What do you get when you mix aliens, earth, brainwashing, hot girls, comedy and a panda? Well, you get My Girlfriend is The President that’s what! It was animated by Alcot and translated for all to enjoy by JAST USA.

The backstory is a bit weird, but here it is: Nippon (that’s Japan to you gaijin) has been destroyed in 20XX AD, but not due to war or a nuclear attack but rather an alien spaceship that has crashed into the country. As if that was not bad enough, you wake up and find that your next door neighbor, who is super cute, is now the President of Nippon - but wait, there's more!

The house next door, which belongs to your cute neighbor who is now the president, has been replaced by the Snow House, which is similar to the current house of the American president. You are now the Vice President and remember life not being so crazy; the night before, you were just a normal high school student. The player doesn’t know what's going on, and in classic "diabolus ex machina" form, it just so happens that the whole world has been brainwashed and you are the only one that remembers how the world was before. You are confronted by the loli alien Qoo who says you must not tell the super cute president the truth or it might cause more harm. Just to pile on issues, the Russian president has come to visit Nippon and has fallen in love with you. Of course, this is a very common presidential love triangle. You need to stay quiet while Qoo tries to fix her mistake and return everything to normal, but in the meantime you have girls competing for your affection. It’s hard to be a Vice President, especially with two hot girls fighting over you, right?

The game is mostly a comedy and makes jokes ranging from video games, anime, and visual novels to parodying the names of current presidents. For example, your neighbor the president is named Yukino Ohama, making reference to Obama, and the Russian president is Irina Vladimirovna Putina, a reference to Vladimir Putin. There is a reference to Bush as well; in a getaway scene where you and Yukino get on segways to escape from a crowd, she falls and you say “Ah, as I thought, a president is destined to fall off when they get on this.” The game references other popular culture too including Pokemon, Metal Gear Solid, Yu-Gi-Oh, Gurren Lagann and more. They even joke about eroge games by including characters that like playing them. The game just pokes fun at otaku culture in general.

My Girlfriend is the President consists of four episodes (aka chapters), each one with an intro and its own unique trailer. As with most visual novels, there are different endings to the story. I liked the fact that it was funny and I understood the joking references to anime, games and real life. I also liked that some scenes had panning shots and were not just still images. I have a feeling that this can be made into a quality anime such as AIR or Love Hina. It has the elements of a comedy along with your basic traditional love story with an all-important eroge essence. The only problem I found was that halfway through the game, the alignment of the text shifted to the point where the words were cut. It was still readable, but I did notice the error more and more as I went on.

If you like comedy, mixed with eroge, then this is right for you, but if you are a hardcore eroge fan, then the pacing might be a tad bit slow. Overall, the story is funny and has some ecchi elements. I wonder if the U.S. will allow the moe party into the next presidential election so that they can finally fix the economy. Imagine it: we could elect a cute girl to be president and sell tons of photos of her and make her sing as an idol to help stimulate revenue increases, and other things. I bet we would raise the spirits of many during these hard times. But for now, you will have to just go buy My Girlfriend is The President.