Taimanin Asagi by Lilith-Soft is a nukige, a visual novel focused very much on erotic content. Catering primarily to certain darker fetishes and only running a few hours long, it won’t be for everyone, despite being from a somewhat well-known franchise.
Shiravune’s release of Taimanin Asagi is based on a slightly more recent version than the original 2005 release, but the question remains: How does it hold up these days?
As a warning, due to the nature of Taimanin Asagi, some of the topics discussed and images shown in this review may be considered extremely objectionable.
Demon Slayer Asagi
Demons inhabit Tokyo and conspire with the corrupt humans living there. They work together to form gangs and even corporations, running businesses together. It’s a dark setting and the disturbing things that go on in the background can easily be imagined, but are barely touched on in the story itself.
The story opens with Taimanin Asagi, one of the most powerful ninja, killing Oboro, a rival ninja who has been working with the dark elements of society. Swearing revenge with her dying breath, this is a prelude to years of peace and Asagi’s retirement in fighting evil.
Nothing goes as planned though. Following the obvious setup, we soon learn that Oboro is back and stronger than ever. Asagi’s fiancé Kyousuke is in Oboro’s hands and her cheerful younger sister Sakura is now saying she wants to be a Taimanin ninja and help society too.
This could have been a good opening to an interesting story about revenge and the love she has for Kyousuke. It does touch on these elements and the events that happen do put her in a very challenging situation. I wouldn’t go into Taimanin Asagi expecting much from the story though. It spends far more time on her violation and humiliation than it does on plot and feelings. Even having finished the visual novel, I couldn’t tell you much about Asagi herself. Perhaps those familiar with her from other media may care more, but it just didn’t build her character up enough for her humiliation to have much impact.
Orcs, Ogres, and More
The vast majority of time spent reading Taimanin Asagi has the protagonist in dire straits. Unable to fight back against Oboro, she’s subjected to all manner of humiliation. Her body is modified to feel excessive pleasure, she’s gang-raped by demons and humans alike, and more. While far too much of these scenes consist of fairly repetitive dialogue, the common theme is her humiliation and Oboro manipulating her using her loved ones as leverage. The scenes themselves often felt like they went on too long and they were sometimes back to back or close enough. This just compounded the issue. While minimal, there are some interesting emotional moments there at least.
One thing that was a persistent annoyance was how she seemed to break in several of the adult scenes, but seemed to be back to her strong-minded self in the few scenes where she wasn’t being raped or threatened.
More positively, the variation in adult scenes was quite good. While the same themes did come up, it changed the type of creature violating her or the situation often. It mixed in a few ways to break her that went beyond the norm. It throws in several niche fetishes too, so will certainly be appreciated by those into torture, tentacles, and some of the more violent content.
Taimanin Asagi has four endings, which you can read about in our guide. I was surprised to find that one ending other than the true one added in a lot more adult scenes than any of the others. That ending actually had a satisfying twist too, while the others weren’t anything unexpected. Do note that this all applies to the 18+ version. The Steam version without an adult patch is heavily cut and only contains the true ending.
Great Classic Art. Dated Game.
Despite being quite dated, the art style of Taimanin Asagi holds up well. It looks great, even at a resolution of 800×600 which, whilst better than the original version’s 640×400, is still fairly low. The CGs are fairly plentiful too with 32 available to unlock, mostly focusing on the 10 adult scenes.
A couple of the adult scenes are animated which I was surprised to find for a title of this age. The others aren’t, but I appreciated seeing the movement of Asagi with several orcs surrounding her.
Sprites are where things are more of a letdown and the age is shown. While some sprites have a few variations or outfits, they only use one pose. When you realize that Asagi is always crossing her arms and Kyousuke is always in an odd arms open pose, it’s hard not to see it.
Audio is fairly limited too. Only Asagi, Sakura, and Oboro are voiced. There isn’t much of a selection of music either and sound effects aren’t great. As one example, Asagi started destroying someone’s property, but it only made a single sword swipe sound that was used elsewhere, rather than any clangs and crashes.
Verdict
If you want to see a busty ninja or two humiliated and violated by all manner of creatures, Taimanin Asagi has its issues, but is something you might appreciate. It has its charms, especially when it comes to the artwork. Just don’t go into it expecting much in the way of story or the same standards as modern visual novels.
WAIT FOR SALE ON TAIMANIN ASAGI
Guide: Click Here
If you are looking for another visual novel, you may enjoy The Shell Part I: Inferno. We have also covered a wide variety of visual novels both original to English and localized from Japanese, which you can check out here.
Thank you to Shiravune for providing a PC review code for Taimanin Asagi.
A gamer since the days of Amstrad and DOS and someone who has dabbled in a variety of professions. He enjoys a wide variety of genres, but has been focusing on visual novels and virtual reality in recent years. Head Editor of NookGaming. Follow him and the website on @NookSite.
