The Future for Vampires: Review of [120330] Dracu-Riot!

Foreword: Alright, who’s the derphead who told me this game was the best Yuzusoft game? YOU LIED TO ME.

Yeah, so after having played a couple of Yuzusoft’s games, I got my hands on what was said to be the “best” of Yuzusoft games, but…

Nope, it didn’t turn out good.
In retrospect, the beginning is indeed very good, and even the flow throughout is excellent. It’s just that like all the other typical charage out there, it loses its focus and in the majority of routes, rushes the romance between the characters, then in the end, uses a very convenient mechanism to solve the conflict that’s at hand.

I’ll try to get to both this game’s goods and bads. Scroll down for the review for Dracu Riot.

PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS REVIEW CONTAINS MINOR SPOILERS! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK!

Title: Dracu-riot
Producers: Yuzusoft
Release Date: March 30, 2012
VNDB Link: https://vndb.org/v8213
Getchu Link: http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=725093
Game Type: Fantasy Mystery Novel with themes of Vampires

Summary: Yuuto and his friend is traveling to the famous “Aqua Eden”, well known for its Las Vegas-like conditions (pretty sure that’s where the authors themselves got the setting from, too), after winning a travel ticket from sheer luck. Both of them are excited to experience this mystical land, with each of them their own reasons.

As they arrive, they realize that without a tour guide, they’re pretty much lost. Finally asking a random girl for help, the kind girl who introduces herself as Miu leads them to the “prostitution” store they (well, not for Yuuto, since he didn’t have enough money) were looking for, but after she departs, they soon hear her scream off in the distance.

Yuuto thinks fast and follows the car that kidnaps their temporary tour guide and end up at a storage near the port. Unfortunately for him, his plan to save the girl is foiled with one of the kidnappers noticing he was there. Now with his life destined to end, the girl who is tied next to him looks at his face and says

“I won’t let you die”

Wow! So cool!

Story Length: Moderately Long (30 hours)
Complete Story Clearing Difficulty: Slightly Difficult
Comments: The story isn’t that hard to clear; it’s just that Nicola’s route is relatively ambiguous. It’s quite a relief that there aren’t many choices in the first place, though.

Character Design Rating: 5/10
Story Rating: 6/10
Protagonist Rating: 6/10
Game Quality: Moderate
Overall Rating: 5/10
Rating Comments: Now understand this–a game with a score of 5/10 is “decent” or “average” for me. It’s just that when compared with other more superior titles, Dracu-riot just loses it out. The previous titles from Yuzusoft I’ve played are Tenshin Ranman, Amairo, and Sanoba Witch, and even then those three games weren’t as bad as this one (although the second title did have one ridiculously stupid route).

Both the character and story rating is low due to the two of the routes having a convenient and rushed ending. In addition, the last route is actually just a fanservice route despite being a full “route”. In return, the protagonist rating is ironically higher because Yuuto is very active and smart; it’s usually him that realizes the “truth” of the mystery within the game, which was a good thing. I just wish the game would be a little more clear with his thought processes which would be presented before he comes to said conclusion. It’s just unfortunate that his setting of being a “Tennen Gigolo” (天然ジゴロ) is used way too frequently in charage.

Character Routes: Alright, here goes nothing.

First is Miu, the girl who leads both Yuuto and his friend around Aqua Eden at the beginning of the story. She is the one who gets kidnapped shortly after and causes this story to start. The kidnapping is actually a set-up by the Disciplinary Team in order to capture criminals who would be willing to do anything to make money, and Miu herself is part of that team as well. From unfortunate accidents, however, Yuuto happens to swallow blood of a vampire and become one himself, and due to becoming one of the “Suckers”, he is forced to stay in the island while his friend is escorted out for faking his name.

More about the character herself, Miu is very competent in capturing criminals with her power of Psychokinesis, and even acts as a counselor with her mature-ish personality. The irony of this is that Miu herself is actually not as mature as one would think, and despite her making sexual jokes or calling Yuuto a “virgin”, she says it with a blushed face so that it’s obvious that she’s not accustomed to talking about it either. Her personality of acting tough even in front of her closest friends causes quite a bit of comedy.

Miu: Alright Miu, poker face, poker face

Miu’s relationship with Yuuto begins with her realizing that Yuuto may have multiple abilities, which is a sign that he may be a super-power vampire called a Lycanthrope. As it is shown, “lycanthropes” are rare beings said to “eat other vampires”, and this causes Miu to avoid him and become afraid of getting closer to him. Likewise, Yuuto who hears of this monstrous being also becomes afraid of becoming closer to the dormitory members.

