Category Archives: One-Shots

One-off articles about games, cultural phenomena, anime and anything else that isn’t getting the Cover Game treatment.

Community, One-Shots

Four Years of MoeGamer, 37 Years of Pete

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It’s my birthday! More importantly, it’s also MoeGamer’s birthday. Buy us presents! (You don’t have to do that. But I’m not going to stop you if you want to.)

Ahem. Anyway, yes, it is indeed the fourth anniversary of MoeGamer’s inception. I’ve told the story of how the site came about numerous times — most notably in last year’s birthday post — so I won’t reiterate that here. Instead I wanted to take stock of the year that’s gone by and thank you all for continuing to support my work.

It’s been an interesting year, for sure — and a very good one, both for me, and for the site. So that’s nice! Let’s look at it all in more detail.

Continue reading Four Years of MoeGamer, 37 Years of Pete →

One-Shots

What’s in the Box: Gal*Gun 2 “Free Hugs” Edition

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Next month on MoeGamer is all about Gal*Gun 2, but in the meantime I couldn’t resist sneaking a peek in the shiny new limited edition box.

Publisher PQube and its partners at Rice Digital have put out some really nice (and affordable) limited editions over the last couple of years, so I was more than happy to stump up the extra cash for the “Free Hugs” edition of Gal*Gun 2.

Thankfully the new game doesn’t come in quite as obscenely large a box as its predecessor — that had a big wallscroll in it, so it was understandable — but still has a rather tasty set of goodies to enjoy.

Continue reading What’s in the Box: Gal*Gun 2 “Free Hugs” Edition →

One-Shots

Honey Select Unlimited: Let’s Talk About Sex

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Despite the fact that as you are reading this, someone somewhere is almost certainly enjoying an intimate moment of some description right now, sex remains the ultimate taboo in video games.

This is one of many reasons why I find it so endlessly fascinating that Japan, a nation whose society is not stereotypically known for being particularly open about such things, leads the way in terms of sexually explicit entertainment, be it interactive games or non-interactive formats such as anime and manga.

Up until now, our exposure to Japan’s thriving “sex game” industry in an officially licensed capacity has primarily been through eroge and nukige visual novels. But with Western hentai localiser and publisher Fakku’s partnership with Illusion, now everyone can get their hands on one of the most world-renowned “sex sims” out there: Honey Select Unlimited. It’d be rude not to take a peek, right?

NSFW warning: This article discusses strong sexual themes and features explicit imagery after the jump. If you read it at work and get caught, I accept no responsibility whatsoever!

Continue reading Honey Select Unlimited: Let’s Talk About Sex →

One-Shots

Re;Lord 1: It’s All a Matter of Perspective

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It’s always a pleasure when a game comes along out of nowhere and gives you a delightful surprise by being “good” in some way.

Re;Lord 1 ~The witch of Herfort and stuffed animals ~ (just Re;Lord hereafter for the sake of everyone’s sanity), a game developed by Escu:de and recently released in both all-ages and 18+ English versions by Sekai Project and Denpasoft, is the most recent example of this happening to me.

Not only is it an interesting, unusual and enjoyable game from a mechanical perspective, but it’s also pretty fascinating to contemplate from a narrative perspective, too. And it has some lovely art! So let’s take a closer look.

Continue reading Re;Lord 1: It’s All a Matter of Perspective →

One-Shots

Seven Days with the Ghost: Fragile, Frustrated and Female

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Ayako Orihara is frustrated, in more ways than one.

She’s frustrated at the fact her school’s Occult Research Club, of which she is the only member and current president, is likely to be dissolved if she doesn’t find some new members. She’s frustrated at her relationship (or lack thereof) with her mother. And by God, is she sexually frustrated.

Little did she know how much taking matters into her own hands would change her life over the course of just one week…

This article has some mildly NSFW content after the jump.

Continue reading Seven Days with the Ghost: Fragile, Frustrated and Female →

One-Shots

An Open Letter to the Video Standards Council

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With Omega Labyrinth Z being the first game to be refused classification in the UK for a decade — the last was Rockstar’s ultra-violent Manhunt 2 — there has been a lot of discussion surrounding the title.

