My old Criticism Thread has gotten a bit dusty after more than a year of involvement with VirtuaGirl, so I thought I'd better start work on a new way of expressing my likes and dislikes regarding specific VirtuaGirls. Obviously the ratings I give are only my opinion; the system of evaluation, however, is potentially useful to anyone.

This system came to me as I was sorting through my collection and marking favorites. Because I have limited hard disk space, I can't afford to keep all my cards downloaded, so whenever I develop a certain degree of disinterest or distaste toward a card I've purchased, I delete it from the collection. If the motive was disinterest, I might redownload them someday in future if I get the urge; if the motive was distaste, I'd ask for my dollar back from Totem if I though there was a chance in hell this would work. So that's two levels of negative opinion, but in sorting through the list I was also interested to notice that there are three levels of positive opinion. The cards I would choose to favorite so that they showed up more often than their counterparts were always members of two categories - either recently-acquired shows that I was eager to see more of, or shows that might be new or old but which I had begun to doubt my fondness for, which I now wanted to subject to scrutiny and determine whether to keep or delete them. To judge a show, I need to see it a lot, but once I've judged it a favorite, I don't need to see it as often, unless it's a VERY favorite. So, if we were to equate the ratings to a "star" level from 1 (lowest) to 5 (highest), 1s and 2s are deleted from my collection, and 3s and 5s are favorited, the 5s so I can "overdose" on them and the 3s so I can decide whether I like them enough to keep them or not. The 4s are ones I've become "accustomed" to, and don't need to see as often despite knowing I really like them.

So, with all this in mind, the five categories follow. (Stupid character limit is five times what it used to be and I'm still running afoul of it.)

***** - Passionate Fave
These are the cards you can't wait to see again...you want to go watch them right now! Cards that I have paid 2 credits for are few and far between, but when it happens I want to get my money's worth, so I tend to favorite these cards and watch them a lot. There are few cards I'd consider to be at this ranking which I've had for longer than a few months (and it'd be a few weeks if I spent more time watching VirtuaGirl than I do); I am the kind of guy who seeks novelty and variety, so even my very favorites of anything eventually grow a little stale from age, and are likely to fall out of this category.
My current passionate faves include:

• Axelle Parker, "Pink Circus" - One of the most fun dance performances, with a girl who is both sexy and clearly enjoying herself, not even trying to pander to the camera but just letting herself go wild. Absolute joy, that.
• Jenny McClain, "Vroom Vroom" - A voluptuous girl in a skintight outfit has a lot of potential; I'm not sure how long this is going to stay a favorite of mine but for now I'm inclined to want to savor its luxurious charms.
• Miss Roxx, "Interrogation Room" - Easily the best job of roleplaying a feminine power role that I've seen out of all the cards I've watched. Any girl can dress like a cop or a dominatrix or a succubus with wings and devil-horns; the ones that make such an outfit work are the ones who put some effort into portraying the attitude of a superior femme, and this is a stellar example of this all-too-rare art.
• Viki, "Diablo" - I actually don't usually like Viki's style of performance, so the fact that she managed to catch my eye with this card got my attention and I'm determined to watch it a lot. It's possible that it will faill straight to a 3 if it strikes a sour chord with me once or twice, but so far is has continued to live up to my demanding expectations in a way that many of her other cards, which should have been my favorites but turned out to be thorough disappointments, could not.
• Natali Blond, "Texas Bar" - Natali's "Black Snake" is one of about three strong candidates for my single favorite VirtuaGirl card; her unrepentant lustfulness and the exotic-in-both-senses nature of her outfit work for me perfectly. And her ***** "Street Style" is also a longtime fave of mine, not the least because of the "Bottle Incident" which apparently makes this one of the most polarizing cards ever released, and one of the catalysts for the creation of the alternate brand Deskbabes to which a milder modern VirtuaGirl would stand as a contrast. All this said, I know Natali to be very high on my list of favorite girls, and so when I finally purchased a third show from her, I had no reason to think I would tire quickly of it as I so often do of even very good shows. Completely distinct from her other two shows and yet still amply possessed of her specific charm, I have no reason to think I will ever tire of this one.

