Holy Maid Academy
—
Holy Maid Academy
Game
Game2022
SAMURAI MAIDEN
Developer SHADE Inc.
A young woman from the 21st century with sharp swordsmanship skills finds herself in Honnō-ji during the Sengoku period! Together with a trio of newfound ninja friends, she races through the Underworld beneath Honnō-ji, confronted by enraged corpses at every turn! From the Steam store page
209 reactions from 4 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky, Mastodon, Lemmy) · newest Sep 25, 2026 · last updated Nov 5, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
58
Mixed
102 positive · 75 negative
95% range 50–65%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 102 | 75 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 10 | 2 | 12 |
| Mastodon * | 2 | 0 | 5 |
| Lemmy * | 0 | 0 | 1 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
Steam's own rating
Mixed
126 of 212 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What players are saying
57% recommend · 103 yes, 79 no
Counted from the reviewers’ own thumbs up/down on the 182 English Steam reviews we collected, not by the AI. Valve’s all-language rating: Mixed (448 of 768 positive).
Many reviewers find the combat shallow, sluggish, or clunky, though some enjoy it over time. [1][2][3] Several posters criticize the censorship, poor translation, and high price. [4][5][6]
Liked
Representative posts
- [4]
What's the point of censoring a fan service game?
- [5]
Pointless censorship paired with ♥♥♥♥♥♥ translation, mediocre gameplay and AAA price tag. Nothing to do here.
- [1]
It's rare to see a "Yuri" focused game these days. It's an okay game if you don't mind the price. The combat is shallow but at least it has Air Juggles and doesn't feel floaty like Genshin. The character 3D models are very pretty. All dialogues are voiced. I play it in Japanese text to avoid mistranslated dialogues. Tsumugi, the main protagonist, uses quite a bit of "Gyaru" words like "マジ” (Maji), and other nuanced …
- [7]
Samurai Maiden is a low budget jrpg with a generic isekai story and very basic and grindy gameplay. The ending was also pretty disappointing. This game is definitely not worth 60€, but I have to give credit where credit is due. This is not bait. This game was advertised as yuri and it IS yuri. No subtext, no bait and no over the top fanservice. This is an actual yuri game. It's definitely not a very good game, but I …
- [2]
(I swear most of y'all reviewing this game are horni mofos.) That aside, this game is fun to play. Reminds me of old hack and slash anime games. Story is interesting and it provides a nice visual novel when starting out missions. Combat and gameplay is pretty sluggish however simple at the same time. Just pretend it is 2009 and I'm sure this game would look good to you. Edit: Time to beat the meat after playing this.
Summarised from 34 of the 217 public posts collected about this game; every point cites the posts behind it ([n] opens the post) and the split is counted from the posts’ own ratings. Updated Oct 13, 2026. How summaries are made
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
The crowd is split on SAMURAI MAIDEN: 103 recommend it, 79 don't. Which camp are you in?
Reactions
60 of 209 · most liked firstWhat's the point of censoring a fan service game?
