I knew it would have to come to this one day…
Let’s just get it over with.
Okay, so last time, we covered Meet ‘n Fuck games. At its core, HuniePop isn’t all that different. The primary difference? Quality. Now, I’m not saying it’s good – no, it’s a fucking piece of shit that attracts assholes – but honest-to-goodness EFFORT was put into it, and I have to give credit for that.
First of all, some background. HuniePop is in fact western-developed. I do have some natural biases when it comes to that, but quality is quality. The biggest problem is that the writing is VERY dudebro alpha male western to an unfathomable degree. Hentai isn’t exactly a bastion of sexual equality, but structurally, the game is borderline sexist and racist. A LOT of people have actually said this of the game, but I am willing to give the writer the benefit of the doubt – he strikes me as merely untalented, not malicious.
HuniePop actually got funded through Kickstarter, earning $53,536. I’m not even mad; that’s a fair budget considering the overall quality of the game’s presentation. That’s the one thing I’ll never complain about HuniePop: the presentation. The art is clean and consistent, the character designs are great, the music is catchy, the puzzle game is simple and addicting, and there’s full voice acting. Many aspects of the game are well-designed. It’s just… I really fucking hate all of the aspects that aren’t.
Okay, so when you first start the game, you get to choose if you’re a male or a female. Great, you get to have both straight and lesbian CG, right? Err… no. The only thing that changes is what gender-specific pronouns you’re referred to as, and when you’re a female, that includes “bitch.”
So, whether you’re a man or a woman, you start off on a Sunday night, alone in a bar with no money when you come across a chick named Kyu.
Kyu later shows up at your place, this time looking like a pink-haired fairy. She says she’s going to help you with your love life, but really, we mean sex life. Before you ask, yes, she is unlockable as a girl you can get with, and no, you are NEVER given the option to see brown-haired Kyu again. What a fucking waste.
So, you go to a random place to bump into one of the main girls, and Kyu gives you advice. She also gives a short comment about the girl, but most of the time it’s just a line describing what cliches the team used to design her.
You’re given a set of three lines to give to a girl, but it honestly doesn’t matter what you say; whether you say something decent or you pick the three worst, godawful responses ever, the girl will ALWAYS introduce herself at the end and give you her contact info.
First I’ll discuss the RPG elements. Basically, the entire game revolves around managing “Munie” and “Hunie.” “Munie” is, well, money. You use it to buy things. “Hunie” is basically experience. You spend it on traits to improve your abilities in the puzzle game. You earn Hunie by talking to girls, giving them gifts they like, and giving the correct response to their questions. You use Munie to buy gifts, food, and alcohol. If you stuff the girls full of food, you can talk to them longer, and if you get alcohol into them, you earn more Munie from interacting with them.
Notice how I never once brought up “affection.” That’s because the girls DON’T HAVE AN AFFECTION SYSTEM. The goal in getting on their good sides is simply to gain Hunie. So, what about dating? In what is quite possibly the most backwards logic in the entire game, you can go on a date with any girl practically whenever you want (limit once a day), even if you just met them and by all means should be disgusted by you. Further, dating is your only source of Munie. That’s right. You go on dates to EARN Munie. What the actual fuck.
“Dating” in this game is essentially just playing a match-3 puzzle game, where each of the match icons represents some kind of action you perform during the date. If you fail the puzzle, the date is a bust.
Overall, the puzzle game is pretty well-designed, if quite a bit luck-based. It’s probably the best part of the entire game. I mean, it’s not spectacular or anything, but it’s well-designed. Just… let’s not go overboard; no one’s playing the game for the puzzle game. Don’t give it too much credit.
In what is perhaps the most western thing about the game’s design, the goal is to have a successful fourth date, at which time you get to have sex with the girl.
…but only after clearing one last puzzle.
There’s no way to lose the “final” puzzle, but it is annoying as fuck. Basically, if you match three, you get a little progress in the progress bar. But the bar steadily depletes at an unfair rate. If you’re unlucky and take too much time finding another match, the bar can and will deplete to zero, completely negating whatever progress you made. I once spent five fucking minutes on one of these puzzles. By the time I finished it, I completely forgot why I was doing it in the first place.
Oh, right. Sex.
