Inside the Existential Abyss of a Pornographic Anime Game

Let’s get into it.

You come home to find a woman fingering herself from behind in your bathroom. You do not know this woman. You are given three options of things to say to her, most of which are telling her off and one of which is apologizing for “interrupting your fingerbanging session.” She responds as anyone would—by telling you she is the Love Fairy and has been sent to ask for your help to rescue Sappho, who the game refers to as the ‘goddess of love’ but we know to be the first famous queer poet from ancient Greece. Sappho, she continues, has been kidnapped by a demon who will fuck her until you, the hero, delivers a bottle full of pussy juice to him.

I repeat, the objective of the game: the poet Sappho is being molested by a demon and the only way to rescue her is to fuck women, steal their juices and bottle them without their knowledge. This is both a hideous depiction of rape being glossed over by the game and difficult news to digest from an elven fairy who has just finished masturbating after breaking and entering.

It is here where your role as a heterosexual male with dark urges is confirmed. “I ain’t got a pussy…and I make very different kinds of juices!” I respond.

“She must be rescued!” the Love Fairy advises me. “That pervert is pounding her in the ass!”

“What do I care about her rectum? Get out of here!” I respond, having no better option provided.

“You’re right, her rectum is not your concern,” the Love Fairy responds.

So how does the hero fuck these women who assume he has their best interest at heart and steal their juices? By solving Candy Crush style matching puzzles while women with gigantic breasts moan every time you make a match. The puzzle-fuck is one of my favorite metaphors. To our constantly erect hero, women are puzzles to be beat, matching small signifiers intended to represent their interests (green bows for presents, blue flowers for gestures, light bulbs for ‘smart brain’) in order to achieve a successful date. This is, speaking as an academic, some real virgin shit.

The rules of the saga continue: once you have gone on five dates with a woman, you have sex with her. In lieu of real-life penetrative intercourse, the player must solve a slightly more challenging “fuck puzzle,” because the only thing more difficult than getting to know a woman you are seducing is locating her clitoris.

The way you meet the next woman you will puzzle-fuck in Pussy Saga is by watching a cut scene between her and the woman you’re going to puzzle-fuck in twenty minutes in Pussy Saga. This is an unintentionally fascinating world choice—every woman you will ever puzzle-fuck in order to unknowingly collect their pussy juice in the hopes of freeing the goddess Sappho from being fucked to death by a demon pervert (inhales) know each other by one degree of separation. In a massive cosmic glitch, virtually all of these conversations pass the Bechdel test.

I quickly become attached to Linda, the art major who we first meet talking to her friend, Marina the lifeguard. Linda talks about her strained relationship with her mother with Marina, who’s sympathetic—that’s two named female characters talking about something other than a man, immediately before they’re both puzzle-fucked by me, a character who believes in his heart of hearts that I am doing this for the greater good. I am doing this to rescue the poet Sappho.

The Love Fairy appears. “If you have any issues while out on a date with her, try to take advantage of her WEAKNESSES.” This is likely a reference to the puzzle game, but also to Linda and her mom. God, I want to protect Linda. But I can’t. Due to rescuing the ancient Greek poet Sappho. From the demon.

To make the fuck puzzles go by faster, I use the ‘items’ the women drop during our dates. Why are these women carrying around love potions that I can later use to make them like me more and get the date over with? Unclear. Are these ‘potions’ stand-ins for roofies? Absolutely.

All the while, there is the force of chaotic evil that is the Love Fairy chiming in. We already got off to a rocky start when she broke into my home and began fingering herself before telling me the life of famous Greek poet Sappho was riding on my ability to fill a jar with the cum of many women, but her character grows even more sinister as the game continues. If I’m being sluggish on a puzzle and the “wet meter” isn’t going up fast enough, she reminds me to give the women (or, as she calls them, “holes”) gifts.

“These little cunts love to talk!” she says exasperatedly as Marina the student lifeguard tells me that she is concerned about her midterms. Before she has sex with me under false pretenses, Marina will explain that men on the beach with wives are constantly harassing her.

“Don’t worry, she can’t see me,” the Love Fairy tells me. “Only guys can see me!”

Here’s another nugget of the Pussy Saga world that speaks volumes. The Love Fairy represents a woman who does not exist—one who is hot, horny and vocalizes all the hero’s sinister urges with encouragement. Dare I suggest the dirty fuckpigs behind the saga of puss are familiar with the illusion of choice, as that’s the result of any interaction with the Love Fairy? If she wants you to buy Linda a necklace so she’ll have sex with you, you will. The Fairy gives you three different ways to queer-shame Paloma, the professor who is fucking her students, but you have no choice but to do it or the game is over.

