77 Oleander Avenue Ghost House Investigation, Guest Review by Patricia B.

January 18th, 2023

Title image of 77 Oleander Avenue, Ghost House Investigation, written out in white letters. The image is dark and moody, showing a brown-skinned woman with red short curly hair, hunched over herself, blood visible on her white tank top. A wine bottle label shows a woman in a red dress. A broken window in the background.Welcome to our first Guest Review Wednesday of 2023! I’m extremely pleased to welcome back Guest Reviwer, Patricia B. on her own account and also because she is here to tell us all about a Visual Novel of note. Thank you Patricia, the floor is yours!

My name is Patricia Baxter (she/her). I am a bisexual autistic writer who has previously written articles concerning how media represents different marginalized communities. You can find more of my work through my personal website “Autistic Observations”.

July 22nd, 2022.  Tabby, a paranormal investigator, wakes up in a dilapidated and abandoned house without her phone, wallet, keys, or memory of how even she got there.  She quickly realizes that she is not alone in the house, upon meeting a ghost named Evie who is significantly better at being adorable than she is at scaring people.  Tabby soon sets up a plan: find her lost items, remember why she woke up at 77 Oleander Avenue, learn more about Evie, and perhaps even uncover the truth behind the house’s final residents: the Larkspur family.  That is if she can survive the night.

77 Oleander Avenue Ghost House Investigation is a visual novel that reminded me just how much I love video games and the unique forms of storytelling that can only be experienced through the medium.  Runa Liore Winters pulled no punches in crafting a horror game that is deeply unsettling to experience, even upon re-exploration.  The writing, visuals, and audio design, all work in tandem to create a place that may have been a house once but was never really home.  The sound design deserves especially high praise, both for its soundtrack and sound effects, which not only allow the player to empathize with the experiences of the protagonists but also feel the house’s hostility surround them through their headphones.  Furthermore, the interactive and cyclical nature of video games helps add to the terror of being trapped in a haunted house.  

At its core, 77 Oleander Avenue is a queer horror game both in terms of its protagonists and central themes.  Tabby and Evie are two delightful lesbians who are the type of endearingly charming people I would be more than happy to befriend in reality and still clearly human in their complexities and personal baggage.  Additionally, the game posits important questions about queerness and how it impacts how we are remembered after we are gone.  In a world deeply entrenched in cissexist and heteronormative ways of viewing people, historical accounts of queer people tend to be ignored at “best” or have their lives entirely rewritten at worst.  It has only been recently through the efforts of the LGBTQ+ community, that we are beginning to uncover those lost histories.  Tabby considers this question as she explores the house, and we see the effects of this erasure as we learn more about Evie’s past.

For all my praise for this game, it is still one where I insist upon reading the content warnings the developer helpfully provides before fully diving in, as the game is full of scenes that may be deeply triggering for queer players and/or those who grew up in abusive households with strict religious upbringings.  I personally found it was better to play the game over three days, one for each level of the house, as this was an effective way of tackling the game’s heavy content without emotionally exhausting myself.

Overall, 77 Oleander Avenue Ghost House Investigation is an exquisite example of the type of stories we can only tell in video games, and one of the greatest examples of queer horror I have ever experienced.  And yes, you can pet and name the (metal inanimate) dog.

You can purchase the game either on Steam or itch.io.

Visual Art: 9 (the game relies more on photography than the digital art typically associated with indie games in the genre, so YMMV on how well that works for you)

Music & Sound Design: 10
Story: 10
Characters: 10 (Tabby & Evie feel like real people, as do the other characters for better and for worse)
Service: 0 (violence is there for discomfort, not salaciousness)
LGBTQ+: 10 

Overall: 10

Thank you so much, Patricia!  This sounds like an intriguing visual novel that I am sure folks here will be interested in.



