Royal Servant
1/10 *TRIGGER WARNING- PHYSICAL, MENTAL, AND SEXUAL ABUSE* Good art, nice secondary couple, engaging core concept. Every other character is bad or uninteresting besides the secondary couple. Awful, abusive seme. Wimpy, dull uke. Poorly handled themes of sexual, physical, and mental abuse. Constant downer and not in a good way. -SPOILER WARNING- I dropped this story pretty late into reading it. I sincerely did not enjoy my experience, the seme is an abusive arsehole for most of the story. It is not believable when he softens and tries to be good to the uke when he finally decides to leave (and he doesn't even leave until he's forced to despite the constant abuse!!!!). The seme and uke are both 'damaged' but that doesn't excuse their terrible personalities. I do not understand why authors use rape and sexual assault as plot points only to ignore the reprehensible actions of the perpetrators because they're not mean anymore. There is a *possibility* that a bad character can be redeemed, but not in this case. This is abuse that is lightly veiled by a BDSM theme. Practising BDSM requires safewords, aftercare, and CONSENT. If this was a story from the perspective of our seme rather than the uke all we'd see is a scared young man being forced upon by his boss. A man who is intimidating, strong, controlling, and has control over the uke's livelihood. What a huge misstep. I literally could not finish this story. The seme being nice now does not erase his wrongdoings in the past. I do not see how I could ever feel sympathetic towards him. Oh nooo, the serial abuser is gonna dieeee... I left this story incredibly unsatisfied and I am not surprised that some people liked it, however, I certainly did not. (Secondary couple was nice though, why couldn't we get more of them).
Oh! My Assistant Webtoon
6/10 Nice art, (sort of?) bi-rep, and a SUPER CUTE COUPLE. Awful love triangle bullshit, smut scenes felt like they cut off too early, for a story with so few characters I felt we were starved of the main couple. *SPOILER WARNING* -MILD TRIGGER WARNING: SUICIDE- This story is both worse and better than a 6/10. The couple is adorable and their interactions are sweet and believable (at first). Honestly, if the story had entirely revolved around them being sweet together and navigating their new relationship it would have been way more satisfying. Sadly, there had to be a love triangle to ruin everything. As soon as the friend character showed up I thought 'oh no, is this an unnecessary love interest?'. Lo and behold, he was an entirely pointless barrier to this relationship. I could forgive his actions while the uke was single. He was trying to look after his friend, despite having clear ulterior motives. However, as soon as his friend was in a relationship that's where the meddling should have stopped. In my real life, I am engaged and if my partner decided to drop a holiday with me to go see a friend that had not only shown romantic interest in them and sabotaged all of my attempts to be around them- I would have done the same as the seme. Except I wouldn't have taken him back. Both the uke and his buddy got away with that WAY too easily. Not only was his suicide attempt a complete lie (disgusting) but he did it to emotionally manipulate the guy he allegedly loves and saw NO CONSEQUENCES. The uke left his boyfriend for another man who had been stopping him seeing said boyfriend for months and saw NO CONSEQUENCES. Not even a short breakup. This whole plot should have been left in the trash where it belongs. Despite the former, there is really a lot of good to be found in the real relationship in this story. The main characters have so much chemistry and are so fun to watch. I wish we had, had more of them alone just being a couple. More cute dates, more living together, working together, doing overtime together. Every scene felt like it was cut off just a bit too early. This is especially felt in the sex scenes. There are times when it's about to get good and suddenly we cut to the next scene. I love after-smut cuddles as much as the next guy but if you're giving people wank material at least give us good wank material. The art is beautiful in those scenes but they just have too little substance. Overall, a pretty average/bad story that is saved by its main couple being adorable. Read for the sweet relationship and skip the angst chapters- you will thank me. Or, honestly, just read Sign if you want a story with a cute main couple and good smut.
