VN Ren'Py A Shot in the Dark [Ch.4] [ViM Studios]

[fh321]

Played this for the first time, some thoughts:
(didn't want to leave an actual review as I skipped quite a lot of dialogue, and it feels unfair to give a bad rating when I chose not to read 1/3 - 1/2 the plot)

- The graphics/animations are stellar. Like, some of the best 3DCG i've seen in a Ren'py game. It's definitely got a 'wow' factor, visually. Very, very impressive. 10/10

- Characters: too many. I get it, I get it, porn games want variety, but if you're investing this much time into a game with this many choices, it's impossible to give a shit about this many characters. Not to mention, they are all hot/stacked. It's like a bunch of perfect women with almost identical bodies wearing different wigs. Zero variety. Where are the skinny women? The fat women? The old women? The MILF characters all look like they should be attending class alongside the MC, not professors/parents. 4/10

- The choices: I can't believe I'm saying this, given how I've never actually made this complaint, but christ there are so many choices that seem so pointless. If there were characters that I cared about, I would appreciate having so many options, but with 30 different women, and 7-8 choices per encounter with each of them, it spirals into a complete mess. The devs take great pains to (i think) try and make this 'replayable', what with all the 'save now!' messages, but... Look, in 4 chapters, there were several dozen branch-moments, which is just too intimidating to seriously consider giving a replay to find out what I missed. And since all the women look alike, and none of them have personalities that are notable, I don't even have any interest in a gallery section. 2/10

- Final thoughts: This game, with the quality of its visuals, could have been an extremely hot AVN. Or, with the mechanics and the attempt at story-telling, could have been a compelling mystery, like Ripples or Shale Hill Secrets. Unfortunately, it seems like the devs tried to do both and ended up failing altogether. Maybe someday I'll try again and actually try and sit through more of the dialogue when there is more content. I wouldn't judge anyone for liking this game, it's slick and feels professionally made. But it didn't engage my mind or my sex drive. Just.... bland and vanilla. 5/10, bog-standard porn.

 

[krypareslam]

I stumbled over this game today and I have to say that it is one of the best that I've seen thus far. Beautiful renders, relatively (within the AVN-universe) believeable characters and real tradeoffs. Go for one girl? You can't get another. Which makes the game more immersive. 4,5/5.

 

[Krytax123]

I like most part of this avn but the romance development and the mc could be way better imo. "Elly" is kinda the only one where it feels somewhat justified that shes falling for him? Maybe the shy sister too but never this fast ...

And while i really dislike boy'ish/shy/awkward mcs in general, somehow the mc in this avn still stands out on the unlikeable-scale. How is it even possible to lack this much confidence while all the girls adore you, the way he talked to his dad made me cringe like fuck, he has to be at least somewhat autistic or am i wrong?

Its like he combines the two avn-stereotypes of male mc being a shy and akward boy yet at the same time being an blackout brute alpha macho lmao, and i hate both of these tropes.

At this point i wouldnt even exclude that hes himself the one who captured the girl, hes such a awkward psycho, i cant stand him at all. And i dont mind mcs with trauma in general, i like Nika form SG for example who gets a lot of hate but its so hard to relate to the mc in this avn at all which makes the whole experience feel a bit nonsensical/disconnected.

 

[eki6859]

Somehow I couldn't find any real motivation for this game and towards the end all I could do was press ctrl. Just a lot of fucking text which made this a really tiring journey. Then there's fucking Paloma. Is she stupid or something when she can't understand the word NO. In the police car she asked me all kinds of shit probably 10 times and couldn't understand the word NO. Always another question and again NO INTEREST. So the bitch goes on and on and on. Fuck you bitch.

Sad... she is THE babe of this game. fucking Paloma

 

[fishbrain]

NGL the stopping point for the update actually made me say "oh come on!" out loud. Too many games lately have had cliffhanger endings to their updates which we won't get any resolution for for another 6 months lol.

By now you know it's coming though, that at least makes it a little easier. lol

What choices do I have to make so that the hostage doesn't get beaten up by the kidnapper?

Happens regardless I believe. The only thing you can change in that regard is who gets taken.

According to the PDF walkthrough, there are two achievements related to this. "Unharmed Damsel" where the hostage is kidnapped but unharmed. And "Beaten Damsel" where the hostage is taken and then beaten. It seems to depend on whether or not you kissed Natalie, either at the party or later on at her dorm room.

I just ran through a few different plays. The one thing I did that stopped the victim from getting beaten was not going to the party with Kevon but having Elly join me, then not abandoning her for Soph and Nat. A little too obvious who the kidnapper is at that point? Are we going to find the victim in the basement? That would justify the cliffhanger.

If you are getting this game for "incest" you will be sorely disappointed.

Not necessarily, true lovers of incest understand it takes time building anticipation to make the payoff more erotic and worthwhile. Her just jumping on his dick in the first update would be boring, plus Aunt Ashley is the hottest character in the game "that isn't ruined by femdom".

 

[Jack Townsend]

While the broken saves do annoy me, I am impressed with the visual upgrades. I don't mind starting over again. I just hope this won't become a habit.

 

[Jack Townsend]

Alexis is delicious sexual chocolate.

 

[fajiker145]

Needs more anal

 

[Jack Townsend]

I know this isn't a harem game. But I wonder if there are any throuple and/or quadrouple paths/endings.

 

[SonsOfLiberty]

Regardless, i would like to have a cheat mod if possible....

There is one that works for 98% of all Ren'Py games.

Universal Ren'Py Mod / URM [2.1.2] (mod any Ren'Py game yourself)

Is "WARNING!!! SAVES WILL BE BROKEN THIS UPDATE!" for Ch.4, or old news?

