Many ’90s eroge protagonists straight-up rape women. When he strips her unconscious body after she faints from Toyotomi’s assault on the beach, Takuya does not rape Kanna. Though the game requires the player to click on her pussy a number of times. In fact, the player cannot rape anyone—Takuya at no point wants to be a rapist. High bar! That means everything is fine!!! Okay, sure, statutory rape—because the response to Takuya apologia is that Takuya is worse than a creeper: he is a man who chooses his daughter as his sexual partner.
Just as no defense of YU-NO can withstand scrutiny, no possible defense of Takuya’s character can withstand what literally happens. (Though were it not for Takuya fucking his daughter, I might consider him about on par with Brent Halligan.) YU-NO assumes the player will identify with a violent, tactless, sexist lecher who thinks his own naked child is hot. Thanks for insulting me every step of the way, Kanno.
Among the rest of the cast are some sparks of genuine interest. Every character has strong, consistent characterization and motivation, and each is involved in much more drama and mortal peril than they initially appear. In the same way Yu-no initially seems to be an alluring and sexy mystery woman but turns out to be your kid who is also your wife, the whole cast of YU-NO, as Sorlie writes, “has more than one side to it.” In context, however, Sorlie is claiming that Takuya, despite “acting foolishly naive,” is an intelligent and complex character, so even this overall accurate observation about YU-NO is absurd.
Eriko is the only (named) female character in the ADMS section who never engages in penetrative sex with Takuya. More power to her. Instead, her H scene is mutual masturbation. A badass, wacky, and competent sexy dimensional traveler on a quest for revenge, Eriko is one of my favorite two characters in YU-NO. In their strange dynamic, Eriko is Takuya’s homeroom teacher and the school doctor who is supposed to encourage him to keep his grades up, whereas Takuya pervs on her nonstop, which Eriko constantly complains about but also seems to accept.
Their rapport falls totally flat. I didn’t buy it for a second. The idea of a teacher and student interacting this way or, indeed, the idea of this chain-smoking woman in a fetishy outfit being a teacher or having any patience for Takuya is so ridiculous it becomes interesting. This must be what people call “so bad it’s good.” It is also another sign that YU-NO occurs in porn world, rather than the world of a good story that happens to include graphic sex scenes.
Amusingly, Eriko simply doing what Takuya never can and combing her bangs off her eyes renders her unrecognizable enough that the true identity of the sultrier persona she takes on to trail Ryuuzouji after dark is a plot twist when first encountered on—most story routes, or maybe all of them. However, almost all of Eriko’s sexual scenes disempower her, including on the Mitsuki route when Takuya finds Eriko stuck on the wall of Ryuuzouji’s estate and proceeds to sexually assault her with his hands and face; when Takuya watches her sleep and Eriko, still asleep, makes out with him; and when Takuya peeps on her while she changes. This leaves a sleazier aftertaste than Eriko’s skin-tight, sex worker-like latex getup.