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →General Impressions Apart from the lovely fully-voiced Live2D animations, SAMURAI MAIDEN was quite frankly, average. Navigating the UI seemed like it lags a little, and performance-wise it felt like it was taking more resources than it should have. There wasn't any form of graphic settings which is surprising. You are locked into the highest settings by default and have to manage with ~30-40 fps on the Steam Deck. The game is censored to a certain extent, but a patch can be found in the…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's rare to see a "Yuri" focused game these days. It's an okay game if you don't mind the price. The combat is shallow but at least it has Air Juggles and doesn't feel floaty like Genshin. The character 3D models are very pretty. All dialogues are voiced. I play it in Japanese text to avoid mistranslated dialogues. Tsumugi, the main protagonist, uses quite a bit of "Gyaru" words like "マジ” (Maji), and other nuanced modern Japanese high school girls' words, so some dialogues is quite hard…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →As I have promised my friend MOJI to write a review for SM a while back, so here I am. Despite usually, I don’t write a review for a game if itself is caught between good and bad these days, I’d only make a review either the game’s extremely enjoyable or horrible to play, there’s no between. If the game’s content is too subjective, recommendation would also be hard to evaluate. To sum up, the mixed reviews on the game’s store page is very accurate. SM has its charms along with some hard to…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Censored like everyone else stated. Language is using stuff like Gen Z, or other slang which is just weird (no one speaks that way). Keyboard and mouse feels awful, and the prompts on screen are all joystick so you need to remember your keybindings or mash buttons till you press the right one. Cannot change your main character to play. Overall a downgrade from bullet girls phantasia for fan service/character customization.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Figured I'd get this review out of the way, as I spent a little over 2 hours in it, and I'm past the point of refunding. Apologies if the review isn't structured well enough, this is a first impressions based on the time that I've had with it, and I haven't had enough time to sort out my thoughts proper. I can look at this game from a few angles. That this is probably the best PC port that SHADE or D3Publisher has put out yet (All of their previous ports sucked horribly, although there's still…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Pointless censorship paired with ♥♥♥♥♥♥ translation, mediocre gameplay and AAA price tag. Nothing to do here.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Alright, let me get this out of the way first. I did enjoy the game for the yuri interactions as someone who regularly consumes yuri content, but you can do much better than this at a much lower price, so if you're looking for just yuri, there are other places to be and better sights to see. The Gameplay First off, this game just feels bad to play. It feels confused as to whether it wanted to be a musou game or a character action game so it gave you character action styled gameplay with…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →came for the lesbians, stayed for the decently fun gameplay. oh, and also for the lesbians. that too.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A fanservice game, with all the fanservice cut out, is a pitiful sight.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →+ Cute girls. + Yuri fan service. +- Okay story with some twist but not that surprised. +- Challenging enemies on high difficulty (or maybe annoying) +- Need to clear story once to use song dlc. +- They fixed that "Gen Z" translation. - Combo feels sluggish. - Weird auto aim when there're many enemies. - No graphic setting. Stay on highest, let your pc on fire like Honno-ji. - Underskirt censored while pausing and in photo mode. - Very expensive for the contents. Should wait for sale if you…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I am a simple girl who wants to play a yuri game that isn't a visual novel or a cozy life game. And this game is that! Yay! It's fun, the character models are super cute, controls are simple. I like that while its your standard hack n' slash game, there is some added in platforming. It's super basic, but it adds a little something to the gameplay. I really enjoyed this game. I would say it is not worth full price, though. I got in in a humble bundle so it was like $25-$30 alongside 5 or six…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Does not run on Steam Deck
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →First thing I'm gonna say is that this game is waaaay over hated. Samurai maiden is a fun jrpg and though the combat isn't the most complex the game makes up for it with really fun story and characters. So if you're into anime style games don't listen to the hatters and buy this game its definitely worth it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Game plays like ass but the girls are cute and gay so I love it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Dear Diary, Initially I was not going to write a review for this game, as this game is kind of my type of game. Even people don’t like it, I will still be fine. But recently I just beat the game and watch the cannon ending… It was a huge let down. Spoiler alert: it’s not the happy ending (in my opinion anyway), and so far it doesn’t seem to have other kind of ending (from quick googling anyway). This ending is low-key giving me depression. We are now arriving at Spoiler’s event horizon (please…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Angry weebs want panty shots because they don't get to see panties in real life.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →No resolution /graphics settings... No quit game option... And it's not a cheap game...
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Too much grinding required for an upgrade. Play Dynasty Warriors or Samurai Warriors as they have better combat mechanics. Awful English translation. 12/23/22 Edit: English translation has been fixed 1/1/2023 Edit: Tried spending the endless hours to continue grinding for the max weapon achievement but it is becoming way too boring. Bugs whereby mobs knocked out of the boss area will remained stuck are still unfixed. I find that the devs seems to be focusing more on the lgbt genre more than…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →[Rating: 2/10] This is a Yuri-Hack'n Slash first game and Isekai Story Afterthought.. Problem is it dosen't nail the Hack'n Slash part either [Half-Baked Maiden, actually seems pretty fitting as a name given the context bellow] Censorship, Translations aside.. sMaid's Core Gameplay has severe issues, not to mention subpar storytelling that it should be relying on to hook people into continuing to play (This is Problematic for a game that claims to be worth $60 games, if it sold for $40 it…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Didn’t Assassin’s Creed 2 have you fight/kill The Pope as a final boss because he’d been corrupted by an artifact of Eden? Heck, I was playing a gooner game “Samurai Maiden” where famous warlord Nobunaga becomes corrupted by a demon and has to be put down. So, China, you’re not the only country whose history gets toyed with in fiction. Wait till they see Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter.
