Assembling a new group of virgins for the auction, Shirohebi samples the wares and puts them out on the market.
What They Say
In a luxurious theatre, thousands of masked spectators huddle close for a good look at the stage. This is the Virgin auction, where the very richest and most perverse come looking to bid. The sadistic Shirohebi assembles choice women for the auction. She examines them inside and out, teaches them the ropes, and samples their wares. She’s just received a new shipment: Yui, Umi, and Gin. Will they make the grade?
The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this release brings us the original Japanese language track and an English language dub, both of which are in stereo and encoded at 192kbps. I listened to this show in its English language adaptation since those can be pretty fun to check out sometimes. The stereo mix for it is essentially the same as the Japanese mix which is almost all dialogue driven outside a few musical cues here and there and the opening and closing pieces. Dialogue for it is good and clear through and through and is free of problems such as distortions and dropouts. We sampled the Japanese mix and they both come across well though they won’t really wow in any sense.
Video:
Originally released in 2005, the transfer for this two part OVA series is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The source materials for this look to be in good shape and the end result is that we have a very smooth and good looking transfer for the majority of the release. Colors have a good solid feel to them even across large areas of the same color, black levels look good and there isn’t anything in the form of cross coloration or aliasing throughout it. One area that’s noticeably bad is the epilogue where there is a lot of grey shadows and blacks which are macroblocking like crazy. Combine it with an upward pan and it just looks plain awful but it is fairly isolated compared to the rest of the show.
Packaging:
The cover art for the show is pretty nicely done as it takes all of the women in various states and has them on the front cover, nicely hiding the nudity while still making it plenty appealing. I also rather liked the way the logo was done with the cherries. It’s not a hard sell cover and doesn’t tell you much but the title tells you plenty. The back cover has better shots of the three main auction girls in different kinds of lingerie as well as a shot of the auctioneer and some action shots from the show. The rest of the cover is fleshed out with a look at the basic production information and the technical grid.
Menu:
Using artwork from the cover, we get a mix of two different types here as some of the girls are in full color while others are done in a purple filter which matches the checkerboard background used. The logo is cute with the cherries and even the navigation icon uses a cherry. All of it is set to a bit of the standard Vanilla Series music and it’s all very easy to navigate and move around in. The disc didn’t read our players’ language presets though and defaulted to English language and sign/song subtitles only.
Extras:
None.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Virgin Auction is a two-part show from the Vanilla Series line of adult shows and it’s slightly different than some of their other recent productions which have delved into more cruel and unusual forms of sexual storytelling. In its own way, it’s actually fairly tame compared to some of their releases but it plays up a few differences and that helps it to stand out a bit more.
We’re introduced to Shirohebi and Ragonji who deal in providing virgins for the ultra wealthy who want to do as they please with them. Shirohebi is something of a perverted woman who is involved in all of this as something of a doctor and a trainer as she deals with the virgins who are brought in. Ragonji is the actual manager but he wields less power in all of this and is subject to the whims of Shirohebi of whom he is incredibly attracted to. Shirohebi is amusing in how she’s somewhat sly in her attitude about what she wants and she loves to torture Ragonji. Their opening scene has him tied by the wrists behind his back and she spends her time torturing him with her foot. It’s amusing to see it played out as much as it is but it’s a nice change-up from something a bit more rough or just the usual interplay.
Much of the show though is about the three new virgins that are brought in, each coming here to become sex workers for different reasons, as Shirohebi lays out the rules and starts placing them into trial situations before they can go into auction. The girls stay in the building where Shirohebi operates things out of so they have plenty of things open to them and we get the fun of girl talk as they each explain why they’re there. But then it gets down to business as Shirohebi puts on her gynecological face and gets to work on checking them out and finding more about their pasts and what kind of virgins they really are before they can be sold off. Bring in a bit more interplay between her and the manager and you have a fairly interesting story as you explore each girl.
There are weak areas in the stories but the actual scenes are where they do a bit better. The character designs for the women are pretty attractive, a few notches above the standard designs and in particular, I really love Shirohebi’s design in conjunction with her voice. They do bring in the difficulty of having a foreign looking character and having her look the same as the rest if not for her silver hair but overall there are some good looking characters. The sex scenes themselves are the type that doesn’t stand out all that much but they’re well done with little in the way of repetition but they do play up some minor kinks which normally don’t get touched upon.
In Summary:
Virgin Auction isn’t a standout title or one that will really gain any sort of serious fandom, especially since it really doesn’t do all that much with the auction itself and the group of wealthy who participate. It’s more about Shirohebi and their preparations for the auction and in that regards it’s fairly fun with some nice character designs and decent sex. It gets an extra couple of points for pulling off an entire foot fetish scene without it coming across as completely hokey though. Virgin Auction is a title that’s probably good for those that are beyond their introduction to adult shows but not so much for those into the more hardcore material.
Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English 2.0 Language, English Subtitles
Content Grade: C+
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A
Released By: Kitty Media
Release Date: August 29th, 2006
MSRP: $29.95
Running Time: 60 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.