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stardust_rifleIf you are involved in English-speaking fandom, you are probably aware of Omegaverse. If you've been involved in English-speaking fandom for a decent time, you’re probably aware of Sentinelverse/Dom-sub-verse. But, what if you were to learn that these are just the tip of a massive iceberg of “verses”?
Yeah, Japanese-speaking fandom has been very busy crafting a fuckton of new “verses”, and adding interesting developments to some of ENG fandom’s old hits of yesteryear, creating a state that has been referred to as the “Verse Warring States Era”.
But, are the majority of these verses any good, as defined by my very specific and rigorous “do they appeal to Me, Specifically, and don’t just give me “we have Omegaverse at home” vibes?” Would I actually want to read an original story which centers around this verse? Would I want to put fictional characters which I like in it? Would I nut to it?
That is what this recurring series intends to find out. I will be going verse-by-verse, using the Pixiv Encyclopedia’s list of Omegaverse derivatives and other verses, summarizing and reviewing them according to my arbitrary and biased whims. If you can read Japanese (and maybe even if you can’t, I have no idea how well this stuff Google Translates) and you’re interested in a verse, I recommend reading the linked page in full instead of relying on my summary.
Without further ado, on with the first of what will hopefully be many reviews!
Omegaverse:
oh dear god do i really need to explain omegaverse to you all uhh it’s become so mainstream that it has a motherfucking wikipedia page
Anyways. I’m not explaining Omegaverse to you. I like Omegaverse. I think pregnancy and boypussy and gender essentialism and sex-pollen-adjacent stuff is hot and I’m not going to bullshit you by pretending that my enjoyment of this verse is because of some deeper social justice reason. That would be cringe.
Anyways, the Pixiv Encyclopedia article is hella interesting, because it kind of weaves a class conflict in with the Omegaverse that I don’t think a lot of English-speaking works do? Alphas as high-class, Betas as middle-class, and Omegas as lower-class, with inter-Alpha marriage presented as possible and not as horribly scandalous, in a sort of analogy to marriage within the upper classes? Interesting. Kind of like to see a hardcore deconstructionist thing that runs with this analogy. Heat suppressants as transhumanist anti-capitalist praxis.
The Pixiv Encyclopedia additionally seems to claim that studding/neutering is not very common in JPN spaces (and given the English names I’m inclined to agree with them) but this is actually the first time I’ve heard of them. Very cool ideas. Additionally, it reiterates that after an Omega is mated, they no longer release pheromones, which… I’m not sure how I feel about, honestly. Evolutionarily, it could be beneficial, but I just don’t like it. More possibility for #angst if it’s the opposite.
(it also claims to the best of my very poor japanese knowledge that the inspiration for the omegaverse was a werewolf episode in supernatural??? gell-man amnesia effect moment i guess)
(also even the pixiv encyclopedia page mentions the “yeah the original wolf research that this was based off of is bullshit lol” talking points so can people trying to make fun of omegaverse PLEASE choose something else to mock. article also gets extra points for linking Alphas, Betas, Omegas, A Primer, my second favorite Omegaverse meta)
RANKING: Omegaverse/10
Cakeverse:
Cakeverse! According to the Pixiv Encyclopedia, this one originated from South Korea, and there are two additional “genders”. Forks, who are exactly like normal humans except they have no sense of taste, and Cakes, who are exactly like normal humans except that they taste sweet. Really sweet. Like “so good even Forks can taste them” sweet.
You know where this is going.
(It doesn’t inherently have to be cannibalism! Cakes’ tears and saliva taste good, but, like, you’ve all had the experience of going “oh, I’ll just eat a little bit”, and then the whole plate is empty. You know where this is going to end up.)
This one is so fun!! So fun!! I love cannibalism and doomed relationships and deep aggressive repression of one’s own desires and a verse that revolves around an entirely different constellation of fetishes than Omegaverse! The one point against it that I have is that the name is entirely too cutesy for the subject matter, but that in itself is kind of a charm point, isn’t it?
