Otome Game Review: Sakuya

For reasons I cannot explain I’ve been holding off on playing this game but I finally got to it and HELL YEA WORTH ALL THE $8 I PAID FOR IT. Seriously Tetrascope strikes again with their beautiful art and amazing writing and characterization. It’s been a while since I’ve enjoyed an otome game maker this much and they’re not even an official company! So I’ll just have to throw my money at them in hopes they will produce more awesome games for me to enjoy ＼( ^o^)／. The story takes place in a distant future where android robots are now part of society. Our heroine Akane, lives with an android robot named Sakuya that her father created. Her childhood friend Shin wants to buy Sakuya for his company to research but Akane refuses to sell him. She has trouble making ends meet and if she sold him she’d be set for life but she can’t bring herself to sell him cause he’s like family to her now. Before her father died he told her to always be with Sakuya for the rest of her life, and if they were ever to part, to destroy him.

Sakuya knows that he’s an android and is very much aware of this factor. Unlike other robots though, Sakuya is very advanced and a lot of people often think he’s human. Girls constantly kyakya over him but he has no interest in them as he doesn’t have any sexual desires. He can only really get attracted to someone via emotional bonds, and he’s very emotionally attached to Akane. He also often gets upset at humans who constantly say that android robots are “disgustingly realistic” so Akane comforts him and tells him to ignore people like that. It’s worse of course when some worker android robot gets spat on but then Akane is treated “better” even though both are the same robots. While Akane, Shin and Sakuya are out together one day, while in the food court they watch a loli almost get hit by one of the cleaning androids there. The loli’s mom comes by complaining about how she hates them and thanks Sakuya for “protecting” her daughter. This of course upsets Sakuya, and that night he asks to sleep in the same bed as Akane. She complains at first but unable to resist his sad face she lets him. He tells her he won’t do anything sexual cause he doesn’t have those things programmed into him even though anatomically he has the “parts” :lol:. He says that he sometimes isn’t sure if he’s really a robot or a human because the androids around him are very “robotic” but he’s so advanced that other than Akane and Shin, no one sees him as a “robot”.  One day Sakuya tells Akane he wants to do a part time job because he wants to buy something – but he says it’s a secret until he gets it.  She panics that something might happen to him when he’s out of her sight and tells him to only work the same part time job as her. Unfortunately, while Sakuya passes the job interview, Akane fails. And so he begins his bookstore job but Akane puts a GPS necklace on him just to be safe.

In the past, Shin and Akane had 1 more childhood friend: Haruki. He really loved robots and reading books a lot but then he died of an unknown illness. Haruki’s mom begged Akane’s father to “bring him back to life” in any way possible. And so her father began on a path to create an android with Haruki’s “soul” in it and ended up creating something that surpassed an average robot.  Unfortunately by then, Haruki’s mother had committed suicide and Akane’s dad had to take responsibility of “Sakuya” on his own. Shin tells her that she might be thinking Sakuya = Haruki and knows that Akane was in love with Haruki always babbling how she’ll marry him in the future. Shin also mentions that he probably started robot research because he wanted to “beat Haruki” and then decides to stop beating around the bush and tells Akane he loves her. Akane’s like whut and gets confused thinking he had a fight with his girlfriend – not realizing he’s loved her for a long time.  Before she can give him an answer, he has to return to work and says that he’s serious.  At home when Akane tells Sakuya about this he’s like would you kiss or have sex with him? Akane’s like whut never and tells him she likes Shin as a friend but never thought of his as a romantic love interest. On the way home from work, after her boss makes fun of her and Shin saying they should be married, Akane bumps into some android policeman. Unfortunately his wiring’s all screwed up and he ends up pushing Akane on the ground and nearly strangling her to death. That is, until Shin comes and saves her.  He explains that while robots normally don’t attack people, a virus has been going around and infecting them and taking over their program. Before he drops her off he tells her to free a night to have dinner with him to give him an answer to his confession.

