Eroge Review

To forever rid the world of the vampire lord known as Drake, the Catholic Church unleashes two highly experienced vampire hunters in a bid for final victory. Taking the battle directly to his vile homeland, the divinely ordained combatants have been ordered to show no mercy or quarter to their undead enemy, and bring swift holy retribution to that which affronts God’s devoted followers. Yet in their blind zealotry, they discover all too late that evil is never powerless against those who would deny it.
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Yami no Senou (闇の僭王 聖女汚辱) is a rape subjugation eroge published by Psychs J in 2006. It has no sequel, side story, or noteworthy doujinshi.
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Generally speaking, eroge that feature vampires are typically outstanding products. Draculius. Izayoi no Hanayome. MinDeaD BlooD. Sabae no Ou. Tsukihime. Each of these incorporates marvelous scripting, fantastic character development, beautiful artwork… the list of praise simply goes on and on. Yet this is merely a reflection of the success Japan has long shown with handling undead bloodsuckers, for outside of hentai there has always been popular titles such as Castlevania, Hellsing, Trinity Blood, and Vampire Hunter D - just to name a mere handful. Yet claiming that the Land of the Rising Sun can do no wrong with vampires would be a blatant lie, for there exists at least one title that contaminates and rots the genre like a malignant cancer: Yami no Senou.
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Set within the European medieval era, Yami no Senou significantly borrows concepts and setting details from the aforementioned Castlevania series, including a castle owning emo vampire noble being pursued by whip toting undead hunters. Taking the role of Drake, the “Lord of Darkness” who captures a pair of Vatican trained specialists that sought to destroy him, the player supervises sexual domination of his prisoners until they willing submit to become his eternally loyal bloodsucking brides. There exists a minor back story which attempts to paint Drake as a sympathetic villain – a kind and loving woman who he deeply cared for was brutally raped then burned to death by zealots of the Church – but the entire subplot is handled amazingly awful. More or less, I found it to merely be an excuse to show kinky scenes with a naked woman burned at the stake.
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Yami no Senou is predominantly a sexfest title, essentially devoid of serious character development and a meaningful plotline. For that reason, the primary goal is straightforward and simplistic: to unlock as many sex scenes as possible, which results in the absolute subjugation of the female cast. In situations such as these, likability of the cast is paramount, if only because likability is all they truly have to offer. Unfortunately, while two out of the three central women are not terminally flawed, the comedic relief providing demonic maid is annoying as hell. Given that she executes sexual punishments that Drake deems beneath him, the infernal maid is a frequently reoccurring character. The core root of the problem is that the somber position she serves, is completely at odds with her chipper personality and outlook, resulting in the ruination of what should be a sinister mood setting.
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It’s rather surprising how the presentation of Yami no Senou is a chaotic mixed bag. Music is unquestionably the title’s greatest strength, uncharacteristically above and beyond everything else within the eroge. While two-thirds of the soundtrack is rather plain and immaterial, six of the eighteen songs are enjoyable grunge metal themes performed by a garage band. Most of the voice acting remains average at best, with only the females roles performed, although the actress for Triela is worth mentioning since she’s really good at crying and screaming convincingly; which obviously constitutes the bulk of her role. Artistically the eroge represents an absolute total failure, as the graphic designer is incredibly subpar. For that reason, the character designs and event illustrations tremendously suffer from inadequacy and unoriginality. Oddly enough, background images were drawn with much higher standards, causing a noticeable disparity of them being more appealing than the foreground’s paper dolls and textbox portraits. The fact that there are incredibly few paper dolls, thus resulting in periodic repetition to the point of insanity, only rubs salt in these gaping wounds.
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In the delivery of sex, Yami no Senou maintains a reasonable list of varying, if not somewhat uncreative hardcore offerings, including such classics as (but not limited to): bukkake, gangbangs, hymen breaking, scat, seamen drinking, shoving foreign objects in various orifices, and tentacle violation. This selection of variety is regrettably offset by the short duration of each activity - typically three or four event frames - and the feeling of déjà vu gained from witnessing the exact same punishment being delivered to the second vampire hunter in quick succession. Such a “double feature” might not be a problem for everyone, but a player who finds discontentment with one of the girls and/or particular sexual punishment will definitely fast-forward out of disinterest. Because artwork quality greatly influences the overall worth of a title’s erotic content, the obvious lack is sharply noticed.
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There is absolutely no reason why anyone should consider Yami no Senou an eroge worthy of attention. There are literally dozens of far superior contenders which deal with the exact same material and methodology; only with greater finesse and infinitely more satisfaction. The time ‘ole saying that “beggars can’t be choosy” clearly does not apply to fans of hentai vampires: the ocean is quite populated these luscious fish, and here we have an example of an underfed and pathetic specimen. Cast it back to the sea and find those mighty whales instead!
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— Central Characters —
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	Drake . Borne from a might lineage and gifted with the arts of magic, Drake is one of the world’s most powerful vampires. For decades he has waged war against humanity, seeking to slaughter and enslave the species for committing a crime he deems eternally unforgiveable. Now that his malevolence has earned the ire of the Church itself, an apocalyptic battle looms on the horizon. One that Drake has been savoring in ravenous hunger.
	Ren . Summoned from the depths of Hell to loyally serve Drake until the End Times, the mischievous Ren is neither succubus or incubus, and more akin to an unholy amalgamation that straddles between the two. Although she acts the role of a court jester, beneath this façade of fun and games belies the mind of a cunningly terrible demon who is a master of shape shifting and illusions… as well as unspeakable techniques of pain and pleasure.
	April Floreal . An expert of the whip, April’s physical prowess is only matched by her intellectual knowledge of alchemy and scholarship, and carries an arsenal of ingenious weapons of her own design. She presents herself as a cold and heartless woman devoid of emotion, but there exists a special few who have seen April exhibit boundless compassionate and warmth to those she truly cares for.
	Triela Mercedes . Deeply versed in the greatest of holy teachings, Triela has been favored by Heaven since birth, commanding the power of clerical magic and knowledge of divine faith. Her mere presence causes the undead to recoil in fear, for the magnitude of purity found in her mind and body is equal to that of an archangel. Triela exhilarates in challenging her limits, seeking to be the best at what she does.