“Only guys can see me!” she giggles again, because the Love Fairy is a hard-nippled representation of the masculine subconscious. As Pussy Saga presents these urges, they are impossible not to give into.

Marina, Linda and Paloma the problematic professor all rebuff me at first when I hit on them and tell me to go away. Instead of doing so, the game offers me three different ways to continue to harass them, often telling them they’re being uptight and that I’m not like the other guys. In this version of the world, this is what they were waiting to hear—they all concede, apologize to me, agree to go on dates, moan as I solve boring puzzles with pussies and flowers, sext me Shakespearean verse. I can pay them to have personalities more to my liking. I can level up and get them to fuck me different ways. I cannot, no matter how many ways I try to, ask Linda what the fuck is going on with her and her mom.

And I feel badly. Of course I do. I, a female-identifying player, see some of myself in Linda. I have had a difficult relationship with my mother. I, too, would like a “freelancer to show me love and affection.” Sometimes I am pretending to read a book, yet “my ass is thinking about you.” I, too, have an ass large enough to be capable of independent thought and action.

After sex with any of the characters, the menu appears: “You Fucked Her! Now She’s Yours! Give her tasks and demand photo reports!” There’s no need for photo reports since I already have a map that informs me where all the women are at any given time for some reason, but the tasks are specific and horrifying.

It’s five in the morning and the looping 8-bit music is beginning to wear into my skull. I’ve taken to expending my energy on having conversations with Linda—does she believe in open relationships? (“Yes, I need a new dick sometimes, mostly in my mouth.”) What kind of music does she like? (“It is forgotten that classic music is the music best.”) I am falling in love with Linda. I go on eight dates with her. Linda is so turned on by my basic respect for her that it makes me want to cry.

“You’re a real special guy!” she tells me as I puzzle fuck her. But I’m not, and I know I’m not.

I have sex with five women, and wait for the Love Fairy to return for their juices. I wait for her to return, and release the poet Sappho from the pervert demon’s clutches, hoping that the feeling of knowing I have helped someone will ease the guilt of knowing I have hurt the should-be-in-jail professor Paloma, the insecure but vibrant Marina, and the girl I wish I could speak to more about how many ribs she would consider removing for silicon breasts, my sweet Linda. I wait, and I look for the Love Fairy, but she does not appear.

I am finally able to locate her on the aerial map. She is waiting by an abandoned property. I click on her, and she asks me:

“Are you ready to open a porn shop?”

No Sappho. No sex demon. A trail of damaged hentai women in my wake. And it was for real estate.

From what I can gather, there is no ending to the Pussy Saga, and this is its ultimate commentary. There is no end. There was never any clear goal to my gaslighting, dark whims and blackmailing the sex criminal professor into hooking up with me (yes, you do that in the game). Life’s not about the pussy, it’s about the saga, and the saga is completely hollow.

Linda, if you are out there, I can’t talk to you anymore. I’m out of fuck points. I spent them all lying to you. I am sorry, Linda. Before we part ways forever, I demand no photo report but will give you one last task—no, it’s not the 150 point request of “drink cum at school.” Get out of your mom’s house, Linda. Stay with Marina at her cabana near the beach while you figure things out. Live your life, make your art and do that horrifying thing where you make yourself cum with a paintbrush like you sent in that picture I accidentally opened at a Whole Foods. But forget about me, Linda. Our relationship was false. I was trying to rescue a ancient Greek poet and never should have done all those things to you during the puzzles.

This Pussy Saga is ridiculous in nature but has real-life implications, just as the ones unfolding in real time. If you’re a young man who doesn’t have a lot of experience with women—and feel free to blow up my mentions, but I’m willing to assume that’s the majority of this game’s audience—Pussy Saga will get you no closer to being able to talk to a woman who respects themselves in the real world. By attaching backwards reinforcement of toxic standards to an anime titty fairy, Saga gives the player permission to blow off their kinky steam, but always at the expense of the avatar they’re having sex with. Ultimately, it’s a world that gets off on its own deception, too eager to engage and pander to one of the darkest corners of the mind.

My Pussy Saga is ongoing.

Jamie Loftus is a comedian, writer and social media victim of the International Olympic Committee. She’s the creator and star of the Comedy Central online original series Irrational Fears. You can find her some of the time, most days at @jamieloftusHELP or jamieloftusisinnocent.com.