**** - Perennial Fave
These are cards that I know I love, but prefer to love from a respectful distance in order not to sour my feelings for them through overexposure. Some of them are definite favorites which I've watched often enough to risk burnout, others are classic examples of girls which I like so much that I've gotten other cards for them, and would now rather watch those than the originals. Still others are just okay, but distinct enough from everything else that's available that I don't judge them on the same sliding scale of relative qualtiy that applies to a more commonplace card. The vast majority of those cards I've purchased end up in this category or in the two-star "almost" bin; many cards drop from 4 back to 2 and those are much more likely to end up back at 2 than those which spent time as 3s in between.
My current perennials include:

• Morgaine, "Lady in Red" - The very first card that made me fall in love with VirtuaGirl, although it was a trailer for a long time before a different card finally made me spend money which I then expanded to pick this one up. The bouquet of roses, the S-E-X choker, and the positively hypnotic way that she swirls her bottom about while gazing over her shoulder at the camera with veiled eyes - all guarantee that I will never delete this card. But I've loved it long enough and often enough to have grown to take it for granted, and so now I am content to let my passion for it cool a little, preferring to remember its finest aspects and not overexpose myself to the parts of it which do not linger in memory so well.
• Jennifer Galbina, "Orange Soda" - The only card she ever made, and for good reason; far from the best performance. Yet it has a certain endearing charm that I just can't bear to be rid of; there's a glimmer of genius in some parts of this flawed showing that makes me pine for what might have been, and so I'll always want to keep it around just in case a desire strikes me to see it again.
• Sandra H, "Dark Master" - Somehow, Sandra just doesn't do it for me; I think it's the hair, neither godlen nor black nor red and not in a style that draws me in, nor is her body spectacular enough to seem more than just okay to me. Both of her other cards are 3s to me right now, but this is her in a spectacular vinyl fetish outfit, and so even if she's not one of the girls I really go for, I'll always pay attention to her when it's this show that comes up.
• Ariel & Tea, "Prison Cell" - Entire leaps and bounds more sexually explicit and seductive than any other duo card, or for that matter any card period, this one is an unquestionable must-have. But there are numerous times when I watch VirtuaGirl wanting to build up an erotic fascination through the slow seduction of a striptease, and jumping right into the hot girl-on-girl action like this card often does is a bit like going out for a Sunday drive only to find that your car is incapable of going less than 80mph. Thusly, this is not one of my 5s despite my considerable fondness for it; I prefer to keep its appearances infrequent so that it will more thoroughly impress me when it does show up.
• Tarra White, "Rock Star" - I can't think of another card that puts the dancer in a snakeskin catsuit, nor can I think of another dancer whose features have the exotic, almost alien cast of Tarra's face. I will always want a few Tarra White cards active in my collection at any time, but this is the only one which I think is unique enough not to appear and disappear periodically.

Potential Faves
Cards that I think I'm going to love, but am not sure - or cards I was sure I loved, but now I'm starting to think otherwise. Unlike a simple five-star ranking system where the middle ranking is "neither good nor bad", this is a dynamic and tumultuous category of the "kinda good and kinda bad and look it's complicated okay", and membership is inevitably temporary. There is no happy medium here, for a "just sort of okay" card is a 4 until I run out of harddrive space and then very abruptly becomes a 2 due to triage; cards which spend time at 3 are those who I have either provisionally placed on the chopping block, offering them the chance to prove that I love them before they are cut due to storage concerns, or simply new arrivals that I have yet to develop much of an opinion of and thus need to study thoroughly. In some cases, they may not actually be new, just long-overlooked, but while I often place myself at the randomizer's mercy I am also in the habit of eventually looking for reasons to check out things that I haven't gotten around to checking out much, so a card seldom stays long at this level if I'm conscious that I've been overlooking it.
Current potential faves of mine (more than any of the others, this list will outdate itself fast):

