Sukui no Serenade Review (spoilers)

[Deep Blue]

Be aware that this is more of me telling you the story than a proper review, so if you want to read this novel then don't read this "review"
This is the story of four girls, some of them are going through some really hard stuff in their life trying to live with it the best way they can while the rest of the girls are going to have their lives changed very soon... and not in a good way.

The novel begins with Mihama Yomi, the first protagonist presented in the novel, she is being raped by her stepfather and later on even by some strangers. Everyday she wishes for her nightmare to end but she cannot escape or go anywhere so she just bares it hiding all her pain inside.
She goes to the school everyday hiding all the bad things that are happening in her house and life, her best friend Yuzuriha Kanon is not aware of anything but she really loves and care for her, still clueless of everything she can't help her. 

(Yomi asking herself how much longer the hell will continue)

On the other side we have Koushou Aika, she is the typical clueless and kindhearted girl, the one that can mistake a love letter with a duel letter. Isami Ritsu is her best friend and she is like a tomboy, she is really sharp and witted, she really cares about Aika and acts as a mother for her.

At one point, Aika receives an anonymous love letter, to make the story short, she meets with the guy (lets call him Pepe because I forgot his name) which ends up being the most popular boy in the school, he has a band and all the girls are in love with him, he even has a fanclub full of horny girls which will kill for him if they have to. Aika rejects the propose of Pepe with a little help of her best friend Ritsu (who at this point was like her bodyguard) but they end up in good terms, no hard feelings, being friends and whatnot.
After that day Aika starts to get bullied on school, photos of her peeing in the bathroom or changing her clothes in the P.E class starts to appear in the school and classroom, later the same thing starts to happen to Ritsu.

 A few days later Aika and Ritsu starts to investigate who is doing this and why... although the answer is more than obvious at this point... even if the novel tries to hide it, yes, yes Aika rejecting Pepe had nothing to do with it, in fact they "ended up as friends and in good terms" so he can't be the bad guy!!!  After a few detective moves...and some random things going on, Aika goes to some weird place behind an alley to meet Pepe, she gets kidnapped and almost raped but she escapes by the skin of a frog, then she tells everything to Ritsu and her great idea is to go and confront him on that back alley too.... needless to say that Ritsu gets kidnapped by this Pepe dude, who is a rapist and his whole music band is the same, they rape their fans too but with their consent...(?) 

( だめpepe-kun だめよ! )

Now we jump to Yomi again, at this point she is not being raped only by her father but by her father's co-workers too she is like a sex slave at this point, also she finds out that her mother hates her and doesn't care if they are raping her or not. 
This is when the story gets a bit interesting and not just a rape fest (at least for a few minutes), she finds on the internet a site where you can make a wish, so she wishes what any teenage girl would want... eternal love from Pepe...(to kill his parents) and her wish is granted.

She transforms into a monster and kills both of them, now you would think that this scene is awesome but nope, everything happens in 2 seconds... the sweet sweet revenge last nothing... also little did she know that after having her wish granted she would have to start working for the person who granted her wish in the first place....  at this point knowing that she wont be able to see her friend anymore (Kanon) she send her a text message telling her everything about the raping and how shit was her life until that point.

 

Spoiler

(one of the bullying pictures)

At that exact moment Kanon while she is reading the text message in the middle of the street she finds a girl named Kamiura Sayo who is the one that is granting the wishes and she tells Kanon that she can't see her best friend anymore because of this wish she made. Some crying happens and then we don't see Yomi again until the end of the novel...(depending of the ending..)

Now we play as Aika again who is trying to find Ritsu that is being held captive by the bad Pepe.

Aika continues her search, Pepe at some point send her a video to her phone in which they are raping Ritsu and kindly ask her to go to that place too so she goes. Now both of them are held captive and they start to rape Ristu in front of Aika... a rape later, Ritsu makes a wish just before they rape Aika and kills all the boys but because of it she needs to start working for Sayo too... so they get separated after. 

After that Aika meets with Kanon accidentally in the street and they begin a colorful friendship, both of them trying to find their lost friends, now we found that Aika has some kind of special power which is to sniff...by sniffing she can detect good people from bad people, that's why she instantly fell in love with Kanon which was pure an innocent. So they become sniffing detectives partners...I don't have to say this but at this point in the novel everything was just pure garbage with a lot of raping... 

Later on Aika and Kanon find out that one of their classmate Nishiha Kanade is giving boys a weird drug that makes them horny and then kills them. At one point both of them (Aika and Kanon) get caught by Kanae who is working for a mysterious girl who is slaving women and giving a weird drug to guys a drug that makes you dream...sorry a drug that makes them want to fuck very badly and then they die, yes the same drug that Kanae was using before. 