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— Scored Summary —
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Scenario: 3 out of 10. Even taking into consideration that this title is a quickie sexfest, the game play duration is amazing short. Perhaps in relation to this, the handful of times attempts to provide back story on the characters presents itself, the moment merely lasts about 30 to 60 seconds at best, thus failing significantly.
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Visual: 7 out of 20. With the exception to background illustrations, the overall artwork is clearly below expectations. This is all further compounded by unimaginative designs and woefully few paper dolls. To put it mildly, everything concerning graphics in this title is amateurish – which in of itself is a contradiction, as there are numerous amateur doujin that are professional looking.
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Audio: 13 out of 20. Surprisingly decent music, adequately sustained voice acting, and an interesting selection of sound effects (ringing church bell, raging fires) combines to make audio the strongest aspect of the overall package. However in no way does this make up for deficiencies in other categories.
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Erotica: 19 out of 50. It has lots of sex, but all of it is hampered by the short duration. On the basis of technicality, the title only contains half the material it advertises because each scene is actually repeated twice: once for each vampire hunter.
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Mechanics: 0 point neutrality. The typical “choose your response” menu system that most eroge share… or rather I should say, “choose your torture.”
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Final Score: 42 out of 100. Thanks to the low quality artwork, repetitive sex that’s too quick, the occasional involvement of an irritable green haired flunky, and zero attempt to at least provide a reasonable story setting, Yami no Senou is a complete waste of time. Don’t be fooled into thinking that sexfest have no standards: that is a common misconception which this terrible eroge does nothing to fix. Absolutely not recommended for purchase under any circumstance. Practically anything else is better.

1. Baldo Says:
   January 19th, 2008 at 7:32 am

   You know, I’m often perplexed when I compare your reviews/scores to the Erogamescape pages of the same games (Yami No Senou is not so bad for those guys). Why don’t join to their group, adding a gaijin viewpoint?
   And speaking of timewasting games, can you specify the titles of those Tactics games you have, for avoiding future moneywasting (even if maybe it’s too late for me… )?



2. Nargrakhan Says:
   January 24th, 2008 at 10:43 pm

   @Baldo: One of the reasons why I wanted to make an eroge review site, is because I rarely agree with the reviews at Japanese sites such as Erogamescape. I’ve simply learned to accept that the mind of a Japanese eroge fan, does not necessarily agree with that of the mind of a Western eroge fan. With that said, I’d rather cater to the “gaijin” than the Japanese (who already have tons of review sites), so I don’t bother with posting on Erogamescape and such… As for those Tactics games: I’m planning to review them soon, don’t you worry. ^_^