Well, let’s see my reward…
That… that’s it? All that effort and my reward is one CG with some nipple in it? There isn’t even any dialogue. You finish the puzzle and you get… an image. Not even multiple images for different stages of sex. Some girls have multiple variants, but it’s basically her in the same pose with underwear on, without underwear on, and with cum on them. And in the case of Aiko over here, not even that; the second variant is just with glasses off.
Yeah, that’s all the hentai content you get per girl. Actually, while you’re progressing with your girl, you do get some CG… that’s sent to the main character’s phone. Yeah, apparently, as a girl starts liking you more, they just text you some pics of themselves in sexy poses, for a total of 4 CG each, 1-2 of which having any nudity at all, and that’s INCLUDING the aftersex one. Finally, I am not ashamed to say this: I have attempted to fap to the CG in this game on multiple occasions, and not once have I succeeded. It just can’t be done. ONE picture isn’t going to cut it, especially when I don’t have any substantial character traits to latch on to.
But the worst part? There are NO ENDINGS. You basically just try to have sex with every girl, unlock endgame girls, and try to have sex with them too. It’s just going through the same motions with the end goal of getting laid with as many girls as possible. It’s deeply, deeply unfulfilling.
So, the reward is hilariously bad. The adventure isn’t any better. I will say this: each of the girls certainly has some semblance of personality to them. But that’s it. Every girl has “data,” like height, age, what they studied, what their job is, what their hobbies are, etc… You learn this by talking to them and asking them those specific questions, and they will ALWAYS answer truthfully, no matter how little they know you and no matter how personal the question (like their cup size). Outside of data and stupid flavor questions like what their political preference is or how sexual they are, you learn jack shit about them. You never get a sense of family or friends (outside of the one cutscene each girl gets when you’re introduced to them), and there’s absolutely no chemistry with the main character at all. The only thing you give a shit about is getting that fourth date and earning Hunie to make that journey easier. And in the name of earning Hunie, you just have to say whatever they want to hear, even if you completely contradict yourself between girls.
So, as an erotic game, it’s a spectacular failure. As a puzzle game, it’s mediocre. As a dating game, it’s un-fucking-believably abysmal. So WHY the fuck would you play or even buy this game? Honestly? Probably just to laugh at how fucking stupid it is. The dialogue is shallow, juvenile, and downright stupid. And it’s all fully voiced in English (and, again, ONLY in English, because this is fully western developed, remember? Some people make the mistake of thinking it’s Japanese.) Now, when you combine insipid dialogue with porn and voice acting, occasionally something magical happens. Personally, I find it extremely cringeworthy, but I imagine if there’s ANY reason to experience HuniePop at all, it’s that.
If you made it this far, there’s probably one question floating around in your head by now. Why do I care so much? Why am I being so harsh towards this game? Yes, it’s just a porn game. Yes, Japan has made much, much worse and much lazier, too, and they probably charged more for it too. Ultimately, I think I just find the entire concept utterly insulting. It feels like a response to Japanese eroge, as if saying “this is what they are like,” and I’m just shaking my head saying “no, it fucking isn’t!”
Here’s how I see it: there are two main philosophies when making an eroge. You can either make HCG the goal, or you can make HCG an added bonus. Games where HCG is clearly the goal go all the way and make a shit-ton of H-scenes. The best games with this philosophy have you adventuring and hunting down every single H-scene and getting involved in dozens of poses and fetishes. Games where HCG is an added bonus tend to be excellent games in their own right or tell a good story that doesn’t need H-content, but is enhanced by it. HuniePop makes the horrible mistake of being a mediocre puzzle game and following the “added bonus” philosophy. If it were a better game, the lacking H-content would be forgivable, and if there were much more H-content, the poor “dating” concept would be forgivable.
Ultimately though, the thing I find most insulting is the people who give the game ENTIRELY TOO MUCH CREDIT. Enough people have played the game to have character polls and discuss who is best girl, which is natural… but fucking WHAT CHARACTER? Every single girl is flat and never develops. All they are is their designs. I can look at multiple girls and weigh certain traits that make them visually appealing, but it’s virtually impossible to be attached to any of them, especially since I automatically lose any and all respect for someone who goes out with and has sex with a non-character like the main character, who pretty much stalks girls and compulsively lies just to get laid. By all means, find entertainment in the decent puzzle game, appreciate the character designs (the artists really did do some quality work), and laugh at the fucking stupid dialogue, but… spare me the nonsense of actually recognizing the girls as characters. You might as well be discussing who the cutest mobile phone wallpaper generic anime clipart girls are.