Human & Robot – End 3:
Akane tells Sakuya the truth about being attacked by a robot and he says for her to be more careful because he doesn’t want her scarring her “beautiful skin”. The next day Akane goes out to actually buy clothes for her “date” with Shin because he told her she should stop wearing hoodies and looking like a hobo. She buys the new dress and Sakuya asks to see her try it on at home. When she does he says she’s beautiful but frowns at the thought that this is the dress she’ll be wearing on her date with Shin. That night, Sakuya comes into Akane’s room asking to sleep next to her again and he admits that he doesn’t want her going on a date with Shin. Akane feels relieved suddenly and says she won’t go and instead tell Shin she just doesn’t see him more than a childhood friend. Sakuya feels bad but is happy and then turns around and hugs Akane in bed. The  next day while Sakuya is out with his coworkers (cause Akane insisted he didn’t skip out), Akane meets with Shin in the park. She tells him she can’t see him beyond childhood friend but she loves the way he looks while he works on robots. Akane asks Shin to continue to be Sakuya’s friend.

Borderline – End 4:
Akane lies and doesn’t tell Sakuya what happened with the robot attack.  She also lies to him about the perfume she bought and Sakuya confronts her saying lately she’s been lying a lot to him. Their relationship gets pretty rocky and one night he asks to sleep next to her. She lets him, and after a while he asks if he can touch her. Akane freaks out cause “family” doesn’t do this but says just a little is ok. All he does is put his arm around her though and fall asleep.
The next day Sakuya goes to his coworkers get together while Sakuya goes on her date with Shin. Cut to the Chase Shin ™ surprises her once more and just places a ring on the table asking Akane to marry him. Akane spits her food out in shock cause lol whut. She says he sounds like he’s lying but he apologizes because that’s just how he is after years and years of only focusing on research. On the way home, Akane refuses (lol I had no choice but to refuse) Shin’s marriage proposal. She then starts to realize that she’s denying the fact that Sakuya’s an android robot. She gets home early and waits for Sakuya but he’s shocked to get home and find out that she went to dinner with Shin (cause she lied saying she was going out with a coworker.)  Akane apologizes for lying to him and then says that she rejected Shin’s proposal. Sakuya says that being with Akane makes his heart ache and then she realizes they’re probably both in love with each other.  Remembering Shin’s words though, she realizes humans and robots cannot fall in love or get married. They both say they love each other – but Akane knows that this is just “as a family”.

Collateral Existence End 5:
Pretty much same as end 4, except at the end, Akane realizes she loves Sakuya even if he is a robot. She almost blurts out that she loves him but then stops herself and runs off to take a bath.  She then tries to sneak into his room at night but he opens the door and they both end up toppling to the floor. He asks Akane to sleep with him and she does and then he says he’s happy in their current relationship but he wants to…move forward. Akane is like well I’m okay with this but as Sakuya is about to kiss her, he hesitates and says they should stop. Not having any of this, Akane grabs him back down and says she loves him..but then says that she’s still afraid because inside of her there’s still the resistance that she’s falling in love with something not human.  She asks him to give her time to get her feelings together. A year later they visit Haruki’s grave as well as Akane’s fathers grave. While there, they both pray and say they will make each other happy which ends up coming out like a propose from Sakuya. He tells Akane to forget it cause he wants to propose properly to her next time. (*´ω｀*)

At Least as an Android End 6:
Warning, this is the BAD end but it’s just SO FUCKING SAD щ(ಥДಥщ). Similar events as end 4, except this time you have no choice but to marry Shin :lol:.  He helps her inside the house since she’s so drunk she’s barely able to stan, and Sakuya’s still not home. As he helps her relax on the couch, she opens up basically and lets Shin kiss her.  She figures well I’m gonna marry him anyway so whatever and they end up having sex (on the floor lol ouch her poor back.) Unfortunately they didn’t think their cunning plan all the way through and well…Sakuya comes home to see them screwing. Akane cries and asks him to stop because she’s horrified at the thought of Sakuya seeing her like this. It’s too late though because Sakuya sees the whole thing and he’s so shocked at what he saw he doesn’t even blink an eye when Shin packs his stuff and leaves. Feeling horrible Akane tries to go back to her room but I guess seeing this set off his rape switch and out of jealousy he ends up raping her  (◞‸◟ㆀ)ｼｮﾎﾞﾝ. Feeling guilty she just takes it, and afterwards he literally begs her to give him a blow job but she knows since he’s a robot he feels nothing and doesn’t get why he’s even asking for such requests. He’s even polite about it and afterwards says he doesn’t want to hurt her, and makes sure she’s uh ready for round 2 before he sticks it in. See normally I’d be raging, but her reaction isn’t negative somewhere inside she seems to enjoy it but the whole thing is just extremely depressing. щ(ಥДಥщ) It’s like the whole time I’m just sitting there rotating between “NOOOO” and “WHY THIS” il||li＿|￣|○il||liｶﾞｰﾝ。  Sakuya says he can’t control himself and all Akane can think is “I’m sorry”. And so they keep screwing like every night but each time he looks sad and if Akane really wanted to, she could stop him, but she keeps accepting him each time.

