VN - Ren'Py - Apocalypse 2059 [v0.3] [BigH4nd.Inc]

Others have pointed it out before, but really what the author is trying to describe to us, and what we see, are so completely different that it'll take you out of the story.

You cannot have a dystopian setting where death looms at every corner and have some characters, MC included, taking the dumbest of decisions at every turn but somehow living to be 20+ years old like they wouldn't get killed the second they ran into someone in this world.

Also and that might just be me because I havent seen it written too much in other reviews, but the pacing is off.
The story feels rushed, the dialog and writing is whatever, and you often end up wondering "how did we even end up here". It should take its time more, and focus on better worldbuilding, dialog, and frankly the dev should take a moment to be like "how would a normal human being react in this situation given the paramaters I've put them in".

Also, it's trying way too hard to be "smart". Some of the dialog is nonsensical, the timeskips bring nothing to the story except annoyance and confusion as you'll spend the next couple renders trying to figure out how far back or ahead you just timeskipped....
If the dev is reading this : please stop. It doesnt make your story better, smarter, or anything. It's just annoying.

Everything about this is fine, outside the MC. It's not great, it's not terrible, except the MC.

This is a character who we are meant to believe has survived 20+ years alone in this apocalyptic wasteland. And yet, as others have stated, he loses EVERY altercation he has. Bar none. He "hates all humans", his words, and yet blindly trusts every single person he comes across. He gets ACTIVELY double crossed, but trusts those same betrayers an hour later. The biggest issue, and where I stopped however, is when he manages to be stripped naked WHILE SLEEPING. For someone who survived all alone, you'd think he'd be a light-ish sleeper. And yet they had no problem taking off all his clothing. All the while we're being told by characters that's he super sharp, intuitive, and sees through all their lies.

The modeling of female characters is good, and the plot background is my favorite type of wasteland. At present, the version is relatively low, and there are more roles to play. The story has just started and it is worth looking forward to.

Well, after playing through two chapters of this game, I’d like to share my thoughts:

The positives:

• The LIs' character designs are quite beautiful.
• The action scenes are well-executed and engaging.
• The post-apocalyptic setting is fairly standard — neither impressive nor disappointing.
• I personally enjoyed the protagonist's personality and the fact that he comes across as quite a mysterious individual.

Now, for the drawbacks — and unfortunately, they significantly undermine the atmosphere and immersion:

• First and foremost, in Chapter 1 alone, the main character was outsmarted and defeated four times. It’s hard to believe how he even survived up to this point. Other characters keep describing him as incredibly perceptive and dangerous, but his actions tell a completely different story — he loses to pretty much anyone who challenges him. Of course it is funny to see MC saying he is lone wolf and hate human interaction and within a couple of minutes you can see him enjoying time around a campfire with new buddies who of course gonna betray him because he is so "insightful".
• This can easily be labeled a kinetic novel, it lacks meaningful choices. The "decisions" presented feel pointless and add no real value to the experience.

Although the game has its strengths, these two major flaws prevent me from rating it higher than 2-3 stars, kinda want to give it 2, but these flaws can be fixed, game has a potential.

Really enjoyed playing through this VN. Fallout and post-apocalyptic settings can be a rich environment for story-telling and this makes ample use of that.

• We get the mystery of the MCs origins combined with some sort of super-natural intervention.
• Power struggles of the wasteland where each group seems infallible when introduced, only to be swiftly undone.
• Morality in the face of basic needs - where is my next meal coming from.

I don't see the simp argument being relevant at this early stage - the big dick stories like Desert Stalker stall out very early as there is no nuance or scope for changing attitudes/behaviours as we progress.

This seems a genuine attempt at novel storytelling in a well trodden trope - bravo to the brave Dev and I look forward to the next installments!

Overall: 2/5
Renders are promising, but my main gripe are the choices. What makes great choices is that they make the player think any of the choices can be picked for a situation. Unfortunately, the choices we get are A and B (Good and Bad) and don't lead anywhere to where you feel like you control the story. It might be fine for some. but when you are promised a VN you expect choices that lead to somewhere or at least unique dialogue or reactions and it doesn't have to a major branch in the plot just something to make me feel like this is a game not a wall of text. Also, what's unfortunate is that the LI's feel too similar or one dimensional. Having seen the previews of the setting and I wanted to try this game out but left disappointed.

After finishing version 0.2

The game seems to me to have tremendous potential, the design of most of the girls presented enchanted me and really has left me wanting to continue seeing what the story is trying to tell.

I like how the protagonist is distrustful and his first instinct seems to be to go in for the kill, although I also let my guard down at times xdd My only question in this aspect is why the girl at the beginning, Lana, is alive. Her design is the one I like the most but the prota doesn't seem compassionate enough to let her live after she almost killed him.

Another thing is that the save power theme feels useless if it is simply that we as players can save the game. It doesn't seem to influence anything except the cheesiness that at some point it is commented that the protagonist can do it. And at least for the moment the choices feel very artificial, they are: choose good and continue with the story or choose bad and end the game. At least the first choice we see the “usefulness” of the save within the story itself, although it's more like an easter egg.

But in summary, even though it's only the first chapter I liked the game quite a bit. There aren't even H-scenes yet but I don't feel an urgency for them to happen either so I hope that when they do happen they feel natural (which in the end my main reason for playing is to get to the H-scenes lmao). I give it a 4.5/5

Something I never like is when the MC is a SIMP, and here the MC is a GIGA SIMP, to the point that he was close to dying several times because of it, and only didn't die because the author decided to ignore all logic.

And what about the girls who tried to kill the MC? He lets them all go without thinking twice, and the player has no choice about it, and he always gets screwed because of it.

"She punched me, robbed me, shot me with the intention of killing me, but if I keep showing up in front of her, maybe one day we'll be a couple."
This line didn't appear in the game, but all of this has already happened between the LI's and the MC.

The choices are just illusions, between two choices one leads to a bad ending, and the other to continue the game.

The HS is above average, it's the only positive thing I saw in the game, and I love HS games, I can usually ignore bad stories when I see a good HS, but not in this game, I don't recommend it.

Review for Apocalypse 2059 [v0.1]

I love the concept of the story and I feel that it has really good potential.
The CGs are amazing. There are various interesting characters with different personalities.

The writing and dialogues in the game are good but at times it feels too stretched out.

There are no sexual scenes in this version. It is to be seen how the developer will handle those in future updates.

I wish the very best to the developer and look forward to how future updates turn out.

The game has potential but feels way too much at present like a New Vegas mod from the Nexus done in HS. Story was confusing and with the time jumps I eventually gave up trying to follow. Also not helped by the lack of sex or anything remotely sexy in this initial release.

The dev has some obvious talent tho. If the game continues, restructuring and editing (lots of words could be cut) would probably benefit this intro.

Love the concept. Pretty good graphics and story telling. End of the world as we know it. The MC seemed to live alone. Always wears a helmet, and mostly shoot first ask questions later type. It is a great beginning as Dev's fist VN

The game from the beginning is very good and unique so far despite this being the first iteration. Employs unique gameplay (spoilers i wont go into) and has decent character models. the only con in my opinion is the constant time jump which i can foresee confusing people. But overall a good start to a good story