• Alexandra, "Smack Me" - Alexandra's "Sex Trip" was the very first trailer that I decided to spend money on and turn into a full show; hers were the first bosoms and the first slit which appeared in HD video on my screen. Inevitably, I tired of that first show, no matter how good it was, just because it was too familiar, so since then I've looked for other Alexandra shows from time to time. This is one where she wears a color other than black or white or red, something very few VirtuaGirls seem to do, and so it was an easy grab. Yet the huge gogo boots are distracting to me, and her dance moves in this show consist of little more than a metronome-like rocking of her body weight from one foot to the other. Thusly, while it offers a uniqueness that makes me loath to dispose of it, I also can't consider it a perennial favorite; the time may come when I'd rather bring back an older Alexandra show which I've tired of and deleted, or purchase a new one, willingly ***** either the contempt of familiary or an additional expense rather than being content with what I have.
• Trisha, "Black Pearl Bar" - One of the few "3s" which isn't on my favorites list at the moment, this one is defined by a much higher degree of both good and bad feeling than most other "3" cards. She's extremely hot, with a tight little body that she isn't afraid of using, but she also has several affectations which irritate me profoundly. Time will tell whether I can endure her quirks well enough to continue keeping her in my collection; ultimately, though, there are plenty of other girls, so her uniqueness is a slim advantage when it is not entirely positive in nature.

*** Potential Faves

(List continued from above due to technical issues I'm not up to the effort of figuring out.)

• Julya, "Secret Society" - Julya's "Black Label" is one of my perennials, and this is another black outfit distinguished mostly by a hat. I suspect I can live without it, so it's currently on "last chance watch".
• Zafira, "Dark City" - This card is so bombastically over-the-top awesome that I purchased tickets for the first time in three months so I could buy it for 2 credits on the spot. And it has proven disappointing. I'll give it lots of second chances to impress me and prove it was a good investment, but so far it hasn't thrilled me as much as one of her far older shows which I got for 1 credit and have been satisfied with for a very long time.
• Ennie, "Sex Instructor" - I've seen clips from this card at least a dozen times, probably twice that, yet I can't describe anything about them. This is a bad sign. If it doesn't make an impression soon I won't be able to justify continuing to devote hard drive space to it.

** Passables
There's nothing wrong with most of these cards; at worst, they were not for me or didn't fulfill the intended purpse for which I bought them. In most cases, they just didn't quite make the cut, and would be comfortably ensconced among the lower-ranked 4s if I had more hard disk space.
Some of my current (and, again, temporary) Passables:

• Maggie, "Domestic Help" - With all the interesting outfits Maggie sports, a French Maid outfit is just too pedestrian for me to bother with.
• Lucie T, "Bavarian Party" - A very interesting costume, but not really a sexy one, and it covers up far too much of this pretty girl, plus even when she strips down the associated skivvies aren't all that exciting. It was one of the first few dozen cards I enjoyed way back in the day, and one of the first few to fall below my standards for what was worth keeping.
• Katty, "Initiation Rites" - One of the worst cards that I don't outright *****, this is just a boring black and red outfit, which if it was called "Party Girl" I wouldn't ever have bothered to buy. But the name of the card made a seductive promise that she was going to roleplay being a vamp who lures men into the embrace of some satanic cult's dark and perverse pleasures - and the failure to live up to that suggestiveness is what made me dash this card wrathfully from my collection. It remains a 2 only because I have some hope that it may eventually redeem itself in my eyes; perhaps someday it just being a pretty costume will be good enough, when I have few enough others to enjoy instead.
• Jana H, "Matador" - This one is still in my collection for the moment, and it may end up clearing 3 status in time, but I am most definitely frowning on it for now. While Jana is extremely beautiful and sexy, she also behaves in a fashion that is not so much sensual as demonstrative, as if she is smacking you upside the head and saying "Hey stupid, I'm being sexy here, pay attention already". Her exagerrated, modern-dance-class-esque maneuvers distract my attention from the illusion of being attracted to the guy that a stripper tries to create; it reminds the viewer that this is just an act, turning it into something resembling a ballet, at which point the stripper's nudity and sexual displays become a puzzlingly mixed signal. The show is enjoyable, but jarring enough that I might want it out of the queue I watch when I want to be turned on. And with my limited disk space, if I was ever in the mood to deactivate the card so it wouldn't play all the time, I'd rather just delete it and download something more reliably sexy.
• Susan, "French Cabaret" - This one used to be one of my very favorites; the shiny sequined dress and her indulgent preening movements enticed me greatly. Yet eventually, I grew unable to stand how sour her facial expressions are in this show; it made her seem harsh and almost *****, so that even when she smiled I found myself wondering how uncomfortable the outfit. Relaxing and enjoying the show was impossible, so I stopped trying. Fond memories make me glad I own the show, but I'm not in much of a hurry to get it back.