The Two of Them Are Pretty Much Like This, Volume 2

January 16th, 2023

Snowy, bare white scene, with a few trees and a building in the background. Two woman stand. One wears a mid-thigh length green hooded winter coat, she looks at the other woman, who wear a pink hoodie, brown shorts with black leggings underneath, and is reaching down towards us presumably to grab some snow. Black and red letters read, "The Two Of Them Are pretty Much Like This", In black a large 2 is in the bottom right corner, and in the bottom left, in black, "story and art by Takashi Ikeda."In Volume 1, we met Ellie a scriptwriter and her lover Wako, and aspiring voice actress. In The Two of Them Are Pretty Much Like This, Volume 2, Wako’s career gets a big bump with a role in an upcoming anime. What will that mean for Ellie? Well, it won’t mean that Wako’s paying the rent just yet. ^_^

In this volume we meet an editor friend of Ellie’s, the kind-of-hapless Ataru. and Wako’s fellow voice actors. There are moments of intimacy, and hard work, and mistakes and embarrassing moments with neighbors. Just every day life things. This is a low drama, low comedy, and low low-key slice-of-life comedy. that’s a fun read, without asking much of us. As I said in my review of this volume in Japanese,  the only problem I had with it was the “birthday gag” in the final chapter, a gag that I strongly dislike. You know the one – “Oh, no, everyone has forgotten my birthday.” UGH.

Ellie and Wako are in love, they are adorable together and we (well, maybe not Ataru) are rooting for them all the way.  I didn’t know how much I needed another Yuri manga from Ikeda Takashi until I read this the first time., but yeah, I really did. His art is outstanding, the tone is goofy without being exhausting for a beautifully balanced story. 

Ratings:

Art – 9
Characters – 9
Story – 8 1 point off for the surprise party
Service – 5 Nudity and acknowledgement of sex, but not more. It’s more just like, knowing an adult couple as friends.
Lesbian – 10 and then sure, Yuri – 10

Overall – 9

As I said the first time, “Fun, relatable and way better than I anticipated, but that one point off for that goddamned awful surprise birthday party plot.” I very much enjoy the recurring Wako-as-an-idol gag. ^_^

Volume 3 will be hitting shelves in English in June!

 



Sailor Moon Sparkling Water – Outer Senshi Edition, Part 1

January 15th, 2023

Taiwanese brand Ocean Bomb announced a line of Sailor Moon-themed sparkling waters, and of course, as an otaku of the series, I was required to purchase and consume these. ^_^ I reviewed the Inner Senshi-themed sparkling waters at the end of 2022. They were bad to okay, so please read that review first. Certainly read it before you buy and drink any of them.

I really didn’t feel like I needed to get any more of those… although I have another can of Jupiter/cucumber in my fridge if I ever need. “Need.”

But then, the news came of Outer Senshi flavors and, despite the fact that I can still taste and smell the Chibi-Usa rose soda, I found Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune flavors and drank them. So here we are for another round of…

Chibi-Usa holds a gun on Usagi from Sailor Moon 'R'. The captaion reads 'Drink the Soda.'

(Thank you, Christian, for this image.)

Okay, so the Inners were not great. I’m saying “Outers” but there are only two to get through. I wondered about how   was going to manage this. Well, I learned with drinking Sailor Mars that food pairing was critical – strawberry was not good with a cheeseburger.  ^_^;

These drinks were purchased this time on Arcaera, a rando online shopping service I found and trusted to take my money and send me cans of sparkling water, which they did. The packaging was not fantastic, so Uranus has a small dent, but she and I survived.  They have limited amounts of these (or so their websites says.)

With all that in mind, here we go! 

 

Sailor Uranus – Pineapple Flavor

Do You Like Piña Coladas, or a walk in the Silver Millennium?

Pineapple is not my favorite flavor in the world, but….this was really good. I joke about Piña Coladas, but there was a coconut-y bottom note that worked fine. This flavor wasn’t nearly as sickly-sweet as the Inners, which helped a lot. 

As for food pairing, I think I was very clever. We had ordered from a local Taiwanese place and one of the dishes was Singapore Mai Fun which was a curry noodle dish. The pineapple was a smashing success with that. Highly recommended.

9/10 Would drink again, with appropriate food pairing

 

 

Sailor Neptune – Kiwi Flavor

So. Kiwi. I actually love kiwis, but can’t eat too much raw. Luckily no one ever gives me too much. I had leftovers of the above noodles and figured that would be a good comparison point. 

The kiwi flavor was there, but a little muted. It honestly tasted more of the cucumber flavor, but much less sweet, with a kiwi finish. I thought it was pretty darn good. It was even better when I doused the noodles with a hot sauce. It made the “coolness” of the kiwi/cuke flavor stand out.

Again, I’d drink this again, when paired with something spicy.

