Product Info

Platform

Switch, PC

Publisher

Gamuzumi

Developer

Winged Cloud

Genre

Adventure, Visual Novel

Players

1

File Size (Minimum)

364 MB

Release Date (NA)

Dec 16, 2021

Purchase From

eShop

Steam

Sakura Santa is a virtual novel that was released on PC in 2015 and recently made the jump to the Nintendo Switch. The game’s setting is based on Christmas, and publisher Gamuzumi takes advantage of this to release the game on the hybrid console during the right time, mid-December. It does not contain nudity, but it is not always safe to play in public. The game has some silly moments, but it ends too quickly, leaving much to be desired.

Three’s a Charm

The visual novel’s story revolves around Koji, a male college student who is going to spend his first Christmas alone soon. Feeling devastated, Koji visits a nearby shrine and makes an offering. His wish is to not spend Christmas alone. Soon after, he encounters three waifus (cute anime girls), Akina, Itsumi, and Santa, each one with unique characteristics. 

Akina is a playful fox spirit who loves teasing people and seeing their reactions, especially from Koji. She wants to repay Koji for donating money and helping the shrine priest shovel snow. Itsumi is a childhood friend who moved away but now works at a local cafe. She is shy at times, level-headed, and harbors major feelings towards Koji. Finally, as weird as it sounds, there’s Santa, a clumsy, pure, naive but thoughtful girl who has the power to create Christmas festivities. All three are drawn towards Koji and you have a week before Christmas to figure out who to spend time with, making it a festive game for visual novel fans.

A Festive Story

The game gives you multiple options to choose from on how to spend your day. Your answer will create the storyline. The game offers multiple stories and most of them start off similarly. Meet the girl, go out on a date downtown, experience embarrassing moments, fall in love, the end. It’s a familiar setting to many romance stories, but the game throws in plenty of fan service to enjoy those waifu moments. The game touches on each girl’s backstory as well, but it doesn’t go far enough, missing out on the potential to develop each character further.

One story in particular is the most amusing. It’s as if players are watching a harem anime series. To see that specific story, players will have to devote an equal amount of their daily time to each girl. Otherwise, the story will focus on one girl, and you’ll have to restart the game to experience a different story. The game isn’t very long: one story can take less than an hour to finish. The fast-forward option is available to get through some of the redundant scenes.

Keep It to Yourself

The game is easy on the eyes, but the most detailed illustrations are based on those lewd moments. And yes, those drawings become available for viewing separately in the game’s gallery after you see them in the story. Therefore, you may want to play by yourself and not in public. Anyway, outside of the lewd visuals, the character illustrations are done well, from their designs to their vibrant colors. Backgrounds are not extravagant and could use more variations, but they work fine. It’s unfortunate that the game doesn’t emphasize characters outside of the three leading females, though. Take the Disgaea series for an example. Those cutscenes have multiple characters of all genders on screen, no matter what their roles are. Having an illustration of the cafe manager or the lingerie store worker would add more life to the game world. The game simply feels more empty than it should be, especially with no voice overs, leaving players to use their imaginations for how each of these characters look and sound.

Troublesome Menus

While using one’s imagination to fill in the game’s gaps is not a big deal, the way players interact with the game is. Simply put, the user interface in this title makes it difficult for players to have the smoothest experience. For example, while playing, players can click the Skip button, but it only actually works if the player rewinds the story or replays the game. Instead of making it available to click, the game should have disabled it by fading out the option or having a “no” sign over it until it’s usable.

Additionally, the main menus in the game use a colorful, festive red. The text is in white, but when you highlight an option or image, the hover effect is a beige color. It’s difficult to tell the difference between the white and the vibrant red that overpowers the beige. The same goes for the in-game menu to rewind, autoplay, and fast forward. The beige doesn’t work and makes it difficult to understand. Changing it to the opposite color—in this example, green—would make it visually easier for players.

There are also bugs in the game. When viewing the game’s gallery, players can choose and get a larger view of those vibrant (lewd) illustrations they’ve unlocked while playing. On the Nintendo Switch, when viewing the last page that only has two images on it, the game decides to show the incorrect visual for both. It’s a bug that can be easily fixed, but it has not yet been updated as of this review. Similarly, there are a few typos in the dialogue, but that shouldn’t faze most players.

The Final Night

Sakura Santa has its silly moments across its multiple storylines. However, the lack of content and the confusing user interfaces make it a challenge to revisit.  If you enjoy harem anime and fan service, you’ll enjoy Sakura Santa, even if it’s a short festival.

A Nintendo Switch code was provided for this review and gameplay footage.