V0.2.3 is out for tiers 3 & 4 patrons on patreon. The public release will be Tuesday, March 5th
Content included:
Took me more than a week to actually got a chance to sit down and play, but managed to do v0.2.2 and v0.2.3. Time for the usual review.
V0.2.2
- There is something inherently amusing about making Ayumi suck the Dark Lord's cock while making Yuma watch, lol. The fact she is so into watching it that she doesn't realize she is being influenced is the icing on the cake. I honestly wouldn't be opposed to more corruption events like this, but I do think it is likely going to be rare.
- Ayumi is stll quite resistant at level 2. The Dark Lord gaslighting her and poisoning her mind with words of truth is quite effective, but at this level it's nothing but a crack in Ayumi's persona and beliefs. Which is good. I want to savor corrupting the princess, lol. Won't be fun if she is not resisting.
- I do have to say the prison game is getting a bit repetitive, though. Once you know what Ayumi responds well to, it is easy to tell which is the correct "choice" -- not saying picking the other options are bad, but there is a certain level of charm in actually having to put some effort into getting the reaction you want.
- Compared to level 1, now we can finally say Yuma is starting to fall to the Dark Lord's hands, haha. She is starting to think with mental gymnastics, making up reasons to justify what she is doing -- pleasuring the leader of an enemy faction, haha. This only serves to add onto the inevitable realization she will have later at the end.
- It's nice to have one of the Gillas workshop quests being to fight more rebels. More EXP to level Yukako and Rina is always appreciated. Other than that, having the story progression cutscene be tied to this quest is a bit surprising, you should do that more.
- Logistic and manpower issues. This is another showcase of your attention to logic, and it is good to see we are given options to decide. Personally, I simply have humans protect the conquered cities and forts. While the idea of using humans against other humans is an interesting psychological warfare, I think I would rather minimize the risks of mutiny and them switching sides. And hey, when I talk to the soldiers guarding the cities, they seem content and happy! Seems like the correct choice to me.
- 2 story cutscenes. I quite appreciate how Majorius doesn't have ambition to become king, he reluctantly accepts it because his subordinates want him too. And his decisiveness to deal with the actual (sorry excuse of a) king is good. He is definitely going to be a boss fight in the future.
And it is surprising to see so many gods, more males than females. Even more surprising that a bunch of them are also willing to take such a huge risk to defend the kingdom, preparing to manifest like that. It's a shame that would not change the outcome -- this is the physical realm, and their powers shouldn't be as effective. Seems Erina will be the Dark Lord's first proper victim, heh.
V0.2.3
- It is a bit of a surprise that Ayumi's level 3 corruption is locked behind main story. Admittedly, the advance itself is relatively straightforward; we have a way to pacify the local governor, why not use it? Also, seeing Ayumi vehemently put her down and talk smack to the city mayor is funny.
- To be honest, a cat girl is plenty tame though. Does that mean we won't have natural cat girls in the future? Truly a sad world we live in. At least Ayumi is getting comfortable with the idea of obeying the Dark Lord, which is both a good and a bad thing. It's always almost a shame when someone is close to being fully corrupted, heh.
- The quest of Fernsdin is the first time we can't quite figure out the plan of rebels in one go. Good. This is how rebellions should be; smart and stealthy. That makes eradicating them feel all the better.
- The second story cutscene -- the fall of the royal family of fools, and the descent of four Divines, and the current plan to take them down. I didn't expect Ayumi's corruption would be this vital to our advance, but on hindsight I should have. Next update should be the full corruption then, and the one after that the infiltration and climatic showdown with Majorius and the Divines.
Finally got around to playing version 0.2 and 0.2.1. Took about 3 hours to catch up from new game to corrupting Ayumi and doing the latest compliance quests. Alright, let's get to the reviews.
V0.2
- The new wake up sex mechanic is nice, but realistically you will use it only if you check the bedroom during gameplay. As it stands, going to the bedroom is entirely optional: in fact after starting a new game and corrupting Yukako and Rina again, I haven't felt the need to go to the bedroom at all due to all the quests, old and new. Perhaps a way to incentivize players to check the bedroom would be good; I will recommend an idea during the suggestions down below.
- I quite enjoy the extended intro. It establishes Romanos really is a sorry excuse of a hero and an entitled bastard whose ego makes him think things revolve around him. It is amazing he even gets this far in the quest to slay the Dark Lord, and his party truly are kind and patient girls to put up with him so long. Likewise, the random conversations whenever you go around the castle during the Misaki corruption stages is a nice touch; it adds to the feeling of realism, and building tension before it all explodes, heh.
- I actually didn't check all the animated sex scenes, but the ones I do remember make me want to point out: maybe it would be good to have blinking and not blinking versions, given players have preferences on whether girls stare intensely or bashfully blink when giving, for example, a blowjob.
V.0.2.1
- Finally, the Zereth Wall has fallen. I quite enjoy how many soldiers we have to slay in this invasion, though I must also say that you might want new types of mobs other than just "Guards" and "Captains", perhaps "Wizards" or "Paladins" since a proper military fortress would have magicians and healers too. Just to spice things up, make things both more immersive and a bit more difficult.