8/10

 

Both of these were significantly less sweet than the Inners and had no floral overtones. They tasted like sparkling water, which really improved the overall drinkability.  The overall order for all the flavors is: 

Sailor Chibi-Moon – 0/10
Sailor Venus – 4/10
Sailor Mars – 5/10
Sailor Mercury – 5/10
Sailor Jupiter – 6/10
Sailor Moon – 7/10
Sailor Neptune – 8/10
Sailor Uranus – 9/10

There are no Sailors Pluto or Saturn sparkling waters available. My wife and I propose the following flavor suggestions: Grape for Saturn and Pomegranate for Pluto. We will await Saturn and Pluto options with anticipation (and some slight fear.) ^_^

In commemoration of these drinks, I have rebranded my ko-fi account to a Sailor Senshi sparkling water account, and now have the following button for tips! If you enjoyed this post, why not buy me another? ^_^


Thanks for joining me on this taste adventure!



Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – January 14, 2023

January 14th, 2023

Yuri Anime

Top story this week is the news that Takeshima Eku’s Whisper Me a Love Song is getting an anime! Crystalyn Hodgkins has the details on ANN.

I am beside myself with glee about this. I just love this manga. It’s adorable and utterly, genuinely, innocent. You can happily give it to a pre-teen or adult of your choice. It’s unabashedly a Yuri school romance, without the skirt-staring of Sakura Trick.

I hope/believe this will be the very first anime we can really point to as a shoujo Yuri anime. The manga doesn’t run in a girl’s magazine, of course, so the category is plenty arguable (and I have, in the past, argued that) but with a majority female readership  Comic Yuri Hime has always been – very much despite it’s editor’s opinion, at times – a women’s magazine. If the animators keep the feel and look of the original manga, we should get something that would still be appropriate for tweens. My digits are all crossed for that! I can teel you with certainty, that I am not the only person out there, rejoicing for this anime.

Black Rock Shooter: Dawn Fall has premiered on Disney+. ANN has a review by MrAJCosplay, which say it looks pretty good, but doesn’t really give us a synopsis of the story, so I don’t know if it is related to either the OVA or the television series, or if any of the Yuriishness from those, appears here. If you have Disney+ and want to write a review for us, contact me!

 

Yuri Events

Yuricon 2023 is moving forward! We currently have more than a dozen panels/presentations/discussions in process. So far all of these are going to be recorded and put onto Yuri Studio to be watched at your convenience, but once we get past Q2, I’m hoping to do at least one live event, as well. Is there a topic you really love to talk about? Apply to run a panel or do a presentation for Yuricon 2023. We are completely open to ideas and the stuff folks are working on now are fantastic, I think you’ll really enjoy them. ^_^  We’re working on a logo now and I’ll be doing an opening ceremonies video once that’s done.

Girls Love Fest is running their next event in the Tokyo area on March 19, 2023. Girls Love Fest 37, will include special “only” sections for Bloom Into You, Assault LilyLycoris Recoil and other popular franchises. Let me know if you’re attending, I’d love a report!

 
Yuri Manga

Creator Mieri Hiranashi has announced that her upcoming book, The Girl That Can’t Get A Girlfriend is number 1 in the nonfiction manga category on Amazon. This eagerly-awaited book will be hitting shelves next month. I’ve pre-ordered my copy. ^_^

She Loves To Cook, She Loves to Eat, Volume 2 will fill your heart with food and squee in English this March from Yen Press!

 

Yuri Visual Novels & Games

Via Sr. YNN Correspondent Ashley, gamedev Christine Love wants you to learn a bit more about Emily Harmless and her quest in Get In the Car Loser! Fate of Another World.

Via YNN Correspondent Cryssoberyl, we have the news that Bushiroad is launching a new Revue Starlight visual novel for Switch and on Steam. Alex Mateo has details on ANN.

 

Yuri Light Novels

I’m In Love With The Villainess: She’s So Cheeky For A Commoner, Volume 1 has hit digital shelves. I implore you to give this series a read. There’s some repeated footage, but trust me…this is not just a rehash of the same scenes. This series *will* have you in tears. inori-sensei’s writing has leveled up in these last few years.

 

Buy us a Sailor Uranus or Neptune sparkling water
Support Yuri journalism on Ko-fi!

Other News

A new Yuri literary magazine is launching next month in Japan. Zerogo: Yuri Literary Magazine (零合 : 百合総合文芸誌) features a cover image by Shimura Takako, and a comment by Mikami Teren, but the other names are less familiar to me. I’m looking forward to seeing what this offers!

