VN - Ren'Py - Completed - A Petal Among Thorns [v6.0.2-RE] [Lockheart]

TLDR - Great game, love the look of Petal, short story w/ a slow burn, has a couple of issues that keeps it from being a 5 (I would have given 4 1/2 stars if I could.)

I really enjoyed this game. I liked the limited amount of characters and the secluded setting. It worked really well for this father/daughter romance. A slight twist, is that Petal is the one that pursues and "corrupts" the father.

The MC is the father and returns after a one year, failed attempt, at being a comedian. He rents a cabin from his brother-in-law to reunite with his daughter, Petal. It is a mostly isolated location and the two get to spend a lot of quality time together.

The Petal character is beautiful and the dev has stated she is unintentionally stylized (slight anime style eyes), but I really like it and I think it works well. The character is extremely self conscious of her body which I find a bit unbelievable. She is the one pushing the MC to develop a more intimate relationship, which is a change from most other VNs.

There is, of course, lots of teasing and slow progression towards being more and more intimate. There is some puppy play by the daughter, which is odd to me. But I believe it's only done twice and I can live with it. There is also some light BDSM, which normally I would not have an issue with, but the timing was very wrong. All the fetishes included were light and I believe most people would be okay with them.

That being said, the BDSM involvement (blind fold and handcuffs) came in during the scene when they finally have sex together for the first time. This is the scene that I have the biggest issue. I really feel that this scene should have included more gentleness, romance, and tenderness between the two of them.

The next scene is them leaving in the morning and they have sex again and it's as if they've been doing it for a long time. Wham-bam-thank you ma'am, style. No tenderness, no foreplay leading up to it.

It's a short-ish game and I really liked the buildup and characters. The ending could have been better, but overall, it's a really good game and I am looking forward to the next one.

One final note, I have not done a replay of this game as I moved on to the sequel, but I am not sure if there are any meaningful choices in it. I did try a few different choices as I played, but it only seemed to affect dialogues and no serious consequences.

really good game, one thing that i liked is the MC showing interest in more girls while spending time with only one, that made me concerned about the game beeing rushed but the "open" end with the announcement of the sequel was a perfect match to the nice story

One of the best games I've ever played. Just such a fine story. Petal is amazing. Deserves so much praise. It's sexy, fun, erotic, great slow burn. My only complaint is there are some really dragged out parts, particularly the brother-in-law stuff.

This game is a work of art in my opinion.
I came here expecting to play something to quickly gap a keep going but I decided to give the story an opportunity and I don't regret it.
Is very impressive the level of the script and plot which made laugh sometimes and made the H-scenes more hot. The main female character Petal is gorgeous in every way, sometimes I felt such envy to not literally being inside the game because if some day I get a girlfriend I want someone like her.
In conclusion I enjoyed this game a lot and hopefully others players will and I recommend to read to enjoy more everything.

It's like the dev played Dating my Daughter and said "no, let's change this".

In a lot of incest games here you have a Father corrupting his daughter. Even if you choose to play the love route, normally you are still manipulating your daughter slowly to reach a point where she falls for you, or you start doing things for "practice". These characters are normally cute, innocent, and easily manipulated.

This one is not the case. Here you get to know Petal, her personality, and how this cute and innocent yet horny girl is trying to corrupt you instead.

On the bad things (kinda)
-Since this is more story focused you don't have different endings. You do have some options that can get you longer scenes but nothing really important.
-Would have loved more dynamic animations.
-More expressions could've been nice but it's not bad.

I really want to play the next game finished and see if it still makes me feel like it's more real than other games

I finished the game twice using the two options the game provided, so I can say it's kind of a one way novel with some changes in dialogues so there's no bad ending or good ending thank god I know I'm on the right path xD no need for a walkthrough lol.

The story: I loved and adored how well-written the story is of the game, It's a beautiful wholesome game. The story focused on the MC and Petal entirely and believe me that's a good thing in this game. I liked the humor and how the MC struggles and fights within himself between admitting his feelings with the guilt of it not being right and giving up and letting go of Petal which SHE doesn't allow, I LOVED Petal so much to the point I got attached to the character. She IS so goddamn good and lovely. Good story and I really recommend it (totally vanilla and I like it).

The Graphics: 9/10 for me, The female characters are so sexy and well-designed, and the renders are good too. The scenes were nice too, sadly short but still HOT. Nicely done!

And last but not least Can't wait for the complete version of the sequel "A Moment of Bliss". And I would like to thank the author and everyone involved in this masterpiece,
KEEP IT UP!

A wonderful game when you're looking for daddy-daughter incest. The characters are very likeable, and the situations are believable in a lewd game sorta way.
Most important, the daughter is very attractive and the lewd stuff is hot. Luckily she doesn't have those freakishly big eyes the dev likes to use in his games (still bigger than normal though).
The game is completed and has a sequel in the works so that's another huge plus in my book.

More games on this site need to be like this. A super slow burn build up with only one love interest. Petal's innocent yet horny nature as well as the MC's guilt facilitates a very spicy build up that manages to hold it's cards till the very end while being exciting all the way.