neutral · AI labelView post →The translation is very subpar, I can't recommend it based on this fact alone.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Full review (with score): https://youtu.be/TciIzZtS7_8 Written review below! The devs behind the questionable Kandagawa Jet Girls are back, this time with their own take on something like Senran Kagura or OneeChanbara. I have played way too many of those for my own good, so of course I had to play this one too. Note: Trimmed to fit Steam, check video for full version! Gameplay SAMURAI MAIDEN is your typical hack and slash fare similar to those games I mentioned previously, but not quite as…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →FREE THE PANTSU!
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is one of the most mediocre games I've ever played. It's almost impressive how it manages to be a 6/10 in just about every possible way. And what it boils down to is: It's too janky to recommend for the gameplay, It's too vapid to recommend for the writing, and It's too tame to recommend for the fanservice. I just don't see much reason to pick this up unless you can get it super-cheap, like in a bundle.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Obviously you better go with the bar low on this one.. This is a PS2/PS3 game sadly, gameplay is bland and bad along translations and main character is a Gen Z.... yes were fked here already! Dialogue also sucks, skills are unlocked through the Album with the affection system. Only the Yuri could be fun but even so get the game at 75% discount i say. And they dare to censor the game, fking joke!!! Im getting old and i still like these kind of games BUT honestly it's time to stop with this…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I don't even think I can finish this. The moveset is rather limited, the action simplistic, story is trite, and the whole thing is grindy as hell with little motivating factors to do so. You're better off buying Bullet Girls.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →At the current price this should be a pass. When it is around 50% I would say, get it if you like soft-yuri anime waifu action... sure, but it deppends how much you like that. But let me list some positives and negatives. Positive The characters are well designed. The combat can be fun, can also be... see below. The voice acting is good enough. Negative The combat stoppes working when you encounter a fight where you actually have to dodge. At this point it just gets kinda annoying. Combat…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Save your money. The translation doesn't bother me. The photo mode does bother me. But its just boring. Not being able to rebind controller keys is unforgivable.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I kept hearing how “mid” this game was for a while, but I was still interested in it regardless. As always, the average person’s opinion is not very reliable. I think this game is absolutely fantastic. Anyone that’s played Neptunia, Senran Kagura, Kandagawa Jet Girls knows what they’re getting into; Team of girls, this time three from the Sengoku era and one from the present day, are tasked with a big goal to achieve and we witness their girly shenanigans on the way there. The game is…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Censored, boring gameplay/story/characters and horrendous DLC practices are all you'll find here. Modders have "fixed" the censorship but if that is your main draw it is very tame. The simplistic hack and slash is super boring and the game is essentially just a grindfest if you want all the content. The disgusting DLC prices for things that should be unlockable is just the cherry on the top. Avoid.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The Translation is way too cringe for me to consume, the game was pretty fun in the aspect of hack & slash, I don't have any problem with the combat or the mechanics of the game, but if you go for a "ecchi" game, you should deliver those things and please for the love of god, change the translation. I literally want to end myself with "drink a shot" everytime the main character says "Gen Z"
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →From their last game, they went down so bad. The story is boring but not bad at all. Pro > - Music. - Character Design. - Voice Acting. Cons > Game Play ( even if the combat its good and can evolve more, it gets very repetitive soon ), - AI is something horrible. - No Customisation at all ( except for few basic colour change if you don't buy the DLC ). - Character Progression is very basic and straightforward ( no personality in that either ). - Heavy censored. - Over priced. Let's not talk…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →4 girls come together to 'make friends' and travel. They just happened to save the world along the way. Tons of girls' talk make me think that I may not be the target player of this game. I thought this is a Senran Kagura or a Valkyrie Drive game. But it is not. It's about 80% talking and 20% gameplay. The gameplay is casual and easy. I didn't pay much attention about combo or skill and could finish 1st playthrough. Platform and exploration is somewhat plain. I just leveled up 1st weapon and…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's a D3 joint you know what that means: Superfluous, nonsense, anime dialogue that takes up 70% of the game's run time if you don't skip it. Normal stages