With that in mind, I felt it important to express my own feelings on the matter directly to the Video Standards Council (VSC), the body responsible for refusing to allow the game to be sold in the United Kingdom, despite it already having successfully attained a PEGI 18 rating elsewhere in Europe.

If you feel similarly, I encourage you to reach out to the VSC yourself using the contact details on their website. I shouldn’t have to say this, but I will anyway: if you choose to do so, please keep your messages polite and respectful, whatever you may think of the decision. And whether or not anything changes as a result of feedback from consumers like this, we can at least say we tried to get our voices heard.

The letter I sent directly to the VSC follows after the jump.

Continue reading An Open Letter to the Video Standards Council →

One-Shots

Rod Land: “So Cute… It’ll Make You Puke!”

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I have spent more time than is probably strictly necessary pondering who my first “video game waifu” was.

My initial reaction was that it was Sophia Hapgood from Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, and to be fair that would be an eminently solid choice for a first digital love. But I had a feeling there was someone special before that… but who?

Picking up a copy of puzzle game Soldam for Nintendo Switch, which I’ll be taking a more in-depth look at soon, reminded me that ah yes, it was Rit from Jaleco’s Rod Land.

Continue reading Rod Land: “So Cute… It’ll Make You Puke!” →

One-Shots

The Case for “Adults Only” Ratings

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It was announced earlier today that the upcoming dungeon crawler Omega Labyrinth Z would be refused classification by the Video Standards Council in the UK, despite the game already having successfully attained a PEGI 18 rating.

The VSC’s comments on the matter note that the game’s “style is such that it will attract an audience below the age of 18” and that “there is a serious danger that impressionable people, i.e. children and young people viewing the game, would conclude that the sexual activity [in the game] represented normal sexual behaviour.” It concluded by noting that the game “has the potential to be significantly harmful in terms of social and moral development of younger people in particular”.

Okay. Omega Labyrinth Z is a game with a significant lewd component. And, as with many Japanese games, visual novels and anime — including those with lewd components — it is set in a school-like environment, which is where the majority of the VSC’s complaints come from. But, as ever, what essentially amounts to “ban this sick filth” represents an oversimplification of the issue.

Continue reading The Case for “Adults Only” Ratings →

One-Shots

Honey Select Unlimited and Illusion’s Quest for Immersive Adult Entertainment

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There have been quite a few “sex games” from Japanese developers over the years, but outside of visual novels that incorporate erotic elements to varying degrees, relatively few of them make it West in an official capacity.

This is a bit of a shame, really, since although the most immediately obvious appeal factor of them is the fact that they are interactive pornography (and many of the most modern ones have virtual reality headset support), for many, the most enjoyable aspect of these games is a creative one: the fact you can use a detailed set of tools to design a character of your choosing.

Those who are interested in such things will doubtless be delighted to hear that renowned hentai publisher and localiser Fakku has picked up Honey Select Unlimited for official Western release. And those who have no clue what I’m talking about… read on.

Continue reading Honey Select Unlimited and Illusion’s Quest for Immersive Adult Entertainment →

Community, One-Shots

Game Chasing: The Retro Hut, Southampton

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Although “gaming YouTubers” have been around for a good few years now, I’ve only really started exploring their work in earnest recently.

One of the channels I’ve grown to be particularly fond of in the last couple of months is The Game Chasers, where two friends named Billy and Jay, who have known each other since the ’90s, travel around various flea markets and game stores in search of retro video games to add to their collection. Their headline videos are inspired by TV shows such as American Pickers, but they’ve carved out their own identity over time and have established themselves as an immensely entertaining channel that is a bit different from your usual Let’s Players and suchlike.

One thing I frequently find myself feeling while watching their videos, however, is a slight pang of jealousy at the awesome retro gaming stores they seemingly have within reasonably easy reach of them. So I was very interested to discover by accident that there is actually a store like this in my neck of the woods. Naturally, I went to investigate.

Continue reading Game Chasing: The Retro Hut, Southampton →