My Darling Signed In
7.5/10 I liked this story a lot! Nice art, good chemistry between the MC's, and season 2 was super good! Pretty average/bad season 1, some pretty icky moments with Eunsung in S1, and the rival was bad. *SPOILER WARNING* This was a fun read! I certainly had some issues with the story but it was nothing that totally put me off. Season 1 was... not great. Nothing totally, unforgivably awful. Just not that good. The core concept was interesting until Jeahyun was basically blackmailed into a relationship. It felt veeerrrry icky to read. Sure, they end up liking each other and being happy. But I just can't enjoy blackmail to romance. Plus I actually found Eunsung to be pretty unstable and, at times, unlikeable. It's difficult because when he's good, he's great, but in S1 he got pretty clingy and jealous in a controlling way. His violence towards Jaehyun was super off-putting. Furthermore, the love rival was pretty shitty. Yeah, I know that was the point but I was not enjoying myself at all when he was in the picture. I was just waiting for that shitty arc was over so we could see the cute couple together again. I never felt any tension about the couple getting back together, just frustration at Jaehyun for being a big dumb idiot and Eunsung for not telling his boyfriend what was going on. Like, Jesus, all he needed to do was send a covert text about the blackmail with the screenshots and it would have all worked out. Just work together you fools. I was just happy for season 1 to be over when I finally got past it. Season 2 is when the story really gets better in my opinion. The couple really gets time to make your heart melt with sweet moments and Jaehyun really comes into his own as a working man. I liked the conflict around Jaehyun's work and his future vs staying with Eunsung a lot more than love triangle bullshit. Although, they do sorta bait a love triangle that, thankfully, doesn't happen. I did enjoy jealous Eunsung that respected his partners' boundaries though. He was always thinking of Jaehyun and I really appreciated it, even if he made mistakes. Despite the positives, I did feel that there were some pacing issues throughout the second season that weren't there during season 1. That's likely due to the authors coming up with the idea more quickly and not having as much time to flesh out the story, although that is just conjecture. The art was pretty nice but there were certainly moments where proportions were off or characters looked janky. Altogether, the story was enjoyable and the couple had enough cute moments for me to give this story a 7.5 out of 10. A stronger season 1 would have bumped its grade up to an 8 but the final product we have was still a fun ride. It's difficult to recommend a story that is similar to this one. For a straight ship, I would possibly recommend 1/2 Prince, although there are some significant issues with that story plot comprehension-wise. For a Yaoi I'd consider Lack of Love for a romance between people with different economic backgrounds (also the seme looks kinda like Eunsung). For shounen ai I'd lightly recommend The Best Smell. Rather than games, it revolves around an otaku and the guy he likes with a supernatural twist. The story is good but it doesn't have much in common with this one besides the nerd appeal.
All About Lust
9/10 Thoroughly enjoyable. Great characters, smut is p.nice, just lots of fun to read. The art isn't the best but I actually enjoy the minimalistic style. Not much in the way of story which is so refreshing. It just follows one relationship per season giving you time with the characters which I really enjoyed. Very solid, only drawbacks are the art and possibly the one tsundere character (but I like tsundere's sooooo). *SPOILER WARNING* I really enjoyed this story. The couples from S1 and 2 are both really fun to watch interact. There aren't very many tropes in this story that are played straight (no pun intended). I mean, in the first chapter Sunjin talks about how much he wants to fuck Wooseung. What an open. It might put people off but these characters have *funny* interactions. I genuinely spent most of S1 with a big grin on my face. Their growth from horndog and pure cinnamon roll to the middle ground they end up in is so pleasant to see. The way they fall for each other is a tad weird but I can suspend my disbelief for it. Just a really nice S1. However, there are drawbacks to this season. I touched on the art in the prologue but I do understand that many people were turned off by the art style. It is minimalist and the characters do not look like the cover used on this site. Despite this, I do believe that the art pops when it needs to and the quality noticeably gets better as time goes on (good job to the author and their assistant!). If you like beautiful/consistent art you may be disappointed with this one. Usually, art is a deal-breaker for me but this story was just too fun for it to turn me off! Another criticism is that the sex scenes (despite being well-drawn and enjoyable) were not quite as... rough(?) as I expected in S1. With Sunjin's imagination, I expected a lot more kinky/rough scenes. I'd expect them to be consensual, of course. But we got quite a lot of vanilla love. It was adorable and still more than enough, just a slight disappointment for me. Season 2 is also very good! I like the secondary couple a lot despite their differences. However, if you don't like tsundere's then you should probably skip this season. I just want to take this moment to appreciate Hyunho. He could have been an awful love triangle character like 90% of love triangles in fiction but he was such a BRO. Sure, he tried to stop Beomchul. But he was happy for him when he finally got into a relationship with Jaehee and didn't push it when it was clear he had no chance. What a great friend, dude, love you Hyunho <3 Aaaanyway. Beomchul. Biiiiig tsundere. But he experiences character growth! I like his dynamic with Jaehee and was not expecting to respect their relationship as much as I did. Jaehee is also a good boi. I like that they're able to argue and learn to open up to one another. S2 is a bit more serious than S1 but it was still funny at times and the tone was still appropriate. Even their brief split wasn't frustrating. The art was also better too! Happiness all around. (ps: the sex scenes between these two are... nice). Overall, this story deserves the 9/10 I'm giving it. I'd recommend Therapy Game if you want something more akin to S2. It's the third part in a series and the strongest in my opinion, plus if you read the first two parts you get a story that's as sweet as S1 (but not as good). Maybe try Two&Too for a shounen ai with a himbo like S1.
Sign
9/10 I loved this story, loved the characters, liked the smut, it was a great overall package. Cons would be that the art wasn't amazing in the beginning (who cares, lmao) and for some people there may be an overabundance of smut. HOWEVER, that shouldn't put you off. Gyoon is amazing and Yohan is the most fucking sweet teddybear in all of manhwa. I loved this story and chances are you will too.
The Story About You x Me