I also love the fun beat where it’s mentioned that most of the time when normal people hear about Forks it’s in the context of sensationalized “cannibalism lust murder” stuff, which just causes more hiding and repression and yayyyyy that means M gets to use the fun metaphors! Fun. Very fun verse. M likey.
RANKING: Cannibalism Doomed Yaoi Fuck Yes/10
Iceverse:
This one is more of a Cakeverse derivative, and it keeps the food theming. In this verse, the two “genders” are Ice, which are indistinguishable from normal humans with the exception of an abnormally low body temperature, and their interactions with the other “gender” of Juice. When an Ice becomes linked with (literal translation)/has sex with (what happened in the 1 (one) web-reprinted doujin I could find) a Juice (who typically do not know about their own nature), they literally melt. The catch is, of course, that Ice are naturally captivated by Juice romantically/sexually.
You know where this is going.
Has the same kind of doomed yaoi “oh fuck will I be able to be with my partner without literally killing them” energy as Cakeverse, but less sexy, I feel? Like, cannibalism is just objectively sexier and more guilt-inducing than you touching your boyfriend and then he melts, which is honestly just kind of funny to me? Like, it’s silly. There’s no way to make another human being melting like an ice cream cone tragic or hot, at least to me. Also, there being no way to tell if someone is a Juice just completely breaks my suspension of disbelief. You’d think that “there is a kind of person who can kill another kind of person through physical contact” would be a thing that people would be trying their damndest to get rid of, or find a test for, and whoop there goes my suspension of disbelief. Interesting, but flawed.
RANKING: One Doomed Yaoi Hold The Cannibalism/10
Gardenverse:
Do you like flower language? Do you like codependence? Are you really into Hanahaki? Then this is the verse for you! The two “genders” this time are the Flower-Bearers and the Flower-Eaters. The Flower-Bearers, as my loose translation of their name suggests, grow flowers from their skin, from the tips of their hair, and their tears turn to flowers when they cry. Producing these flowers is physically hard on their body, so they’re typically sickly and delicate and pretty, you’ve already got the mental image forming in your head. They need lots of nutrition, and the absolute best nutrition they can get is from the semen of the Flower-Eaters, who, as the name suggests, find the flowers of the Flower-Bearers to be the most delicious food, and especially if they become mates Boutonnière.
This one has a fun aesthetic, but there’s something about it that’s just kind of putting me off? I can’t describe it, I love the mutual codependence aspect of literally living off of the things your partner’s body produces, the obsessive yandere elements, and the fact that what kind of flowers grow depends on the Flower-Bearer themselves makes for some fun customization via playing around with Western flower language and hanakotoba to make a mix that suits the character. I have no idea why my brain isn’t going absolutely crazy for this. I do really like that the Pixiv Encyclopedia page gives Japanese names for the verse-specific terminology that’s derived from other languages, that makes my nitpick worldbuilding brain happy. All in all, mostly fine, but the amount of random terms and subnames for those terms and phenomena made my head spin.
RANKING: Would Have Gone Crazy For This When I Was Thirteen/10
Dom/sub-Verse:
An oldie, but a goodie. Here’s the Fanlore page if you need a refresher. The Pixiv Encyclopedia’s version of the verse makes it more Omegaverse-like, such as Doms and Subs being a rare portion of humanity as opposed to the majority (which for me, was what characterizes the AU, because you could just write normal BDSM), there being stuff like supressants, and it also seems to lean pretty heavily into eroticism of the caring and the pre-negotiation and the aftercare, which, like, I’m not that into as a concept. It’s just not that hot to me. “Video games about playing video games” energy. It is a bit funny to see the Pixiv Encyclopedia writing about basic BDSM etiquette like it’s another arcane set of verse-based terminology, though. Interacts very fun with all the biological imperative stuff. Humans have a biological imperative to use traffic-light based safe-words, apparently.
