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A Housewife’s Healing Touch - NTR Route Review
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Preface/Intro
I think the best place to start would be to address the format of this latest offering from Alicesoft. This game is clearly in the vein of their popular wife NTR series which I shouldn't have to mention and it's related titles, but it's actually available as two seperate downloads for each route. Prior to this title, it was possible in at least one other similar game to avoid NTR altogether by making a single choice at the very beginning. None of this is really going to stop anybody frothing at the mouth though and there is some speculation that this was done to somehow increase profit. In any case, nobody should make the mistake of thinking an NTR route was spontaneous decision. This is more or less a spinoff "wife eater" game, but there's some important differences that should be noted.
Art, CG and Sound (kinda)
On it's own merit, this is a beautifully illustrated game. However, it's very difficult not to see it in terms of Alicesoft's work as a whole. Fuurin (the director) is the fucking man, but Homare's (the artist) work is a fundamentally different style to the last game of this type. It's slightly more realistic in linework and proportion, though it's set in a fantasy world. I'm not artist, but I can see less shine and less volume than say, Kuroda Akimi's work. Ass and titties don't pop the same way, it's a more mature, less saturated style. That's not to say the main heroine isn't stacked as hell and she sure looks great, but your mileage (in taste) may vary. I've seen some discussion of the CG's as boring with less variation than prior works, but again, viewed on it's own; it's pretty good (more on that later). Perfectly jerkable. Just don't expect anything much crazier than obscured penis in vagina (for the most part). The VA is top notch but as for commenting on sound effects you could probably slap two herrings together and I wouldn't know the difference.
Story, "Gameplay" and Dialogue
The thing I'm really here wanting to discuss is the "gameplay system" and associated UI - that is with how this combines with the story. Alicesoft cheaped out on the main screen and has stripped away much of the scheduling complexity you may expect. There's no real RPG elements in this route: you spend time with Rui when you can, or you don't. You get a few choices when you do but it's mostly linear. Since you picked the NTR route, you're here to see defilement and since you picked Alicesoft, you're here to see impregnation. The cut-in's, bars and competing rivals are all here, but there's some wackass mana bullshit being used to orchestrate the plot. There's a twist I won't spoil but the games narrative is ultimately kind of at odds with the heart-breaking, baby-making race you might've come to expect. I'm still not really sure what compelled this choice but I suspect Fuurin said he wanted to make a wife-fucking NTR game again and a group of Alicesoft employees sliced his Achilles tendons. If this wasn't off-putting enough, Rui gets fucked by plenty of guys but gets most of her scenes with 1 or 2 guys. There's two pregnancy meters (usually representing the accumulated spunkshot deposited by two rivals), but in some cases random cumshots add to one meter together. Long story short, this game lacks some of the relationship development between characters that you might like in your emotionally masochistic fap material. There are relationships being subverted, there's certainly induced emotions via cock/bullshit and realistic reproductive biology sure gets slung out the nearest goddamn window but we're missing something. The lack of dialogue (in quantity as well as quality) and relative shortage of scenes saps the impact that could and should have existed. There's no time to flesh out the world or it's inhabitants, so the betrayal feels less powerful - impact lost somewhere in the budget and murk of an overstretched idea. The skeleton of a good title is here; but I never saw a scene that really captured the physical and emotional turning of Rui as these dudes pump a bun in her oven. In essence, the game begins to feel more like some other kind of Nukige, which leads me to my next point...
Addendum: Rui is down to do sexual shit with dudes from the beginning because magic; which isn't a horrible way to get people to suspend their disbelief on her fall but it is lazy. There has to be some give and take when writing a story about a married woman eventually coming to accept bearing another man's offspring. This issue in writing good NTR has a simple solution: take your time and establish the facts. If you don't have time to write something believable in it's own world and compelling in the sense it compels people to cum reading it, don't set it in a fantastical world - set it in a real one.
Direction and Intent
I'm trying to talk about the game objectively but also struggling not to directly compare it to another VN and the formula followed by that VN and others like it. In light of this, I'd like to bring up once again what I mentioned in the beginnning: the game is available as two downloads, for two routes (combined if you so please). I haven't made a direct count of the cgs/events and compared them when combined to any other VN, but what I can tell you is that by playing through and as I touched on before, it feels a little light. I can't shake the feeling there's less than two halves of game here, maybe more like two thirds or two quarters. I can't pretend to know what's going on behind the scenes but if this is a sign of the future then the NTRbros should temper their expectations. The setting is generic but such a bizzare choice - why would they go for this at all?
Summary, or How I Kind of Contradict Myself Because Shiiiet, It's Still Pretty Alicesoft NTR
So it's not a big game and it's not got the highs of some others. It still looks good and there's very little gameplay schenanigans to get in the way of the porn. It won't tickle your brain or anything but it's still got some of the best production values of any NTR game/VN in, well, probably ever. It's out of the question to recommend to anyone who doesn't like NTR and impregnation, but if you're reading this then you probably already know you're going to try it. This isn't an exciting new direction or expansion for Alicesoft, but it's certainly positive that this was in English on release (now if we could only uncensor the art...).
If you wanted the intensity of an NTR type B race to the egg with clashing rivals, a smoking-hot wife heroine and smutty, feverishy narrated breeding scenes - you will get *most* of what you want. To get the full experience - ask around for the right translating tools and dive deeper.
Game gets an objective 4 stars. Depending on how much of a degenerate you are, it could stand to lose half a star because you've been spoiled so bad before.