Related to that, it is also a good idea to add mob women (among magicians and healers), so we can see cases of the Dark Lord just not bothering with slow corruption and instantly break them, haha. He is the new Dark Lord; it should be shown to his army and his enemies alike that some victims are just beneath his dignity and effort.
Also, the kingdom's incompetence in its rulership definitely doesn't apply to general Majorius. He is a competent military man who knows what is the best means to slow down the advance of an army, and he did the best he could. It is almost a shame his actions to slow down military advance also helps the Dark Lord to gain compliance in the city he basically pillaged and damaged -- he never anticipated the new Dark Lord can engage in human negotiations and the traditional way of winning over the populace, hah. Would be fun to get this person as a future boss fight.
- FINALLY I can corrupt a princess, haha. It is almost a shame that like Yukako and Rina at the beginning of the game, Ayumi just gets blown away and knocked out rather than taken down like a damsel; it won't be too hard to make the Dark Lord or Misaki touch their forehead with a dark shine and make them drool and faint with a little magic, yes? It goes well with corruption too...
But the corruption process starts good; it is not hard to see where you are going with Ayumi's corruption. We are going to pray on her insecurities and her need of approval and her desire to be a good girl, heheh. Also, roping Yuma in for Ayumi's corruption is a possibility I did not consider -- seems like we might get interracial threesomes soon enough! That said, I must say Yukako's part in corrupting Ayumi is still somewhat minimal, despite Misaki making a note that she is more suitable to do so. Hopefully next levels show off why Yukako should be trusted to take the lead with this princess.
- The strip game is good. Adding a chance of failure to each game depending on the choice we pick is exactly the kind of interactivity we need to make each corruption more than just watching. Like my previous reviews, consider making these choices part of the actual corruption events too.
- The Divines! It is quite interesting to see that they seem to be good people thorough and through, given even the elf goddess turns out to be a responsible one willing to admit she might have used her ability to communicate with her followers frivolously. And yes, an archangel which shows signs of the previous Dark Lord's mark is exactly what we talked about before, so yet another thing to look forward to! Falling is always an option...
- Gotta say, the new city and its compliance quests finally feel like a proper RPG quest lol. You get sent here to get a material, then it turns out to get the material you need to do another task, chained to one another might be annoying for some, but I personally enjoy it. The quests themselves are interesting; securing food supply and metal to provide weapons to your army is how logistics would work in this medieval fantasy. I just can't help but laugh when another Orc Warlord gets to be a boss... And he doesn't even get a turn before my party kills him.
Good updates to catch up with, so time for suggestions. Just like the previous ones, these free ideas are yours to do as you see fit.
- I think it would be nice to add a new feature to the bedroom: Dark Lord's personal notes for major information and events. Such as the state of the kingdom he originally served, and more importantly Bogthos and Yuma lore conversations. It would be very helpful to have a place in game where we can review progression, events and lore, and putting them in the bedroom incentivizes the player to check other bedroom features.
- Since Zerethin Wall is among the locations where the Divines once manifested in full to assist humans, I think it isn't a bad idea to make the entire Wall be a location where the separation of the physical realm and spiritual realm is a bit "thinner" than the others.
This would make the Wall be a good location for the Dark Lord, Misaki and Yukako (the latter two especially as they had connection to the Divines) to start experimenting if it is possible to peek into the spiritual realm the same way the Divines peek into physical world. It doesn't have to show anything relevant for now; just the Dark Lord trying get a feel for that plane.
This series of quests can be a good foreshadowing for future content if you like. More importantly, peeking isn't like invasion; just like how nobody in the mortal realm can tell when the Divines are watching, so would the Divines can't tell when someone is watching their realm. After all, with the weakening of their influence, the balance between physical and spiritual should shift in the physical's favor.
That would be all. Tis was a nice series of updates, and I will faithfully wait for the next one.
Quite a few surprises in these two updates, and I am sure more to come. As usual, I will share free ideas as suggestions.
- Now that I think about it, Romanos is effectively useless when our opponents are Divines. Romanos did not surrender his free will to the Dark Lord, so any Divine can potentially restore him. This makes him a liability... if the purpose is combat, that is.
How about a quest to use him as a bait? If we dispatch him somewhere to do a task such as subjugation, with minimal forces so as to appear vulnerable but not too suspicious, a Divine might be tempted to send an angel or manifest in the hopes of reclaiming him, as he is a major asset against the Dark Lord.
Of course, Romanos has secretly been turning his current outpost into a much more simplified and scaled down version of the Dark Lord Castle, allowing the Dark Lord to transport to where Romanos is and ambush whichever angel or god who thought Romanos would be easy to reclaim. We get one more victim!
- Since I doubt the male Divines who descend would be corruptible, and killing them outright would be a waste, could they be used as sacrifices? As one of the masters of the physical realm and the holder of the concept corruption, the simple fact Divine blood is shed is a powerful idea of corruption.
If we sacrifice all three Divines (assuming we do beat them here in Zaratheon and they don't retreat back to their realms, anyway) then it might even be possible to create a pool of literal unholy force, which would be perfect to corrupt other powerful beings and for corruptive baptism. Yukako would get wet for those, heheh.
For now, that's all. The last two updates have been interesting to say the least, and it seems like that won't be changing anytime soon.