Miu’s route was probably the best in the entire game, mainly because it holds various events beginning with the synopsis above into the Government’s Foreign Affairs Committee ultimately deciding to do away with the vampire race. It’s in Miu’s route which I found Yuuto in the most amount of action (+ protagonist points for you, bud!), and the introduction of a subcharacter at the end to incite Miu’s jealousy was a nice finishing touch.

Next is Erina, the other character with the “good route” in this game. This interesting character is actually pretty memorable because she calls herself a “bitch” (which really means that she uses a lot of sexual jokes without embarrassment) even in the beginning of the scenes which involves her meeting Yuuto half-naked. Even then she does not “scream” and instead wonders why Yuuto wasn’t getting an erection.

More of a comedy character than Miu, this character makes a lot of sexual jokes as she proclaimed she does, and actually enjoys it to a certain extent. In addition, she works as a dealer in the Casino and is actually quite proficient as well, enough to -illegitimately- win consistently when Yuuto visits.

Her route starts off with her health deteriorating, and having an unusual condition that she’s afraid to share with the dorm members. However, as fate plays out, Erina shares her secret with Yuuto, who still comes to accept her as she is. The gratitude Erina feels for Yuuto after this results her falling in love with him, and start to bring up new conditions that require members from the Soviet Union to visit Japan.

Erina does play major roles in counseling characters in other routes which added to her charm. She’s very light-hearted, but ultimately caring for her friends, so that was definitely a plus of her character.

Why, Yuzusoft? You have everything going well and you just HAVE to create a bullshit trash route like this? WHY!?!?!

That’s really what Azusa’s route was; pure nonsense and convenience topped with nothing more than words acting as a filler. The route literally goes from normal days to conflict within seconds, and the flow is just so horrible in the sense you’re watching an H-scene one minute, and the next is all about this bitch named “Kaede” who really needs to go fucking die. I really wish she got a fist punch in her face or a gangbang rape scene; that’s how much of a bitch she was, then the game goes to say that she wasn’t really that mean of a person. Yuzusoft, Y U DO DIS

Not only this, the entire Azusa’s route is about two antagonists who mix up a shitstorm in Aqua Eden then disappear, along with the “Hunters” which has that one bitch that needs to seriously die. Oh, I already said it already?

For your own sake, don’t even go through Azusa’s route. It’s really unfortunate since she’s very nice as a character, but her route is just trash and will be a waste your time in addition to (at least for me) being infuriating. Well, unless you have an abnormal fetish for lolis, be my guest.

I can’t call any of Yuzusoft’s games a kamige so far because they seem to purposely place a craptastic route like this in every game I see, for no fucking reason at all. It’s really annoying to see this, especially since I believe I said before I’d much rather just play a bad game than to see a game with good potentials turn bad.

As a character herself, Azusa is pretty much your “oversensitive to sexual jokes” character, becoming flabbergasted at anything suggestive and taking words the wrong way. She actually doesn’t really have anything else other than this, so that’s really a shame. Even for Yuuto, his actions in Azusa’s route is actually pretty stupid, how he says he acts “only for Azusa’s benefit” when his ideals would suggest otherwise (aka, if the story wanted to be consistent with his personality at this scene, he would cooperate with the “riot”, but he still refused because he “loves Azusa”. Minus Protagonist points for you, bud)

Oh yeah, but they do have the “Azu-ny*n” reference in her route. that was funny.

Personally, if I could rewrite Azusa’s route, I’d make it so that the “Hunters” that come later within the route are pulverized (and killed hopefully, with the exception of that bitch Kaede) by Jirad, but Yuuto takes him down after a lengthy battle utilizing the gun-techniques that he learned from Azusa. Then Yuuto will walk up to the injured Kaede and talk about how her stubborn mindset made her weak. BUUUURRRRNNNNNNN.

Like Yuuto’s eyes after he looks at sunlight after “vampirization”

Last is Rio, an oblivious-kyonyuu character who takes on the role of a chef at the dorms. She’s the complete opposite of Azusa in the sense that she has absolutely no knowledge about sexual jokes and often asking for what things mean in the most innocent way.

