Title: Sagara Family
Genre: Comedy
Platform: Windows XP/Me/98/2000
Credits: 2005 Zyx/G-Collections
Shop: Sagara Family CD, Hentai Game Shop, Hentai Item Shop

Cover Description:
Come for the room, stay for the women!

When his parents decide that Yusuke will live with the Sagara family while he attends university, he’s not too thrilled about the idea, until he hears that the Sagara household is made up entirely of women: four sexy daughters and one hot mother! What’s more, they’re not used to having a man around the house, and they all want to get him in bed! The ultimate erotic homestay fantasy! Experience life through Yusuke’s eyes in one of the best interactive dating-sim games ever!

Really. If I wanted to make my life effortless, I would just go through my old reviews, highlight the text on titles like Pick Me, Honey! and Slave Pageant, and simply cut and paste everything onto this page. The next thing to do is to replace the names of the characters on those previous games with the characters of Sagara Family. That’s how generic everyone is. Heck, even the protagonist is creatively named…Yusuke.

The huge difference in Sagara Family is that, unlike most G-Collections or Zyx presentations out there, it has challenging branches. In fact, even as I write this review, there’s one CG and a couple of Arisa’s special scenes that I haven’t uncovered. Unlocking the harem route is no guarantee of completion. Getting desperate enough to consult a walkthrough will not guarantee you of completion either. That’s how tricky Sagara Family can be.

Before you can realize the rather complicated patterns of choices, you must first realize that this game is sicker (in a comical way) than most. For one thing, Maria, Sagara’s matriarch, is a staple. Whatever choice you make, you still end up with your dick in any of her orifices at one point or another. This makes screwing any of her daughters just plain greedy of you. But wait, there’s more. There will be moments when you can actually do three holes in one, mix and match sisters, or do a mother-daughter tandem. The Sagara women are completely nuts. Arisa, for one, would be afraid of some blackmail footage of her masturbating, but has no qualms of doing it in public. Ruruka, who’s supposed to be your signature Lolita, has breasts that are bigger than the average Japanese woman’s. And Sanae…funny, but she reminds me of myself when I was commuting way back in college. I was luckier, though. I lived in a country where sexually harassed women can get away with stabbing sex offenders with a mechanical pencil (or bashing them on the head with a Nextel radio, which I also did). I heard a woman can get arrested for maiming train sex maniacs in Japan. So, okay, I’m forgiving Sanae for letting public transpo sickos off the hook so easily.

Plot-wise, you’ve basically seen it all before. Sagara Family just upped the ante a bit. The situations are all messed up and disturbing that the only logical way to go about this game is to do the harem route. If you’re going to be one sick bastard, why not do the Pokémon and catch ‘em all? There seem to be no totally good or totally bad endings to Sagara Family because everyone is just plain twisted. In fairness, to Yusuke, there are times when he makes perfect sense or utters the sweetest lines. (He once said something like, “…Then I will find a nice tree and commit seppuku,” in reference to his future being destroyed by his sexual urges.) It just so happens that the little head between his legs functions more often than the one that sits on top of his shoulders.

Sex is Sagara Family’s selling point. Not only is it abundant, the CGs and characters are also beautifully rendered. Animation is a plus, and the artwork is Virgin Roster sans the gore. Voice-acting is superb, if you don’t mind hearing some of the delicate words get bleeped out. Extra features include animation recollection, scene recollection, chat logs, and the usual CG and music gallery.

Individual Rating: Art/Animation: 10 Story/Plot: 4 Characters: 7 Sounds: 6 Gameplay: 7 Ecchi Level: 9

Ok, first off…this game is nuts. It’s crazy. It’s whacko.

Right. Now that that’s out of the way, let me start by saying that Sagara Family was the first hentai game I actually bothered to finish. I’ve played classics like Crescendo and Critical Point, and uncovered a couple of endings, but Sagara Family was the very first time I unlocked every single ending, CG, animation, AND the harem ending (which, by the way, can only be attempted after completing the game with all five ladies).

What was so different about this game then, you ask? I don’t know…the environment…the humor…the characters…the crazy situations. There are a lot of reasons. But for this review, I’m going to focus mainly on two of the game’s best points.

First off, the humor.

“Maybe someone could just end my misery and shoot me here and now.”

The protagonist, Yusuke, is funny as hell. And by funny, I mean really funny. He’s your average ordinary guy, no different from you or me. He goes to school, watches porn, slacks off when he’s supposed to be working, and can be a bit of a chauvinist at times. At the same time, he’s also good at heart and has a conscience that (usually) gets the better of him. You won’t find Yusuke acting dumb and innocent like most h-game lead characters out there. He isn’t stupid. He isn’t antisocial. He doesn’t have the stereotyped tragic past that made him untrusting and secluded, and MOST of all, he’s no saint. This makes the game a very refreshing experience right from the start. Couple this with the fact that Yusuke goes on these long, sidesplitting and morbid monologues and you’ve got a really hilarious game on your hands. He’s got this uncanny ability to reflect your thoughts exactly onscreen. A lot of the times, the girls end up doing or saying something really stupid and you think, “WTF?” Well, Yusuke pretty much does the same, except he’s more comical and imaginative. The other characters can also be pretty funny at times, and some of the situations the game puts you in actually give you a pretty good laugh. For instance, this one part in the game where Yusuke’s imagining his father’s voice in his head…you’ll know what I mean when you see it.

Next, the sex.

In the wise words of Yusuke: “Hot damn!”

Really…we all know Zyx games have a reputation for being beautifully drawn, animated and have high production values. Sagara Family is no different. Except it’s also very creative. A lot of the sex happens in out of the ordinary situations and this makes for a lot of fun. It’s not as bland as Come See Me Tonight or as outrageous and unbelievable as Do You Like Horny Bunnies 2. While the voices during the h-scenes aren’t as well done as, say, Critical Point, they suffice. And besides, you won’t be as interested in the voices as the visuals you see onscreen. The art is detailed, and all the h-scenes with animated sequences are very well done. The girls are obviously stunning and have gorgeous bodies, and Yusuke’s no wimp either. That said, he isn’t all buffed up like lead characters from other h-anime titles. There’s enough sex in the game to satisfy anyone. For the most part, you get to make the right choices in the game and still get your share of sex.

Apart from this, TSF is to a large extent, a very believable game. It has its dark moments and its light-hearted moments (though the dark moments are mostly restricted to just one character’s path). The characters are diverse and there’s never a time when you’d think that they were thought up by some retard with a sick and twisted perception of women (a la Do You Like Horny Bunnies 2). Maria, for instance, is a widow, and while she’s over her husband’s death, she still misses the closeness and intimacy of a relationship like any normal woman would. Ruruka’s the typical underage and annoying “younger sister” and so on.

The game comes with a “Skip” feature which fast forwards all messages and is very useful for someone who’s trying for all the endings. It also features a gallery where you can view all the h-scenes individually, the hentai CGs, and the animated scenes. All in all, even if you overlook everything else I’ve mentioned here, The Sagara Family has extremely good production values and that alone makes it a game well worth playing.

Individual Rating: Art/Animation: 10 Story/Plot: 7 Characters: 8 Sounds: 7 Gameplay: 9 Ecchi Level: 9