This VN is a testament to the fact that you don't need constant sex scenes and nudity so you don't "blue ball" players. Great characterization and teasing goes a long way.

An inocent game if we can call it so.

The history of love that develops between the two of them is so sweet. Unfortunetly given the fact that the game is quite short few
steps are missing and the sexual tension between the two of them is rushed.

Good graphics, the same mechanics as in other games, so nothing to mention there.

A Petal Among Thorns has many things going for it but also several things that, depending on personal taste and preference, may seriously detract from the overall experience.

The game is your typical father / daughter story. You can customize the relationship status before the game starts, but it's blatantly obvious that this was meant to be a father / daughter story, however you can make Petal your roommate or whatever you like.
The daughter has secretly harbored feelings and desires for her father for several years (this is the reason given for why Petal is so forward with her advances towards her father). The father has been absent from his estranged wife and family for a year because he went on a stand-up comedy tour that never really amounted to all that much though.
But the father has returned now and he goes on a weeklong vacation with his daughter Petal to reconnect with her. They have rented a cabin and this is the setting throughout the (short) game.

And of course father and daughter get closer, they tease each other, the teasing results in some awkward puppy roleplay, then things get steamier and the game more or less follows the apparently mandatory progression route for sexual relationships in VNs... the progression and the plot are entirely predictable and it ends exactly how you think it will.

This is mostly a sweet / wholesome romance, but not everything was to my liking. I did not like at all the puppy dog roleplay, I also found it a bit silly that Petal is so self-conscious about her body that she won't undress or reveal her body (she covers all the important bits with her arms and hands when undressed for a very long time) after doing several quite naughty things with her father. And when Petal finally shows her body it's of course your typical 10/10 goddess body that no one would ever feel self-conscious about.

Teasing is often a good thing but I feel the teasing eventually outstays its welcome here or becomes a bit silly and unrealistic.

I am also not a fan of the blindfold Petal wears for various scenes (nothing you can do about it) and I am especially not a fan at all of the unavoidable handcuffs she wears when things reach their culmination towards the end. They do get eventually removed in the final scene, as well as the blindfold, but with this being Petal's very first time it just feels odd and very wrong to include it at all. This ruined the mood for me in the final scene. Make these things optional!!!

And while I know that this is all a fantasy and inherently unrealistic I think it stretched things too far when Petal eventually reveals to her father that she'd love her sister to also get close to him, since two daughters are better than one... right? (her words)
There is also an unskippable scene with the father masturbating to a lewd photo of the other daughter Bliss while Petal encourages him.
I suppose this is meant to set things up for the sequel (which I have not played and probably will not play based on the reviews I have read) but it had no place here.
This should have had a focus on the daughter / father dynamic without hinting at Petal being yet another (bi-curious) sharing fanatic that far too many VNs feature. Completely unneeded in this context and this type of story.

Also, a game that is all about the teasing needs a killer scene at the end. But the scenes at the end were just... very disappointing.
There is no foreplay , no tenderness, not even kissing. Just in and out and bam, that's it. And then the next morning it's the same, in and out on the breakfast table in two positions, but without foreplay, tenderness or anything that would enrich the scene. That felt entirely anticlimactic after all the build-up and made the entire journey to this point less worthwhile for me.

Of course creating animations is very time consuming, but I think a few static renders could have been added to the final act between father and daughter to make it look and feel special.

On a technical level A Petal Among Thorns is one of the better DAZ experiences. While Petal looks stylized (she has anime eyes and generally looks a bit like Alita from the Battle Angel movie) she's cute and pretty. The MC is yet another invisible protagonist who never shows his face. I feel this decision was a major mistake, since it extremely limits camera angles and what kinds of interactions the game can show between the MC and the daughter.
This needed a fully visible MC and generally more interactions between the MC and Petal, but those usually require that the MC is fully visible with his head. Since he's not you won't get several things here that you would otherwise expect. Oral sex is very one sided in this VN, for example, it's only Petal doing things with her father. That was very odd.

All in all A Petal Among Thorns is ok, it's your typical rushed father/daughter fantasy with lots of teasing that uses the typical progression system in these kind of games, which makes everything very predictable. There are foot massages, there is a changing room scene, there is yoga (always yoga...), handjobs, blowjobs, some rubbing, teasing with the tip etc etc and then more of that until at the very end both Petal and the MC are sure they want to do "it".

It's a bit unfortunate that all the teasing never results in a really satisfying ending scene (too short, not elaborate enough) and a game like this with only one or two actual sex scenes needs that, in my opinion.

And again, for a mostly wholesome romance the handcuffs and blindfold both felt wrong, as well as Petal telling her father to also go after the other daughter so they both can pleasure him. I didn't like that at all it felt extremely silly.

A Petal Among Thorns at least looks pretty, Petal is cute and sexy, but for a story focused VN the plot and overall progression through the romance is just paint by numbers. And the lackluster final is just thoroughly disappointing. It would have been better maybe not to have any animations before that and to invest all the resources in one proper and long(er) scene at the end that pulls all the stops instead of being so boring and very short.

Also, don't expect too many meaningful choices, this is a linear story, which is ok, I have no problems with that. But certain (very mild) kinks should still be optional altogether.

