A friend recommended this to me with just the premise "you'll love it, Crusty". I was wondering what it was about this series that had made my friend so eager to tell me to watch it. And I saw the light, and saw that it was good.
It's great to see a lovely vanilla series come along, seeing as hentai as of late has been teetering towards the hardcore side (I'm pretty sure that Euphoria will go on forever). Now, I may be a girl, but that doesn't mean that I don't like the rough stuff. I happen to like S and M, things like that. It's nice to get a breath of fresh air every now and again, and Amakano is just what the doctor ordered. Most likely Doctor Shameless, but that's a hentai for another time. Its hard to tell cause the title was in katakana, but I'm guessing that the title is a mix of the words 甘い/amai and 彼女/kanojo meaning sweet girlfriend. I will be so embarrassed if I'm just totally wrong. And that's exactly what this series is- very sweet.
The art, oh dear lord, the art. Hentai NEEDS to keep going in this direction, style-wise, just more polished, more professional-looking, and preferably less of that "Queen Bee" bollocks that seems to be seeping in through the cracks lately. Hentai seems to be getting colour schemes, and it's becoming more and more detailed. Basically, good all-round. One specific thing I must mention about the art in this hentai is the backgrounds. The snowy cabin, the inside, just everything. They are nothing less than beautiful and I dare to think of how long it must have taken to paint them. The whole hentai is gorgeous. Even the detail of the character designs impressed me.
The voice acting is notable since the female lead manages to stay believable and not become annoying with her loudness during the sexy times. Her trait of shyness stays prominent even through the sex scenes, something pretty rare. I'm not talking about a tsundere's shyness, I mean genuine shyness in a more adorable way. A bad habit hentai has is introducing a shy girl and then the second things become sexual, her personality goes out the window and she becomes just as loud and over-the-top as other more extroverted girls in the series. It's also nice to hear a younger boy protagonist, someone who is more of the "boku" type rather than "ore". I also like that he's not completely silent during sex like other protags tend to be.
Both character designs are attractive, but obviously the girl is more detailed than the boy. The main trait for both of them is shyness, since they both seem to stutter a lot and are very respectful of each other. It was a nice change to see a truly loving couple in a hentai, and it has somewhat reaffirmed my faith in the genre. I don't know where else I'm going to mention this, so I might as well do it now. The female character has odd-coloured eyes. I loved seeing something different, since I end up watching a lot of same-y things. I found the odd colours strangely attractive. Her cat-like eye shape is also worth noting, since a lot of shows tend to opt for more loli-esque, round eyes. She's not just a sexy female character; she's a genuinely beautiful girl with an adorable personality.
Obviously, I liked this series. It is outstanding, but didn't exactly blow me away enough to get a 10. It does however get a 9 for breaking away from the harem bullshit we're all expected to gulp down lately. The sex has a nice build-up; it doesn't just happen out of nowhere, and I find this to be a massive plus. the only thing that wasn't worth praise is that it could be considered "boring", since the episode I have seen is just "Here is a couple. This is their story. This is their sex. Cute, right? The end." I definitely don't think this way, but I know some people might not want something quite so vanilla.
Keep it up, hentai industry. Keep. It. Up. I'm liking it.