are hordes of enemies with combos not existing, so spam that light attack and get comfortable. Bosses that can kill you in 3 hits from full and often just juggle you into all 3 hits for no reason. Empty upgrade paths and itemization. Laser accurate heel turns so enemy attacks track you from the heavens. Quite frankly…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Samurai Maiden is a low budget jrpg with a generic isekai story and very basic and grindy gameplay. The ending was also pretty disappointing. This game is definitely not worth 60€, but I have to give credit where credit is due. This is not bait. This game was advertised as yuri and it IS yuri. No subtext, no bait and no over the top fanservice. This is an actual yuri game. It's definitely not a very good game, but I got what I expected and I could enjoy it for what it is. I hope we will get…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →(I swear most of y'all reviewing this game are horni mofos.) That aside, this game is fun to play. Reminds me of old hack and slash anime games. Story is interesting and it provides a nice visual novel when starting out missions. Combat and gameplay is pretty sluggish however simple at the same time. Just pretend it is 2009 and I'm sure this game would look good to you. Edit: Time to beat the meat after playing this.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-jm... I'm sure it's a mid game at best, but the trailer for Samurai Maiden is the secret sequel to the Dream C Club "Cool Nippon" ad. Once again an NHK parody, this time educating the theoretical clueless foreigner on the zombie warriors and lesbian samurai of ancient Japan
negative · AI labelView post →Check out our [url=store.steampowered.com/curator/36364102-Horny-Hentai-Festival/]Steam curator , [url=www.youtube.com/curatorhhf/]YouTube channel and [url=twitter.com/hhfcurator]Twitter! [Kawaii/Action] A stunning 3D beat'em up featuring an isekai'ed young highschool girls. Tremendously cute anime 3D modeling. Embark on the adventure in Medieval Japan. [カワイイ] タイムスリップJK達が繰り広げる剣戟3DACT。
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →$60 is too much for this game. Most grindy game I have ever played in my life. Story is zzzz; I find myself skipping scenes because I just want to fight things. . A lot of your partner's special moves are delayed and it is frustrating. Grinding for currency on end is awful. I want to upgrade things but its super expensive. I love the characters, style and music but I hope the above can be adjusted. I'm only going to keep playing to get my money's worth. I pre-ordered this to give it a chance…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →bruh game runs like hot ass on my rtx 3080, plus you cant even do pantie shots in photo mode like what the hell man.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →bought on discount and still feels like it should have been cheaper. Gameplay (swords) makes up about 40% of the game, and the rest is uninspired visual novel. For those looking for it, yuri scenes are about what you see in the trailer. little to no fan service, and the action is fun at first until you realize it never evolves, and assets just get reused and repurposed. The story is MEH.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Refunded. It's extremely uncharacteristic of me to refund a game, but in its current state, this product is simply unplayable for me on keyboard & mouse with multiple monitors. My rather short experience can be summarized with a single word: frustrating. * The mouse doesn't stay in the game window regardless of which full screen mode I'm using so while evading a boss, my next attack may minimize the game. Honestly, what's worse than being in a boss fight with the game minimizing?! * Menus and…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Game Overview : A young woman from the 21st century with sharp swordsmanship skills finds herself in Honnō-ji during the Sengoku period! Together with a trio of newfound ninja friends, she races through the Underworld beneath Honnō-ji, confronted by enraged corpses at every turn! Nyanco's Review : + Bishōjo + Ecchi Yuri + Ninja Action = Yeah! ヽ(´• ω •`)、 Intro SAMURAI MAIDEN is an anime, action-adventure game developed by SHADE and published by D3 PUBLISHER. As you may know, developer…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This should have been a fun game. After all, it's about four cute girls. However, it ended up feeling more like a chore than entertainment. Maybe it's not just my type of game. It just felt repetitive and slow moving.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →1. Not worth $60. 2. Like a Sword Art Online game but worse. 3. First chapter is mostly a visual novel. 4. The way they added unlockable combos is cool, but also very bland. It just says they should do training, skips to after training without getting a way to test it and learn it. This makes you learn it on the fly in a mission. What sucks about that is the combos are very hard to pull off. Most of it comes down to luck. 5. Poorly optimized for pc, no graphics settings, and no way to actually…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I can't believe I wasted 39 minutes on this game. My worst mistake was closing Nioh 2 to try Samurai Maiden out. Both games are the same price, both on and off sale. Both are set in the same time period and are maybe about the same thing, though I didn't get far enough into Samurai Maiden to really know that. What really ticked me off about Samurai maiden was the context of the dialog. They're in a burning building and there are enemy soldiers running around searching. The player and…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →gameplay: the gameplay is ehh.. at start but as you progress it becomes fun. story: story is good. degenerate accessibility: you can play it safely outside or beside your parents