RANKING: Stop Trying To Tell Me That It’s Fun To Play Video Games About Playing Video Games/10
Callverse:
The child of Dom/sub-verse and Sentinelverse, apparently this one was created by a streamer and their followers collaboratively, which I think is neat. The three “genders” in this universe are Dears, Froms, and Tuners. Dearshave the mother of all audio processing disorders have loads of noise overpowering their ability to hear human voices. The only kind of person whose voices they can hear clearly are the Froms, whose orders are extremely compelling to them, thus leading to a dom-sub-esque setup. All three “genders” can also send their voices to anyone they’re aware of.
Lastly, are the Tuners, rare mutations of Dears and Froms, who retain their base “gender”, but gain new abilities as well. They can Tune, or strengthen the wavelength that a Dear and a From exist on, they can Detune, or fuck up the wavelength of a Dear and From, and thus their relationship, and Disconnect, or permanently separate a Dear and a From’s relationship.
Genuinely interesting! I love it when there’s a third “gender” thrown in there that isn’t just “Normal Person”, and the dual throuple/NTR possibilities are very interesting. Names are a bit dumb, but I’m not really going to critique that or any other cases of silly-sounding English use, because by and large the people who are making these aren’t English speakers and that would seem mean. This also has the potential for !Fun! metaphors, insane codependence, either mutually beneficial throuples or insane NTR stuff, just a lot of possibilities and a nice sandbox to play around in.
RANKING: !Fun!/10
DN-Verse:
Standing for “Day-Night-Verse”, this one has a whopping 7 “genders”, Days, Nights, NDNs (Non-Day-Nights, which I’ll be calling “Non-DNs just to avoid acronym overlap), Twilights, Dawns (the latter two are mutations of Days and Nights respectively), and Prime Twilights and Prime Dawns.
Days are both very good at guiding people and make people want to be guided by them. Nights are very good at protecting people and make people want to be protected by them. These effects are known as their Charm, and differ based on the person. Non-DNs are just normal people, who don’t give off any Charm or have any ability to resist Charm. When a Day is overwhelmed by the Charm of a stronger Night, the Day becomes a Twilight, which makes people want to protect them and makes Nights fall in love with them and Days find it difficult to fall for them. When a Night is overwhelmed by the Charm of a stronger Day, the Night becomes a Dawn, which makes people want to guide them and makes Days fall more in love with them and Nights find it more difficult to fall for them. Prime Twilights and Prime Dawns are just naturally born Twilights and Dawns with stronger effects who naturally attract both Days and Nights.
Marriages between Days and Nights are avoided, due to not wanting to risk the possibility of becoming a Dawn/Twilight. There’s like a bajjillion more Stuff but my brain is melting into pieces, and therein lies the problem- this verse is just too complicated for me! The interactions between all the different “genders” in this verse are just overwhelming, and there isn’t really an overarching “theme” or “fetish” like the other verses have. There’s just nothing to pull me in.
RANKING: M Has A Migraine/10
Dolceverse:
oh god this is another complicated one. I get the impression that this would be best explained via a shitty diagram, so…
graphic design is my passion
As you can see if you are a being with eyes, this is a wildly complicated verse and if you have any understanding of Japanese then I would really recommend that you go to the Pixiv Encyclopedia page and read it yourself because I’m still not sure that I adequately explained all of this well enough.
And therein lies the problem. This verse is extremely complicated, with five “genders”, each of which has a unique interaction with every other gender. This is the verse’s strength, as well as its undoing. It supports poly relationships really well, but it does this by creating a complicated Yaoi Food Web/Pokemon Type Matchup Chart. It has interesting predator/prey vibes, but the overcomplicated nature leads it to not focus as well on the predator/prey stuff as it could, honestly. Nevertheless, it’s interesting and I kind of want to play around with it… just as soon as I get my mind around how it works!