She doesn’t really play a big role in the beginning scenes, and even her abilities are hidden until her route. In that sense, there was no form of “foreshadowing” or “hinting” of her as a character or her route in the common route, so there’s one minus. Similar to Erina, her route starts with her condition worsening and Yuuto taking care of her. It is then that the story reveals that the two have similar pasts as an orphan who received a major surgery.

What I really don’t like at this point is that literally after this single event, they show Rio to have already become infatuated with Yuuto. No seriously. It only takes ONE scene where they interact one-on-one and bam, there’s your romance for the route. I know there are Yuuto-Rio scenes in the common route as well, but that’s supposed to be just the tip of the iceberg.

Like Azusa’s route, Rio’s route had an extremely convenient ending with “Love solves everything~~~~”. Can we seriously fucking not, Yuzusoft?

Last would be Nicola, the chuunibyou roommate that is actually shown to be a girl instead of a guy as presented. The story never references Nicola as a “he”, and since he always wear male clothes, everyone assumed he was a male except for the girls in the dorm–who knew of his gender.

However, since Yuuto only recently moved in, he was completely unaware of this chuunibyou’s gender. After that, the story is literally the generic “I suddenly fell in love with a girl who I thought was a guy until a while back because she’s cute” story. There’s just the additional topping of “Nichola’s unusually large breasts ignoring physics” in there.

That’s her (him?) in male clothing.

Simply put, this subheroine’s route was just a fanservice route.

Oh, but I still get some attention, right?

Sexual Content: Moderate

Comments: First, the biggest thing that a lot of the players may be thinking, is that this game really should have ditched the “school-life” theme. They’re talking drugs and alcohol while fighting crime, and not only are those things a taboo in school, “school” was never even played a big role except as a location. This kind of design suggests that Yuzusoft is lacking a bit of innovation and is only using “school-life” without actually knowing how to use it. As a critic, this was an extremely bad choice and enough to knock its status from being a “good game”.

It was really an excuse to use “school uniforms”, methinks

Second, yeah, them routes. They’re inconsistent. I’m sure the players who have played this already will have already noticed, but there are inconsistencies everywhere, including Ougi-sensei’s true motives which was the biggest one. Yuuto’s “background” as a Lycanthrope is also inconsistent across routes.

Personally, I actually wanted more fight scenes. It’s shown that Yuuto himself is a Lycanthrope, but there were no scenes involving him actually using multiple abilities to fight. In addition to this, the scenes he actually has some action by himself (aka, without another heroine) is abysmal. It’s called a protagonist for a reason, guys. Not someone who needs “love power” to stop missiles or fight bad guys. Both Batman and Goku didn’t need a girl to fight, right? 

Neither of them had a harem, either.

Lastly, this thing of “racial strife” is actually quite common in media, and that’s what I thought this game would present, a group of individuals (vampires) who are constantly suppressed by another (humans). In reality, this is also shown in the prologue when Yuuto can’t do anything just because he’s a vampire. The story makes sure that the readers sympathize with the oppressed by making the human antagonists seem like a bitch (*coff Kaede, you fucking whore *coff*), but in the end, it didn’t really seem like a “racial strife” between vampires and humans.

Racial strife is called that because the two groups have a significantly different lifestyle or culture; this game portrays both the humans of Aqua Eden to be similar to the Vampires with the pure exception of physical properties, like having amplified strength or being able to absorb blood for power. In short, the humans and vampires of this setting had nothing different in terms of mindset or culture, and therefore cannot actually have a racial strife.

So in the end, all this shitstorm about Vampires vs. Humans are all about both parties unwilling to take the time to understand each other. Childish, no?

On another thought, Miu’s jealousy was pretty enjoyable to watch

Affection for the Characters: Low

CG Score: 6/10. Cute CGs, but that’s pretty much it. Animated SDCGs are a plus, though
Music Score: 2/10. Maybe it’s just me, but not only was the music bland, it was inappropriately used. The impact created by scenes change greatly according to the music they use, and Yuzusoft failed on this part.

Addictiveness: Low.

I really hate how they always use Aoba Ringo as the CV for subheroines.

Conclusion: The beginning of this game was amazing, but the ending just plain sucked. I remember this pattern from this game, too, and I remember it being rather insulting. Same with this one. I can see how people would have thought this was a good game, but those would be the ones who only played the beginning portions and didn’t finish the game entirely.

I guess overall, I don’t regret playing this game, but I wish someone would have warned me about the deterioration in quality in the heroine routes.