At the end we find out that this mysterious girl is named Serena and she is slaving women, she also happens to be an extraterrestrial and the only way she/he/it can procreate is to have a girl making a contract with her but this girl must accept that contract by her own volition or it doesn't work, once that contract is made Serena can possess the girl to reproduce (?), also they are hermaphrodites, why am I talking in plural now? Because Sayo is an E.T too! Chan chan chan... she/he/it is like a brother/sister of Serena but is one of the good guys and doesn't want procreate and populate the earth with her own race of little E.Ts like Serena does, instead she wants to help girls in need like Yomi, turning them in weird monsters who cannot go back to their life after having their wish granted.

(Tetsuo and Kaneda I mean Kanae and Serena )

Back to the story...Serena has a horde of horny guys that constantly rape day and night Aika making Kanon watch everything, if she wants the rape to stop she must perform a contract but they are not dumb and they wont fall under Serena's trick so both of them hold on... until Serena gets tired of waiting and kills Kanon... at that point Ritsu comes to the rescue ... wwwwwwwwaaaaaachaaaaaaaa ... she kills all the baddies. Aika wishes to revive Kanon and then she starts to work with Sayo along with Yomi (which at this point doesn't exist anymore in the plot) and Ritsu.

We also found that the E.Ts are some little guys living inside the body of a human O.o

If you are curious how the E.T looks: (warning is a bit shocking)

Spoiler

http://imgur.com/HYzBe8N

Kanon goes back to her life (she is the only girl at this point who hasn't been raped) and that's it... now that's it the "good ending", the bad ending is also really bad but Kanon gets raped a lot too and Yomi appears at the end and starts crying with Kanon and more yada yada that nobody cares.

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The truth is that I picked this novel because it had the same writer of Yume Miru Kusuri, a novel that I love and is very dear to me, this was nothing like that. the only redeeming point of this novel was the music, some of the tracks were really good.

At first as a lover of the utsuge genre it was actually a good reading, Yomi's character was actually well written, her thoughts were realistic and I actually cared about her, it kept me wanting to read more, specially when the "wish" part came, her relationship with Kanon, not being able to tell her, acting weird around her, forcing herself to be happy just to not arouse suspicion. Even the part when Kanon read that message it was actually really sad. 

But the execution was terrible and everything ended so soon, the explanation as why she turned into a monster and was able to kill never came, or why did Sayo could turn the girls into monsters....everything was left unexplained.
 
Same goes for Ritsu and Aika, both character were interesting, sometimes Ritsu acted in a very realistic way, specially with the bullying part, it was fun to read the relationship between them how silly Aika was and Ritsu's reaction, how protective was for her friend. But then you see her doing things like going alone to a back alley knowing that she is facing a bunch of rapist, not calling the cops or telling anyone, there was a very stupid explanation for this actually, Pepe told the girls that her father was a cop which by the way was a buff, so they never told anyone because of that...

Finally I have to praise the novel for keeping a good pace, it never felt boring to read, I can say without a doubt that it was bad but never boring and the music was always well placed on the scenes a swell for the art-style though very lacking, very very few backgrounds, this was probably due to the many rape and sex scenes.

In the end this was nothing more than a nukige with some sci-fi elements and a plot that didn't make any sense, leaving aside the sci-fi this could have been an average novel at least if not a good one but sadly it was not.

3/10

[Zalor]

14 hours ago, Deep Blue said:

The truth is that I picked this novel because it had the same writer of Yume Miru Kusuri, a novel that I love and is very dear to me, this was nothing like that. the only redeeming point of this novel was the music, some of the tracks were really good.

That's unfortunate, as Yume Miru Kusuri is one of my favorites as well. Although, what I have come to discover in the anime/manga/VN world, is that people involved in creating such works are rarely consistent in their quality. Particularly in VNs it is tough, as Nukige sell so well, that writing it is the best way to put rice on the table. My understanding (from what Clephas has said before), is that writers and companies usually create several Nukige for every non-nukige they produce, as a way to hedge their bets.

Hell apparently some fairly influential people worked on the likes of Boku no Pico. I think the person who did the music for Evangelion (or End of Eva) did the music for Boku no Pico.  

Even companies that are consistent (like KEY), bore me because they basically just rewrite the same story over and over again. So yeah, generally I don't use company name or author involvement as a way to predict if I will like a VN. Although there are exceptions. For instance the only reason I like LittleWitch is for their artwork, and they were pretty consistent in that area (but I think they don't exist anymore).

[Kawasumi]

I was doubting you because I love Euphoria and I dont so I thought that we were somewhat different in terms of that

Then I tried it and was done after the first H scene, This VN just reeks of lost potential.

[Deep Blue]

5 hours ago, Zalor said:

That's unfortunate, as Yume Miru Kusuri is one of my favorites as well. Although, what I have come to discover in the anime/manga/VN world, is that people involved in creating such works are rarely consistent in their quality. Particularly in VNs it is tough, as Nukige sell so well, that writing it is the best way to put rice on the table. My understanding (from what Clephas has said before), is that writers and companies usually create several Nukige for every non-nukige they produce, as a way to hedge their bets.

