOU ALL WHO THINK OTHERWISE.

Lastly, Yumina the Ethereal. They’ve got a lot of updates up like more visual samples, new subsections in the system section, and a whole lot of other shit that you might find interesting. Including a sample of the game’s OP theme! The adorable SD CGs still make me laugh, but I hope that their reason for putting off the game’s release was for them to polish the gameplay system more and make it less rage-inducing and more intuitive and player-friendly. Well, that and they might not have wanted to risk competing with Leaf’s title. Oh, and look! Telecards! I mean, sure, I can’t fucking get them, but they’re still pretty nice to look at. Even if rageworthy because I’ll never be able to get my hands on them. FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF WHY DOES IT HAVE TO BE THIS WAY BRB PUNCHING BABIES IN THE FACE.

And that’s about it for now! Just biding my time until TT3 comes out…and you can be fucking assured that once it does, every eroge in my Now Playing list is going to be dropped in favor of it. WHOOHOO MORE BACKLOGS!