* Pariahs
These are shows I regard as failures, ones where I regret spending a ticket on them. Once again, this is very subjective; others may love these shows for the very aspects I disliked. But if you're buying your shows Ala Carte rather than getting the cheaper subscription, it means you're a discriminating individual, accustomed to having the best, and even one card you don't enjoy owning is a serious failure.
These are some cards I would remove from my collection altogether if I could, so as not to be reminded that I ***** a ticket on them.

• Silver, "Beauty Queen" - I bought this card for no other reason than because it was #1 in seuqence. Apparently, first does not equal best. I enjoyed this one for about an hour and had then seen enough to last me a lifetime. I blame no-one; it was a first attempt, the makers stumbled a few times but later got it right. But I will not again buy a card for such a frivolous reason.
• Misa, "Street Style" - I thought she was sort of cute, and she was - emphasis on "sort of". If you're into the girl-next-door look, Misa's imperfections are probably endearing to you, but she is definitely not one of the great beauties of our time, just an average girl who made a few bucks taking her clothes off and then went on with her life. I also bought this card in part because I wanted a better look at the writing on her shirt, which to date I have still never managed to read. So I regard this now as a card I should never have deigned to notice, for it is insufficient to my needs and I would have been better off had I not failed to notice that.
• Davon Kim, "Dragon's Breath" - I used to regard this as one of my very favorites; the outfit is massively over-the-top exotic, and putting it on an Asian girl and giving the show a suggestively Fu Manchu-esque name made it seem like exactly my brand of epic. But eventually I noticed that Davon is just not that good-looking, her plastic surgery being obvious and not all that skillful from the looks of it, and what I thought was a pretty girl being accentuated by a great outfit turned out to be more of a disguise, even a deception, transmuting my fondness into disgust. I now look back on this as an utter mistake, and wish they'd bring the outfit back on some girl who, well, doesn't need it to look good.
• Liliane Tiger, "Scandal" - My problem is not with Liliane in this case, just with the card. Her makeup and hair in this show are just thoroughly botched and I can't really enjoy her finer qualities. I tried for a while; judicious use of the magnifier helped me focus my attention away from her rather *****-looking face (again, due to bad makeup). But this wasn't good for either my computer's RAM or my conscience, so I just had to let the card go and buy a better performance to represent her.
• Shabba, "Fitness Lesson" - Shabba is a talented dancer, I'm sure, but she seems to think she's a comedian who performs in the nude rather than a member of the adult industry. Her lighthearted, whimsical performance style thoroughly fails to turn me on, and I knew that when I purchased this card, which I guessed might be closer to my preferences than any other. I felt like with her and Susie Q, another Virtua Girl whose exotic dance is more dance than exotic, I should give them a chance and get a card that was at least close to sexy enough for me, just to vive la difference. But this gambit failed, and I now regret the expenditures. These girls are simply not for me, and I should have recognized that. Of the two, Susie is simply not my type sexually, while Shabba actively irritates me with her slapstick gestures and expressions, so I single the latter out as an outright error in judgment that I ever gave her a chance.

reading you from couch at home, very very interesting, please keep going ;)