Hell apparently some fairly influential people worked on the likes of Boku no Pico. I think the person who did the music for Evangelion (or End of Eva) did the music for Boku no Pico.  

Even companies that are consistent (like KEY), bore me because they basically just rewrite the same story over and over again. So yeah, generally I don't use company name or author involvement as a way to predict if I will like a VN. Although there are exceptions. For instance the only reason I like LittleWitch is for their artwork, and they were pretty consistent in that area (but I think they don't exist anymore).

this video explains it really well, how pure fan-service (in this case nukige) can actually be a beneficial thing for a company and also talks about piracy so it's a win win video to watch  

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

3 hours ago, Kawasumi said:

I was doubting you because I love Euphoria and I dont so I thought that we were somewhat different in terms of that

Then I tried it and was done after the first H scene, This VN just reeks of lost potential.

 everyone has different opinions and tastes, but this novel is just crap  speaking objectively and subjectively

[Tyr]

On 13.1.2016 at 0:06 AM, Deep Blue said:

 

 everyone has different opinions and tastes, but this novel is just crap  speaking objectively and subjectively

Wrong. This novel is objectively and subjectively kamige and GotY. I can say this with certainty, because my D is never wrong.
I really don't know what's wrong with you guys hating on it, seriously. I'm baffled.

Sukui no Serenade is by far the best dark nukige released this year. And with "nukige" I mean "nukige", I don't mean "storyge with porn".
It's everything you could hope for. It's dark, it's sick, it's incredibly erotic and the writing is perfect (I see the Yume Miru Kusuri influences).

On 13.1.2016 at 8:26 PM, Kawasumi said:

Then I tried it and was done after the first H scene, This VN just reeks of lost potential.

Where is the lost potential? I found the first H scene to be great. It had everything it should have. Characterization, atmosphere, ero talk and great art and music. And of course the writing.
The dirty talking is perfect in this one. It's not "porn talk", instead it depicts the ugly situation she is in. I love how the next day Yomi's friend says to her that she is cute and shouldn't say lewd things. And Yomi then realized that she is truly a dirty girl, because her manner of speak and even her thoughts are reflecting what became of her. It's beautiful. fap fap.

[Deep Blue]

2 hours ago, Tyrosyn said:

Wrong. This novel is objectively and subjectively kamige and GotY. I can say this with certainty, because my D is never wrong.
I really don't know what's wrong with you guys hating on it, seriously. I'm baffled.

Sukui no Serenade is by far the best dark nukige released this year. And with "nukige" I mean "nukige", I don't mean "storyge with porn".
It's everything you could hope for. It's dark, it's sick, it's incredibly erotic and the writing is perfect (I see the Yume Miru Kusuri influences).

Where is the lost potential? I found the first H scene to be great. It had everything it should have. Characterization, atmosphere, ero talk and great art and music. And of course the writing.
The dirty talking is perfect in this one. It's not "porn talk", instead it depicts the ugly situation she is in. I love how the next day Yomi's friend says to her that she is cute and shouldn't say lewd things. And Yomi then realized that she is truly a dirty girl, because her manner of speak and even her thoughts are reflecting what became of her. It's beautiful. fap fap.

well that might be it, really. I was expecting something else rather than a nukige, why? because when I "bought it" it wans't very clear that the novel was going to be a pure nukige, when you pick up those types of novels you can see it in the cover of the novel or in the description, here everything was pointing out to something serious with a real plot not just something on top of the ero. I don't have anything against nukige I don't review them just to bash them (if i can avoid them I do because is not my genre) but I felt tricked with this one. Bear in mind that I played it on the release date so there wasnt any clear tag on vndb on what was the novel about.

Is it a good nukige? Can't say to be honest, I don't have a critic eye towards that genre  so probably you are right.
And yes you can sense the YMK influences and writing style all over the place, that's why I was even more disappointing because it had a lot of potential to be something else rather than a nukige. Making a nukige is easy, just throw porn all over it and there you have it, now writing and developing interesting characters, relationships, problem with those character on that will make you empathize and care for them, that is something not everyone can achieve, this guy did, sadly it went all to waste.

[XReaper]

making a nukige or its derivates is by no means an easy undertaking. trust me if i say so, but after reading or supposed to were enjoying whats considered a hellish legion of porn (from kosai to ryona) , i found only around 50!!! beeing of supreme quality. theres a huge difference between meaningless ero content added one after another or those consisting primary of erotic writing (yes you faggots, thats indeed considered literature) paired with aestetic visuals that stimulate both, mind and body, at the same time.

[Deep Blue]

well is a genre that I don't enjoy or like so I'm not very informed of. If you say that there is more to it than just throw ero scenes I believe you. Again I didn't bash the novel because it was nukige but because it made me believe it was something it was not (maybe it was my mistake or misconception from the beginning)