One night he asks why she won’t stop him, and Akane realizes she’s in love with him! He then hugs her and asks her to kill him. Akane of course refuses and they fall asleep. After this, Sakuya no longer lays a hand on her, not even kissing…aka they return to the way things were before shit hit the fan. One morning as Akane is leaving for work, Sakuya gives her a “goodbye” hug. Akane isn’t sure why, but that night Sakuya doesn’t come home and Akane notices he left without his GPS necklace. She runs around looking for him and instead runs into Shin who offers her a ride home. To her horror, Shin tells her that Sakuya is in his car’s trunk. She demands to stop the car and when she looks inside she finds a box…full of various “trinkets” and connector pieces that her father used to create Sakuya. Shin tells her that he took Sakuya apart, per his request and sold the other parts to a junk shop. The ones in the box Sakuya had asked to pass on to Akane. (´；ω；｀) In a flashback, Sakuya told Shin that having sex with Akane he felt absolutely nothing and he was jealous of Shin because of it. He wanted to please Akane sexually but realized he can’t so he asked Shin to “destroy him” because Akane wouldn’t do it. He said that he forced himself on Akane until she could barely move, and a robot who hurts humans should not exist. ;_; He also asks Shin to give his data to Nextroid so Akane can get enough money to support herself.  Shin says he’ll donate his body to Nextroid but he will keep his memory parts only for Akane. In the epilogue, Shin has created an android robot that looks exactly like Sakuya, but doesn’t have a personality and is basically only a robot that helps Akane around the house. Because of the striking similarity though, every morning Akane wakes up, sees him, and starts crying.

End 1 (family) & 2 (tears):
Sakuya gets annoyed that his feelings/likes/tastes seem to just be something that he received from Haruki’s memories. Meanwhile Akane gets annoyed when Sakuya talks about some big boobed idol faced coworker of his. One day after work, Akane decides to take a peek to see how Sakuya is doing at his job.  She’s basically greeted with his coworker Maria flirting with him though Sakuya has no reactions to any of her attempts. Akane gets irritated while raging behind a random magazine and decides to go to the register to buy it as an excuse to interrupt them. Unfortunately, she realizes too late that she’s buying some porno mag ((((((((((ﾉ∀`)･ﾟ･｡ ｱﾋｬﾋｬﾋｬﾋｬ .After she gets out of the store, with Shin behind her, she gives him the mag saying he prolly likes big titties anyway. She also rages that she’ll be going out to dinner and tells Sakuya to have fun with his cute coworker. She ends up going to dinner with Shin, getting drunk and having him drive her home. On the way he tells her she’s just jealous of those who interact with Sakuya and when asking Akane what Sakuya is to her, she can’t answer. When she gets home, Sakuya tells her she should have called so he isn’t worried and asks her to face him while talking. Drunk & pissed off, Akane refuses. Sakuya gets really pissed off that she’s being so careless and getting drunk around Shin and pushes her down. Akane tells him to get off and babbles all her jealous feelings about Sakuya and his coworker, further digging herself into a hole.  He tells her she sounds like a jealous woman because she probably loves him, but then stops and says – because she loved Haruki. After this night, Akane works overtime and by the time she gets home she says she’s too tired and basically ends up avoiding any deep conversations with Sakuya (´；ω；｀).

She decides to finally talk it out with him the following night but instead runs into him helping Maria with some shopping while she flirts as usual. Unfortunately the idiot destroys any chances she has with Sakuya by calling android robots “gross” when a police robot walks by. Seeing all of this, Akane comes out of hiding and tells Sakuya to go home with her.  They walk home holding hands and the moment they get inside, he hugs her begging her to never ignore him like that again.  He almost reaches down to kiss her but then cockblocks himself because he and Akane are not in such a relationship! ／(^o^)＼ﾅﾝﾃｺｯﾀｲ  Akane then realizes that she’s fallen in love with Sakuya.  While Sakuya is out with his coworkers, Akane goes to visit Haruki’s grave with Shin. On the way home Akane tells Shin she’s fallen in love with Sakuya and he and Haruki have blended into “one” for her. Shin immediately asks her if she’d ever have sex with Sakuya but Akane gets pissed off and rages home.  That night she can’t stop thinking about what Shin said and even invites Sakuya to sleep in the same bed as her. Well the good news is, Sakuya wants to bang dat sheit too and Akane confesses her feelings to him. Sakuya is not sure that she loves him  or that she still has feelings for Haruki so he aks if Akane sees him as a human or a robot. If you pick human, Sakuya tells Akane that its possible his feelings for her are old feelings from when Haruki loved her. Akane says she only loves Sakuya but he’s like fine, if you wanna do this, then “I” will do it for you and then end up havin sex – but Sakuya asks her not to call his name. The whole time they do it, Sakuya is pretty much stone faced and Akane feels lonely because it’s as if she’s only enjoying herself. When she wakes up, she sees Sakuya crying and well since he’s an android he’s never cried before.  Akane hugs him – the end.