RANKING: Drowns And Dies In Its Own Complexity/10
Yeah, Japanese-speaking fandom has been very busy crafting a fuckton of new “verses”, and adding interesting developments to some of ENG fandom’s old hits of yesteryear, creating a state that has been referred to as the “Verse Warring States Era”.
But, are the majority of these verses any good, as defined by my very specific and rigorous “do they appeal to Me, Specifically, and don’t just give me “we have Omegaverse at home” vibes?” Would I actually want to read an original story which centers around this verse? Would I want to put fictional characters which I like in it? Would I nut to it?
That is what this recurring series intends to find out. I will be going verse-by-verse, using the Pixiv Encyclopedia’s list of Omegaverse derivatives and other verses, summarizing and reviewing them according to my arbitrary and biased whims. If you can read Japanese (and maybe even if you can’t, I have no idea how well this stuff Google Translates) and you’re interested in a verse, I recommend reading the linked page in full instead of relying on my summary.
Without further ado, on with the first of what will hopefully be many reviews!
Omegaverse:
oh dear god do i really need to explain omegaverse to you all uhh it’s become so mainstream that it has a motherfucking wikipedia page
Anyways. I’m not explaining Omegaverse to you. I like Omegaverse. I think pregnancy and boypussy and gender essentialism and sex-pollen-adjacent stuff is hot and I’m not going to bullshit you by pretending that my enjoyment of this verse is because of some deeper social justice reason. That would be cringe.
Anyways, the Pixiv Encyclopedia article is hella interesting, because it kind of weaves a class conflict in with the Omegaverse that I don’t think a lot of English-speaking works do? Alphas as high-class, Betas as middle-class, and Omegas as lower-class, with inter-Alpha marriage presented as possible and not as horribly scandalous, in a sort of analogy to marriage within the upper classes? Interesting. Kind of like to see a hardcore deconstructionist thing that runs with this analogy. Heat suppressants as transhumanist anti-capitalist praxis.
The Pixiv Encyclopedia additionally seems to claim that studding/neutering is not very common in JPN spaces (and given the English names I’m inclined to agree with them) but this is actually the first time I’ve heard of them. Very cool ideas. Additionally, it reiterates that after an Omega is mated, they no longer release pheromones, which… I’m not sure how I feel about, honestly. Evolutionarily, it could be beneficial, but I just don’t like it. More possibility for #angst if it’s the opposite.
(it also claims to the best of my very poor japanese knowledge that the inspiration for the omegaverse was a werewolf episode in supernatural??? gell-man amnesia effect moment i guess)
(also even the pixiv encyclopedia page mentions the “yeah the original wolf research that this was based off of is bullshit lol” talking points so can people trying to make fun of omegaverse PLEASE choose something else to mock. article also gets extra points for linking Alphas, Betas, Omegas, A Primer, my second favorite Omegaverse meta)
RANKING: Omegaverse/10
Cakeverse:
Cakeverse! According to the Pixiv Encyclopedia, this one originated from South Korea, and there are two additional “genders”. Forks, who are exactly like normal humans except they have no sense of taste, and Cakes, who are exactly like normal humans except that they taste sweet. Really sweet. Like “so good even Forks can taste them” sweet.
You know where this is going.
(It doesn’t inherently have to be cannibalism! Cakes’ tears and saliva taste good, but, like, you’ve all had the experience of going “oh, I’ll just eat a little bit”, and then the whole plate is empty. You know where this is going to end up.)
This one is so fun!! So fun!! I love cannibalism and doomed relationships and deep aggressive repression of one’s own desires and a verse that revolves around an entirely different constellation of fetishes than Omegaverse! The one point against it that I have is that the name is entirely too cutesy for the subject matter, but that in itself is kind of a charm point, isn’t it?