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's pretty boring. I bought this game while it was on sale for around USD$28 and still found it to not be worth the price. I would say that it is on-par or worse than their other game, Bullet Girls Phantasia, with the story being unattractive, combat being bland and stages being too short. Take this with a grain of salt as I have only played this for less than an hour and have refunded the game because I found it boring. But in my opinion, I still feel like it wasn't worth the estimated…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's just goated lesbians that deserve to be together. Peak fiction.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A game with a lot of controversy for some reason, I think people were expecting a similar product to their previous games, but it isn't, it isn't a fanservice game. I recommend it, even so I think it's clunky, you can feel that it's a low budget game but they put a lot of heart into it and is fun, the story and the characters are the major focus this time around and they aren't spectacular but they are good for what they are, they aren't shallow or tropes, a lot of thought when into them. The…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Not worth the price and translation is cringe, like High schoolgirl(高校生) translates to Gen-Z.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I have no problem with long cutscenes or dialog scenes in a story driven game like a RPG, this however is an action hack and slash game. I played for one hour so far and only 15 minutes were spend with actual gameplay. The dialog scenes are not only too long, they are boring and badly done. Stiff animations, overexaggerated movements and terrible lip syncing. This feels like the first game of some dev who is milking people on Patreon, not like a game from a studio that has been developing games…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →While not a bad game, it is DEFINITELY not worth the AAA price tag. So it's only really "Not Recommended" for the asking price. I got it in a Humble Bundle, and I've enjoyed it well enough. BUT. The gameplay, visuals, voice acting, AND writing ALL lack polish. All told, it's only at "decent for an indie game" level. If you can get it in a bundle or on a HEAVY sale, pick it up if you want a simple action game with yuri elements.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →These Maidens gay! Good for them. Good for them!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Quite the price tag, but it was well worth it for me since my life revolves around yuri. This is one of the very few yuri games on steam that is not in a visual novel format, yet it still uses the visual novel style to present its story, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it is a hybrid between hack n slash and visual novel. Despite the bare bones combat mechanics and general lack of enemy diversity I still find myself enjoying playing it because of the pretty animations between the…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The main cast is interesting, their design are appealing. The enemies are underdevelopped and the gameplay is serviceable The yuri is good, but the ending is unsatisfying I'd give this game a mixed review, get on sale if you're intererested.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Visual Novel + Hack n Slash is the best way to describe it. The visuals are great, the controls were chunky at launch but now it feels better, 4 girls are cute especially when they take a selfie, the story is fine and not boring. I didn't care about censorship stuff so It doesn't affect my gaming experience. The price is quite high and the game is quite low so I suggest buying it on sale. Once you reach endgame, there is a parry counter which I really like it. It's a bit hard to execute…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →SAMURAI MAIDEN is a special title for me because it reminds me of SENRAN KAGURA. It is a combination of a visual novel and an action game. The plot and everything else is presented in the form of dialogues. After completing the game I can say that it was a good title, I liked the characters and the plot in the game and the combat system. The game itself had no problems or bugs. Moreover, the game time was not that bad because in total it took me 54 hours, which is a pretty good result, I think.…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I was surprised how much better this was than reviews made it out to be. It runs smoothly, onboards you well with the gameplay systems, and must have received an updated translation because Tsugumi will tell you (and her potential girlfriends) all about her being a typical highschool girl with nary a mention of "gen Z" or whatever. I overmatch the specs and the game is running perfectly; high framerate, smooth, and I didn't even think to touch any options besides upping the camera speed. It…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →
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