I’ve been watching the news on this, but Ashley convinced me that you’d be interested too. Ogata Megumi, voice actor of Sailor Uranus in the 2000s Sailor Moon anime and Shinji in Evangelion is doing a series of voice-recordings they are calling a Solo Reading Project. Episode 1 is titled HALF MOON. Tickets are available on Peatix. The event will run from Jan. 14 – 21.

Exciting news for queer comics fans, the No Straight Lines documentary will premiere on American PBS’ Independent Lens on Jan 23! Check local listings for broadcast times or stream at pbs.org/nostraightlinesfilm or PBS Video app! This is a must-see documentary. I reviewed it in 2021 here on Okazu. It was brilliant.

 

Yuri Surveys

Thank you to everyone who filled out the Yuri Fandom Survey. We had responses from more than 1600 Yuri fans world-wide! I’m working on the preliminary results now.I’m really fascinated by all of your answers (not in a  creepy way, it’s just really cool!) and will get those results up soon.

The timing was off for posting here on YNN, but this past week Comic Yuri Hime was also running a survey – their first-ever look at what overseas fans want. I hope some of you caught my posts about it online and filled it out. I conjecture that this is a direct result of the popularity of I’m in Love With The Villainess being grown overseas first, then in Japan.

Seven Seas is also doing their monthly reader survey – this one offers a 30% off coupon for all of their imprints on Bookwalker! Since She’s So Cheeky For A Commoner launched digitally this week, I made a point of filling it out. ^_^

In a related topic, Mainichi Japan reports that Japan survey on asexual, aromantic people reveals the terms are not black and white. People have very individual ways of thinking about themselves. How do we really encapsulate gender and sexuality when ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯ is an answer that people actually use? ^_^

 

If you’d like to support Yuri journalism and research, Patreon and Ko-Fi are where we currently accept subscriptions and tips. Your support goes straight to paying for Guest Reviews, folks helping with videos, site maintenance, managing the Yuricon Store and directly supporting other Yuri creators. Just $5/month makes a huge impact! Become part of the Okazu family!

Thanks to our Okazu Patrons and Supporters who make the YNN weekly report possible!

Become a YNN Correspondent: Contact Us with any Yuri-related news you want to share and be part of the Yuri Network. ^_^



MURCIÉLAGO, Volume 20

January 13th, 2023

Blonde woman with large breasts in a tight t-shirt that reads "Destroy" short short and hiking shoes, sprawls with a variety of classical Japanese toys. Large outlined letter read MURCIÉLAGO and again in yellow, MURCIÉLAGO, 20, by Yoshimurakana. And explicit content warning features prominently.“Kuroko’s group goes to a hot spring deep in the mountains, where the entirety of the land is owned by the wealthy Yamatsukami family. But right as the family is going to decide the next heir, the third son is found murdered… To make matters worse, the only road in and out of the area is suddenly destroyed! Cut off from the rest of the world, the family begins to whisper about a mysterious “Ayako.” With little to go on, how will Kuroko solve this closed-room case?”

Not gonna lie – that synopsis does a better job of summing up the plot of MURCIÉLAGO, Volume 20 than anything I could have written, Kudos to whomever at Yen Press was responsible for that.  ^_^

Super creepy murders, a family secret, probably someone being buried alive, Hinako running off after bugs, large breasted women…you know, a typical volume of MURCIÉLAGO.

But when Reiko, our crazy-eyed, hot sniper shows up, I wondered where this story was going. It’s not like I have to be convinced to keep reading, I’m clearly in for the whole mishegas on this. 

The extra chapter was a hoot, however, as Kutsuha, Reiko’s…whatever she is… introduces herself at the end as a variety of famous people, including a kind of Rose of Versailles’ Marie Antionette in a little tale meant to praise Reiko. These pages had me laughing out loud, all out of proportion to the actual story. I guess any humor after 170 pages of death, manipulation, lying and torture is extra funny. _^_

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Service – Weirdly, still mild on the sexual stuff, but murdery service is pretty high.
Yuri – 1

Overall – 7

MURCIÉLAGO, Volume 21  is slated for a May release in English and has been out since March 2022 in Japanese. Volume 22 seems to be the last one available so far in Japanese so far, so we may catch up to this series this year.