VN - Ren'Py - Completed - Acting Lessons [v1.0.2] [DrPinkCake]

This is difficult. The game starts exceptional. It plays as a title that cares enough to make enjoyable characters and take them seriously. I had it sure in for the best game I had played from a western developer. Strong characters and good graphics. The writing is not perfect, but it is clearly a step above the usual. The sexy bits are... adequate, good enough for a wank, but nothing special. The writing was what makes or breaks the game.

Then the game decides that it has to follow the path of other amateur work and go dark and go dark fast. It becomes a soap opera, then a pretentious drama before becoming a horror movie and finally ending as a fairy tale in most endings. If you told me the game was written by two different people I would believe you.

That's the dilemma. It's bloody brilliant at first. The end is so rubbish that it makes the grand beginning unplayable in retrospect. If a game started badly and ended well I would give it 5 stars if the latter part made up for the bad start. This is the opposite.

Played it from start to finish, and while there were some elements and possibilities in the game that weren't exactly my cup of tea, it was superb. I have played it before when all the updates have come in, but only by playing the whole thing through gave it due credit.

Great game , I enjoy it a lot:

Graphics 4/5: great overall: Nice models, nice rendering. Good animations,
enjoyable sex scenes, different type of girls.

Script 5/5 (best, I praise this part) Original history, drama and NICE characters.
This VN can make you feel funny , sad, furious, intrigued. Dont you like dramas? well a VN is more than sex, its a history. I don tcomplain and I praise the DrpinkCake effort to make a history outside easy fucks.

Good dialogs and entertaining situations

Overall: 9 . Great game.

Please excuse my english, it is not my native language.

A genuine triumph. Not a simple sex focused visual novel and will leave you feeling all kinds of emotions but well worth the time and effort. The cast of characters are among the most likable and well developed in the genre and getting your choice of 3 'main' routes provides ample replayability.

Honestly, this game has been amazing. Having the time in between updates REALLY made some of the story rough on the feels... I am actually really satisfied that the DrPinkCake stuck it out despite all the negative criticism and ended the story in such a thoughtful way. Sure part of tying everything together ended up being convenient, I can honestly look past it. Absolutely looking forward to his future work. Artwork is stellar, animation is good, and story is top-notch.

The story is great and doesn't actually fizzle out. The two main femal characters are interesting and easy to empathize with. The MC is also an everyman's man. Which again makes it easy to connect with his character. The actual story itself has a plot, which progresses, climaxes (lol), and resolves. Which is fulfilling.
Animations are good. And kudos to the dev for making a black character that isn't meant to draw on racial stereotypes or cultural taboos.

Oh yeah and there's sex.

5/5

The story is nice, but nothing special. The renders are nice, I also like the numerous options to choose in situations. The reason I give five star is the dynamic between MC and his best friend. It feels so real, so natural, I almost wait for the duo on the scene, better than any sex scene

Massive Spoilers Alert!!

After playing this story, I felt like there must be some other different endings! Like, what if I never fucked a girl? It turns out there are 22 possible endings. Now I regret fucking every girl... This game is freakingly awesome for readers but for a porn game it's really sad because of ending! I understand why many people are giving 1 star. But, this game massively touched my heart so 5/5 from me...

I'm giving it 5 stars, but I want to give it 4.5. the rating won't let me. That being said, I love this game. Rena and Melissa in particular are hawwwwwwt as hell! The story is well-scripted. Honestly, I didn't see the "crazy" ending before the ending ending. (how's that for avoiding spoilers? LOL) Fact is there was one threesome ending I WISH was in it but is not. That is my only knock on the game, if you can call it a knock. You can't please all of the people, so just remember I'm one dude.... and I gave you 5 stars... LOL! You've done amazing freaking work here! Hope to see more from these characters in the future maybe... maybe in "life lessons: Acting Lessons Part deux"? (kidding) You're an amazing storyteller.... We can talk artwork all day, but this story is the best scripted of any of them I've yet played. (The Liam story about the rug still kills me).

This game is a rough draft of something that could be amazing. It starts out great and goes downhill after a few episodes.

It's worth checking out for the good parts, but overall it's poor as an adult game, which is what I think it wants to be reviewed as. As a porn game, it's a bit low on scenes and variety but ok. If you're looking for a game where crazy stuff happens, then it's excellent.