No, it's not old news, it says it directly on their Patreon, Steam and Itch.io page for Chapter 4.

The dev blog is posted here...

 

[Raynare69]

Anyone take any particular notice or care for what Mai decided to name her photo...
Hiding in Plain Sight

I'm not necessarily thinking it has anything to do with her, per se, but perhaps it's the author's hint at something...

What does everyone think. Have we already met the perpetrator? Is it us (MC, possible multiple personality disorder)? Someone we know?
Clearly whoever it is seems to have something against the twins, or not necessarily, maybe jealousy? The closer you get to one of the twins the other twin gets beat up more when kidnapped when you sleep with them.

My original thought was that it could be Ashley/Ellie, but I'm hoping it's not. I'm pretty much playing this game for Ashley so if it does somehow end up being her, then we'll... I guess it's the criminal life for me if they allow it

 

[TurhaanKoitatte]

yeah, better go to GH or WVM...wtf are you doing here in the first place?

There was nothing wrong with the material, as all the shit is avoidable, but boredom set in and that's where I stand on the ctrl button.

 

[Darkenning]

I just ran through a few different plays. The one thing I did that stopped the victim from getting beaten was not going to the party with Kevon but having Elly join me, then not abandoning her for Soph and Nat. A little too obvious who the kidnapper is at that point? Are we going to find the victim in the basement? That would justify the cliffhanger.

We are only at the halfway point of the story, so ending a major plot thread in the next chapter doesn't seem likely. I suspect that we will find signs that she was there but has since been moved somewhere else, but that Protagonist may not realize the implications as he's focused on discovering the truth of whatever happened there in the more distant past.

 

[TsubameYui]

Anyone take any particular notice or care for what Mai decided to name her photo...
Hiding in Plain Sight

I'm not necessarily thinking it has anything to do with her, per se, but perhaps it's the author's hint at something...

What does everyone think. Have we already met the perpetrator? Is it us (MC, possible multiple personality disorder)? Someone we know?
Clearly whoever it is seems to have something against the twins, or not necessarily, maybe jealousy? The closer you get to one of the twins the other twin gets beat up more when kidnapped when you sleep with them.

My original thought was that it could be Ashley/Ellie, but I'm hoping it's not. I'm pretty much playing this game for Ashley so if it does somehow end up being her, then we'll... I guess it's the criminal life for me if they allow it

My theory is that Elly has been in love with MC since they were kids. The repressed memories from the cabin were about Elly killing another girl that MC liked, out of jealousy. Elly kidnapped whichever twin MC showed more favor to, but only hurt them if MC made a move on them. Dad and Ashley covered up the original incident, and decided to keep the kids separated to avoid future problems. Ashley likely decided enough time had passed, and Elly had changed enough, to stop the separation. Unfortunately, Elly has clearly not changed at all, other than physically.

I don't think Ashley is involved at all, though I did find it odd that she seemed to go out of her way to avoid telling MC that Elly is Danielle. She had to have seen the PhotoGram shots of them together, and there is absolutely no reason she wouldn't have mentioned Danielle's name change to MC. So it is possible she was involved in Elly's efforts to deceive MC about her identity. There's a lot more evidence that Elly is the kidnapper, but I've typed up plenty already.

 

[vs2011xyz]

Nice game BUt where is WT mod last time i checked, we had a multi mod

 

[SonsOfLiberty]

Nice game BUt where is WT mod last time i checked, we had a multi mod

It is built into the "game", you have to activate it in the settings, and that's why the mod was abandoned.

 

[Raynare69]

My theory is that Elly has been in love with MC since they were kids. The repressed memories from the cabin were about Elly killing another girl that MC liked, out of jealousy. Elly kidnapped whichever twin MC showed more favor to, but only hurt them if MC made a move on them. Dad and Ashley covered up the original incident, and decided to keep the kids separated to avoid future problems. Ashley likely decided enough time had passed, and Elly had changed enough, to stop the separation. Unfortunately, Elly has clearly not changed at all, other than physically.

I don't think Ashley is involved at all, though I did find it odd that she seemed to go out of her way to avoid telling MC that Elly is Danielle. She had to have seen the PhotoGram shots of them together, and there is absolutely no reason she wouldn't have mentioned Danielle's name change to MC. So it is possible she was involved in Elly's efforts to deceive MC about her identity. There's a lot more evidence that Elly is the kidnapper, but I've typed up plenty already.

There's also the fact that Elly seems to lie out of her teeth, hid her stuffed bunny under the bed when you came in, ignored your text around a shady time saying she was busy (I think? If I remember correctly), and even if you reject her she still wants to have sex with the MC or tries to.

What you say sounds very plausible, but what I was thinking was slightly different. I was thinking it was more like animal cruelty (that may have later developed even further, towards cruelty to humans now, out of jealousy, etc.)

Either way she is definitely hiding in plain sight, if it is her. She says she hates "cheaters"... Perhaps MC made some kind of childhood promise to marry her and she's acting on that in revenge or something? Possible...

 

[UnoriginalUserName]

Texting Elly from the park bench, or anytime after that, warps you to the gym conversation with Kevon or whatever his name is where he tries to get the MC to use the fuck app for femdom shit, except the phone ends up blank and you're stuck there, so I'd recommend nobody bother with her until that gets fixed.

 

[hagare]

so, is this gonna be a pick your girl and stick to it game
or a hook up with everyone with no consequences kind of game?

 

[Raynare69]

so, is this gonna be a pick your girl and stick to it game
or a hook up with everyone with no consequences kind of game?

There might be some consequences later, but so far you can pretty much date around and go for everyone's routes.
I'm not sure if anyone has any official quotes answering this, but personally I would like there to be some consequences down the road.