I also love the fun beat where it’s mentioned that most of the time when normal people hear about Forks it’s in the context of sensationalized “cannibalism lust murder” stuff, which just causes more hiding and repression and yayyyyy that means M gets to use the fun metaphors! Fun. Very fun verse. M likey.
RANKING: Cannibalism Doomed Yaoi Fuck Yes/10
Iceverse:
This one is more of a Cakeverse derivative, and it keeps the food theming. In this verse, the two “genders” are Ice, which are indistinguishable from normal humans with the exception of an abnormally low body temperature, and their interactions with the other “gender” of Juice. When an Ice becomes linked with (literal translation)/has sex with (what happened in the 1 (one) web-reprinted doujin I could find) a Juice (who typically do not know about their own nature), they literally melt. The catch is, of course, that Ice are naturally captivated by Juice romantically/sexually.
You know where this is going.
Has the same kind of doomed yaoi “oh fuck will I be able to be with my partner without literally killing them” energy as Cakeverse, but less sexy, I feel? Like, cannibalism is just objectively sexier and more guilt-inducing than you touching your boyfriend and then he melts, which is honestly just kind of funny to me? Like, it’s silly. There’s no way to make another human being melting like an ice cream cone tragic or hot, at least to me. Also, there being no way to tell if someone is a Juice just completely breaks my suspension of disbelief. You’d think that “there is a kind of person who can kill another kind of person through physical contact” would be a thing that people would be trying their damndest to get rid of, or find a test for, and whoop there goes my suspension of disbelief. Interesting, but flawed.
RANKING: One Doomed Yaoi Hold The Cannibalism/10
Gardenverse:
Do you like flower language? Do you like codependence? Are you really into Hanahaki? Then this is the verse for you! The two “genders” this time are the Flower-Bearers and the Flower-Eaters. The Flower-Bearers, as my loose translation of their name suggests, grow flowers from their skin, from the tips of their hair, and their tears turn to flowers when they cry. Producing these flowers is physically hard on their body, so they’re typically sickly and delicate and pretty, you’ve already got the mental image forming in your head. They need lots of nutrition, and the absolute best nutrition they can get is from the semen of the Flower-Eaters, who, as the name suggests, find the flowers of the Flower-Bearers to be the most delicious food, and especially if they become mates Boutonnière.
This one has a fun aesthetic, but there’s something about it that’s just kind of putting me off? I can’t describe it, I love the mutual codependence aspect of literally living off of the things your partner’s body produces, the obsessive yandere elements, and the fact that what kind of flowers grow depends on the Flower-Bearer themselves makes for some fun customization via playing around with Western flower language and hanakotoba to make a mix that suits the character. I have no idea why my brain isn’t going absolutely crazy for this. I do really like that the Pixiv Encyclopedia page gives Japanese names for the verse-specific terminology that’s derived from other languages, that makes my nitpick worldbuilding brain happy. All in all, mostly fine, but the amount of random terms and subnames for those terms and phenomena made my head spin.
RANKING: Would Have Gone Crazy For This When I Was Thirteen/10
Dom/sub-Verse:
An oldie, but a goodie. Here’s the Fanlore page if you need a refresher. The Pixiv Encyclopedia’s version of the verse makes it more Omegaverse-like, such as Doms and Subs being a rare portion of humanity as opposed to the majority (which for me, was what characterizes the AU, because you could just write normal BDSM), there being stuff like supressants, and it also seems to lean pretty heavily into eroticism of the caring and the pre-negotiation and the aftercare, which, like, I’m not that into as a concept. It’s just not that hot to me. “Video games about playing video games” energy. It is a bit funny to see the Pixiv Encyclopedia writing about basic BDSM etiquette like it’s another arcane set of verse-based terminology, though. Interacts very fun with all the biological imperative stuff. Humans have a biological imperative to use traffic-light based safe-words, apparently.