Good art and dialogue, creative ideas (for example, the acting scenes), some great characters ... brought down by too many over-the-top dramatic twists. There is a genre shift, but the bigger problem is that most of the premise only makes sense as a porn game (ie, ignore things that don't make sense), but later on the game wants to be taken seriously as an adult game, despite having a foundation with too many holes in it.

Anyway, play it until it jumps the shark. If that doesn't happen for you, enjoy! If it does, unfortunately it's not going to get better.

Absolutely awesome VN. looking forward to more of your work in the future.
Great story & funny at the same time. Now I've just to find time to do this 21 more times to see ALL the endings.
I hope Retrieving the Past will have more links to this.

Great 5 episodes but then the dev ruins it and tries to force a different genre upon unexpecting players. Dropped it episode 6, not going to touch neither this nor devs other games ever again.

He could even make everyone happy with a very minimal update but I guess his "vision" is more important that half of the playerbase.

It's not just a porn game. Got very emotional further into the game. A good Story in my Eyes, and a nice game if you are not trying to masturbate.
the first half of the game is more Porny than the other half.
You shouldn't play it tho, if ya tryin to bust a nut.

So here we are at the end of a something extraordinary. But its still a game right? nope Its something more, one emotional ride, hell of the rollercoaster and from what i'm seeing not for everyone, and i can understand it becouse not everyone likes to make hard choices at the place where they go to have fun. The thing about choices though is that every one of them small or big are never easy, can be very emotional even vonderful but sometimes devastating. Every choise though is what life is all about and writer of this piece understood it. He used that knowledge and executed it almost flawlessly, sure renders are beautiful, some of the characters are rl interesting but the whole project needs to invest u emotionally and thats what Acting Lessons is all about. Thank you

This is one of the best games. Yeah it is cheap forced drama, but good one.

The characters are all great and likable or the ones you have to hate are perfect for that. Liam is DA MAN and the girls are awesome!

The renders are really good and the writing is spot on with not to long texts to annoy you. The story is interesting and your decisions do make a difference.

But be warned, you will need more tissues than just for you little friend ...

4,5/5

This game is more than just a run of the mill porn game. The writing would make many Hollywood productions look cheap. If you allow yourself to get invested in the story this adventure takes you on an emotional rollercoster.

The models are beautiful. The characters have so much depth compared to other video games.

5/5
One of the greatest games this community has ever seen.

this game has all what a good vn story needs, emotions pure, brilliant story and fantastic arts and animations... a must have and play game. i play it 4 - 5 times from the beginning to see all what the game brings with and sometimes it remembers in some situations on my own life and this is, what i think, what a very good story have had... sry for my bad english... thx to the uploader and a big thx to DrPinkCake !!!

By far one of the best games i have found here. Simply for the breathtaking emotion that you feel playing this game. The characters feel so real that they pull you in and you are the MC. Artwork is surreal, i love it. From the characters development to how each decision changes or effects the outcome is amazing.

Interacting with one character makes a choice that would not be able to with another character, leaving out that development with the MC changing their relationship and outcome of the whole story. Very well done . Its a game very close to real life.

P.S- I just love that you can get go after two characters and have them in a relationship with the MC.

I love this game, amazing story, heart warming, branching, unlike most games of the kind it actually has consequences and real Human emotions. All in all this is one terrific game, all of the good endings are amazing, the one with Megan almost made me cry.

When I started playing this game, it was AMAZING.
Terrific writing, characters you care deeply about, good graphics, everything you could want in a game... right?

However, as the game went on the writing took a dump. Each release ended with a cliffhanger, and the cliffhangers stopped making any sense. By the seventh release the game itself had stopped making any sense. Too many twists, not enough development leading up to the twists, and lots of development for things that haven't (and no longer could) appeared in the game.

I realize there is still 1 more release left, but I have no desire left to see how this ends. Which is a terrible shame, considering that this started out as one of the best games ever. I don't know if this was a case of momentary brilliance early on, or outsmarting himself trying to live up to the high standard set by his early brilliance.

I figure this should get 5 stars for the intro and 1 star for the last few releases, so I have rated it 3 stars on the average.