If you choose Android, you get ending 1 where Akane tells Sakuya she loves him as a robot. After this they have some sexy time (which was so much cuter than all the depressing shit in end 6 T_T.) The next morning Akane wakes up freaking out that she’s naked 😆 and lies that she’s cold so Sakuya hugs her to warm her up. (*´ω｀*) He tells her he had a dream based on an old memory of from the past. In the past, when he was turned into a robot, he was still known as “Haruki” but both Shin and his mother said he “isn’t Haruki” and his mother said she can’t love a robot. Akane’s father said he’d take responsibility for this and asked Sakuya what he wanted to do and Sakuya asked to be destroyed because he’s an insufficient replacement for Haruki. Akane’s dad said he can’t kill people, so instead he agrees to change Sakuya’s face so that he no longer looked like Haruki. Per Akane’s request, her dad made Sakuya’s eyes blue since it’s her favorite color. After the operation is over, Akane gives him his new name – Sakuya. After the flashback, Sakuya thanks Akane for the eyes and for a reason to exist in the same world as her.  Cue me bawwing (ಥ＿ಥ）!!! In the epilogue, 1 year later, Akane has decreased her job hours and  taken over the household duties. She instead has Sakuya going out working more instead since he has unlimited work energy. He tells her he’ll give her a goodbye kiss but after he’s done, she notices a necklace with a diamond ring around her neck.  He then asks her to marry him and of course Akane hugs him and says yes. (　；∀；) ｲｲﾊﾅｼﾀﾞﾅｰ！！ Once you complete this ending the  main screen changes to a CG of Akane and Sakuya in their wedding attire. (*´ｪ｀*)ｷｭﾝ♡

Extras: Once you’re done with the game  an extra section called “??” opens up in the scene gallery – which is where the remainder of the CGs are. In the first one, Akane remembers how Sakuya first learned how to cook and how he’d mix up salt and sugar. He said he was inspired because he loved seeing Akane’s happy face while she ate. (✧≖‿ゝ≖) In the 2nd one, it’s the time after her father died and Akane gets sick and takes a long time to recover. She starts crying when the realization hits home that her father died. Sakuya’s “adult” body was his last work (which resolved my mystery of how Sakuya “grew up” from a shota form.) Sakuya then gets sad and asks Akane not to die because her being in bed reminded him of her father before he passed away.  He asks to sleep with her that night so he can feel reassured that she’s gonna be ok. In omake 3, which takes place even further back, Akane’s high school friends invite her to a gokon and ask her to invite Shin because he’s a super smart ikemen to them lol. Shin of courses refuses, and then Akane tells her friend she won’t go… cause she’d rather see a movie with Sakuya. She tells him that she doesn’t need to go to a gokon cause Sakuya’s ikemen enough and he’s like “how ikemanly am I? more than your dad?” LOL. Seems like Sakuya really idolized Akane’s dad and wanted to be like him in the future. Omake 4 is also during high school days, one day Shin comes over Akane’s house to discuss his career plans with her father. Unfortunately this was the time where her father fell ill and Akane said she was thinking of not going to college and working part time instead. When Shin comes inside the house, some bullies in his class shoved a porno mag in his bag. Sakuya finds it and is like can I see—wwhoaaa naked ladies! ﾌﾟｯ(※థэథ)∵.*.∵ He then starts to “study” it like a diagram and wonders if Akane looks the same way LMAO XDDD. Sakuya then asks Shin what does “arouse” mean and Shin explains to him – which also then explains Sakuya’s constant usage of it in end 1 (Akane was right lolol).  When Akane comes back into the living room she’s like “What do you have there Sakuya?” and he’s like “……..porno mag?” ﾌﾟｯ(※థэథ)∵.*.∵Akane then rages at Shin for showing Sakuya lewd crap and teaching him this stuff x’D. The 5th omake takes place after the true ending and Akane is all giddy with her new diamond ring. While he’s at work she goes out to buy a cake for their engagement anniversary but it begins to pour. Shin stops by and gives her a ride home but she and Sakuya both get home soaked. After arguing on who will take a bath first they compromise on bathing together…which of course leads to lots sexytime／(^o^)＼ﾅﾝﾃｺｯﾀｲ. Kinda disappointed all those CGs were just used for the ero scene as I was hoping for some cute cuddle moments lmao oh well :P.