RANKING: Stop Trying To Tell Me That It’s Fun To Play Video Games About Playing Video Games/10
Callverse:
The child of Dom/sub-verse and Sentinelverse, apparently this one was created by a streamer and their followers collaboratively, which I think is neat. The three “genders” in this universe are Dears, Froms, and Tuners. Dears
Lastly, are the Tuners, rare mutations of Dears and Froms, who retain their base “gender”, but gain new abilities as well. They can Tune, or strengthen the wavelength that a Dear and a From exist on, they can Detune, or fuck up the wavelength of a Dear and From, and thus their relationship, and Disconnect, or permanently separate a Dear and a From’s relationship.
Genuinely interesting! I love it when there’s a third “gender” thrown in there that isn’t just “Normal Person”, and the dual throuple/NTR possibilities are very interesting. Names are a bit dumb, but I’m not really going to critique that or any other cases of silly-sounding English use, because by and large the people who are making these aren’t English speakers and that would seem mean. This also has the potential for !Fun! metaphors, insane codependence, either mutually beneficial throuples or insane NTR stuff, just a lot of possibilities and a nice sandbox to play around in.
RANKING: !Fun!/10
DN-Verse:
Standing for “Day-Night-Verse”, this one has a whopping 7 “genders”, Days, Nights, NDNs (Non-Day-Nights, which I’ll be calling “Non-DNs just to avoid acronym overlap), Twilights, Dawns (the latter two are mutations of Days and Nights respectively), and Prime Twilights and Prime Dawns.
Days are both very good at guiding people and make people want to be guided by them. Nights are very good at protecting people and make people want to be protected by them. These effects are known as their Charm, and differ based on the person. Non-DNs are just normal people, who don’t give off any Charm or have any ability to resist Charm. When a Day is overwhelmed by the Charm of a stronger Night, the Day becomes a Twilight, which makes people want to protect them and makes Nights fall in love with them and Days find it difficult to fall for them. When a Night is overwhelmed by the Charm of a stronger Day, the Night becomes a Dawn, which makes people want to guide them and makes Days fall more in love with them and Nights find it more difficult to fall for them. Prime Twilights and Prime Dawns are just naturally born Twilights and Dawns with stronger effects who naturally attract both Days and Nights.
Marriages between Days and Nights are avoided, due to not wanting to risk the possibility of becoming a Dawn/Twilight. There’s like a bajjillion more Stuff but my brain is melting into pieces, and therein lies the problem- this verse is just too complicated for me! The interactions between all the different “genders” in this verse are just overwhelming, and there isn’t really an overarching “theme” or “fetish” like the other verses have. There’s just nothing to pull me in.
RANKING: M Has A Migraine/10
Dolceverse:
oh god this is another complicated one. I get the impression that this would be best explained via a shitty diagram, so…
As you can see if you are a being with eyes, this is a wildly complicated verse and if you have any understanding of Japanese then I would really recommend that you go to the Pixiv Encyclopedia page and read it yourself because I’m still not sure that I adequately explained all of this well enough.
And therein lies the problem. This verse is extremely complicated, with five “genders”, each of which has a unique interaction with every other gender. This is the verse’s strength, as well as its undoing. It supports poly relationships really well, but it does this by creating a complicated Yaoi Food Web/Pokemon Type Matchup Chart. It has interesting predator/prey vibes, but the overcomplicated nature leads it to not focus as well on the predator/prey stuff as it could, honestly. Nevertheless, it’s interesting and I kind of want to play around with it… just as soon as I get my mind around how it works!
RANKING: Drowns And Dies In Its Own Complexity/10
I learnt about Cakeverse when it was made a canonical tag on ao3 last year
Date: 2026-01-09 11:25 pm (UTC)That last one is some kind of RPG battle system.
Re: I learnt about Cakeverse when it was made a canonical tag on ao3 last year
Date: 2026-01-09 11:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2026-01-10 04:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2026-01-11 04:14 am (UTC)