I had hoped for more, for a more original romance that doesn't follow the overused progression route, for a daughter that has not been secretly lusting after her father for years and who - even before she ever has sex - encourages her father to go after the other daughter so he can have them both at the same time. That's just plain bizarre.
Petal should have been more innocent for the story to work. And the very mild BDSM felt entirely out of place here. Include it for those who want it, make it avoidable for everyone else. But in my opinion these things were entirely unneeded and wrong to include in the first place. Your mileage may vary of course. But I can't see how BDSM fans will find the extremely mild scenes with Petal even remotely interesting.

Rating as of Final version.

I may be too much nitpicky and this game is indeed worthy of a 5*. This game is made nearly to perfection and Petal is gorgeous, so I will focus as to why I didn't give it a 5* rather than praising it for its virtues, as this game is probably one of the best on its sub-genres out there.

I think the chapter 1 bothered me too much to let it pass. I don't think the dynamic and build-up specifically on ch1 really worked for me. I don't think there the sexual tension, or rather, the start of it all was convincing to me. To me, at the start, the relationship buildup and pacing didn't really work out.

As a game that tries to portray a man that tries to hold his ground at the start of this relationship and tries to hold his urges as best as he can and is constantly pushed to his limits by the counterpart, having him show sexual attraction to her way before she does and way before any sexual tension is built really made the entire ch1 pointless and weakened a lot of his restrained thoughts later in the chapter.
To me, even if he had these thoughts before all those interactions, all that buildup, the wiser decision would be to not make it explicit until after the tension is resolved way later in the story.

Again, this seems to be really nitpicky by me, but as I see it, if it were not for how freaking hot Petal is and how well written everything else was, I would've dropped it way before I could enjoy the entirety of the story.

I want to see developers like Lockheart, who's actually concerned about creating a well written story, thrive. And that's why I try to point out the weakest parts of a great game in hopes the dev sees it (which there's a lot of them that actually read the reviews) and take those advices to heart and then ponder whether they are useful or not.

This little game is an example for other games of how the relationship develops gradually, without being too stretched. The small drawback is that the animation is a bit refined. The graphics are good, the participants are very good, the story is excellent, the animation is above average.

My favourite VN on this website in the past few years. I really loved the writing and all the build-up. This within a nice story length, it didn't feel too long, nor too short. If anything it did make me want more, but that's solved now with it's sequal. Nice renders and atmosphere as well.

A solid game. The model is excellent and the game is well written. It's definitely a slow burn, which I enjoy, but things escalated a little too quickly for me. It took a nice long time to get to "we shouldn't..." and then snowballed very quickly into "cool, let's do everything." The reason I knocked off a star is that I found the side story to be so dull that I sped through every single scene that wasn't just Petal and the MC in the cabin.

This was the first AVN I ever played and so far it still holds up as the best.
I prefer incest games so I am a little biased in favor of them, but the story alone is amazing. I prefer games where you actually become invested in the characters and in order to do that they need to gave relatively well developed and believable backstories and Lockheart does just that.

Other than the great story, this game has high quality visuals, with realistic yet sexy clothing (not the over the top laughably promiscuous outfits you sometimes see in other AVNs) which helps keep the fantasy feeling more believable.

The pacing might be a bit slow for some, but you spend the first day or two learning more about your daughter and flirting, but the payoff is SO with it. I really got attached to Petal.

O and I LOVE how you can pick exactly what your relationship is to each other AND most excitingly you get to choose what nicknames you have for each other while in private.

Another example of why F95 is great. I wouldn't have picked up this game if I hadn't read the reviews. And now it's shot up into one of my top ten faves - sweet and steamy at the same time, and the somewhat stylized characters (Petal and family) are hot as f...lowers. Great stuff - moving on to the next in 3..2..1..

Well I can wholeheartedly say that's one of the best little renpy games i've played. Just the right amount of realism to lewd shit, great GREAT writing character and story wise, got me emotional at parts and had me really not wanting it to end.

I'd give it a 9/10 and that purely just cos i wish it lasted longer. The degenerate writing of lewd scenes, the character writing for the main characters, god man.

Really enjoyed playing. There is very little in terms of choices (it's more 'do you want to see a scene' rather than 'chose your path') but the story is rather good. There are few minor issues I had a problem with (MC's reaction to Chuck's job offer, a lot of internal monologue, and the annoyinng 'people talking their ass off during sex' that just doesn't happen in real life) but I was rather positively pleased with it.

I hope the sequel will come soon.

By the way, the story in this game does end the moment MC reaches for the doorknob on the way home.

Wonderful character work from Lockheart on Petal. She's quite the stunner! PAT has a great story with a really nice pace that builds to a great finale. There's really nothing to complain about with this title! Definitely looking forward to the sequels.

I am pretty mad I typed out a review and then accidentally clicked outside of it and lost everything I typed

So ill just abbreviate the main thing I wanted to say
lines are pretty fairly amusing and cute and at few moments kinda meta in a roundabout way
love the very uninspired appearance of Good Guy Greg meme uncle Chuck having not seen anyone make an appearance like that in any game