Sweet Present for Shin – This is a stand alone mini game that they released for Shin. It takes place back when Akane was in high school, during Valentine’s day.　One of Akane’s friends asks her to pass some chocolates to Shin but he’s upset that he didn’t get any from Akane. Akane made a bunch of chocolates to give to friends & classmates but she ran out before she could give any to Shin at his school. (Akane attended an all girls high school.) The following day Akane tries to apologize to him but because she’s running late she ends up dashing by him, and after school she can’t find him and goes home. Fortunately for Akane, 2/17 is Shin’s birthday so she has a chance to make up for her failures! She makes him a burnt cake and emails to meet her at the park on his birthday.  Finally he shows up in the evening after she falls asleep on the park bench. She gives him the cake and when he realizes she made them for him he blushes like a dork. 萌━ﾟ☆;｡+(*pq′ー｀)+｡;☆ﾟ━萌 If you choose for Akane to just buy some fancy name brand chocolates, but then her friend asks her to pass on some late Vday chocolates to Shin too. Turns out it’s the exact same ones Akane bought and she feels awkward. She tells him happy birthday and says she has no present (while blatantly hiding it behind her back lol) but he smiles and thanks her saying he didn’t expect one anyway. If you have Sakuya help Akane with making the cake, it comes out perfect and then Shin realizes Sakuya probably did most of the work. He comes back to Akane’s place and Sakuya & Akane sing Happy Birthday to you~ for him. And so back in the present time, it’s 2/17, Shin’s birthday and he gets a call from Akane to come to her place. Soon as he comes through the door, Sakuya and Akane pop some party crackers and yell out Happy Birthday and have prepared a full course dinner for him. He thinks they’re annoying as hell but is happy to have such great friends.

While the story was nothing that original and I feel like I’ve seen it somewhere before, I still enjoyed it a lot. I don’t know what it is, but Tetrascope just writes everything so well. I never feel like there is “pointless waste of space dialogue” and I actually thought the R-18 scenes in this game were decently done! Wow a decent R-18 scene in an otome game? Is the sky falling? While ending #6 DOES have rape, be forwarned, I thought that every bit of that ending was relevant to the characterization of Sakuya, Shin and Akane and their relationship throughout all these years. It wasn’t the usual “hur dur I’m a nice guy who becomes a rapist for no reason” or the “you’re a dirty slut so you deserve to be raped” kind of garbage you see in most R-18 otome games. As far as ending order I’d recommend playing 3-5 (in any order), then end 2, 6 and 1 in that order. Oh and if you can’t pinpoint a good seiyuu for the guys in the game I found that imagining Okamoto Nobuhiko for Sakuya and Hino Satoshi for Shin worked really well (✧≖‿ゝ≖). While this game you can purchase on DLSite for only $8, if you can’t spare $8 you can download the free version which doesn’t have any R-18 content from the makers official site. A couple of the R-18 Cgs were a bit weird, but overall I thought the artwork was great. Tetrascope’s artist is amazing and they continue to improve with each game they release. BGM was perfect to fit with the whole android robot theme and while the guide may not be needed, they provide a guide for all the endings on their site as well. The Shin omake game was really sweet too and I recommend playing it AFTER you’ve finished playing Sakuya, as it’s also free to download. I just found out the other day that Tetrascope is working on a new R-18 title so I’m pretty much ready to throw my wallet at them :P. I know they have 1 more game up for sale on DLSite that I haven’t bought yet but it’s definitely on my to buy list. Honestly their writing and art is so good, it’s better than some of the “official maker” I’ve played in the past year （ಠ_ಠ）. If you’ve not yet played this game or WataJu I definitely recommend jumping on the Tetrascope bandwagon! They are definitely my new auto-buy maker now! (￣ー￣)ﾆﾔﾘ