Ren'Py - Area69 [v0.83] [k78Games]

Area69 [v0.73] review

Review score : 4.5/5 - rounding up to a 5 because I'm that nice.

I had a lot of fun with this one!

What it is:
It's a sandbox game with paranormal elements and a wide range of characters. It's a very ambitious project and it's mostly executed quite well. There's plenty of content already, with high levels of fappability. I had lots of fun for at least 8 hours.
I feel the need to point out that the game sometimes shows sex scenes between characters that aren't the MC. It's not NTR per se, but since some people have an aversion to not being included in every single sex scene in the game, I thought I'd just mention it here. I don't mind it at all and it's here to stay. Don't come whining about it.

Visuals: 4.5/5
Overall very high quality. Sometimes the facial expressions seem a bit unnatural, but that's just a nitpick. Also, I'm not a super fan of the overabundance of GILF and overweight MILF characters and scenes, but I don't really mind them.

Animations/sex scenes: 4.5/5
Definitely above average. Scenes range from kinda OK to excellent. There's a heavy focus on multiple poses/angles for most of the scenes. Honestly it's a bit overkill, but I'm not gonna complain about it. I'm a sucker for good creampie scenes and these are abundant! Thanks!

Story/writing: 3/5
Multiple story threads which don't seem to overlap or interlock (but I could be wrong here). Its sometimes silly, sometimes spooky, sometimes just pure sexy.
The English is non-native but passable.
What's quite unique about Area69 is the mix between action/violence and sex and I enjoyed that immensely. Example: A vampire biting the neck of a victim while fucking her. Few devs dare to show the sex+blood combo and I really applaud how well it's done in this game. (Please note that this kind of content is just a very small fraction of the total content, and not this game's main selling point.) I just expecially liked it, so I had to comment on it. It's far from straight up gore though, so don't be too scared.
I really like how this dev uses narrative tension. It's not just boring conversations. Things are happening and mc needs to do something, fast! The story pacing is really excellent and definitely a breath of fresh air for a jaded lewd gamer like me.
A minor nitpick is the use of the turbo-slut trope (Olivia I'm looking at you!) where there isn't any meaningful escalation, just straight to banging. I feel There's sometimes several steps missing between "Hey nice to meet you" to "Yea fucking cum in my pussy". A bit more focus on the seduction of the characters would be nice. I like it when I have to work a little for the nookie.
And lastly, I'm a bit bummed out that the absolute best story thread/character, BEST GIRL LUCY has barely any content. I fucking LOVE her overly-horny antics. And her model is the best by far! That scene where she's all sweaty and can't sleep was hotter than the sun! MOAR please!

Coding : 2/5
-The coding is this game's weakest point. The version I played [v0.73] was bugged and needed a fix for a quest to work properly.
-The game suffers a bit from "unnecessary mechanincs syndrome". More on that later. It's a super ambitions project with a shitload of different stat points and mechanics and some of them barely do anything.
-The game sometimes switches to Spanish for short periods.
-It's often unclear how to find the scenes in the achievements list, which made me come back to this thread a lot, to find what needs to be done. A walkthrough for the achievements is desperately needed! It's also quite weird that this achievement list is not "global", but tied to each save. It makes it even weirder when considering that some choices are either/or choices where option A leads to one or more achievements not reachable through option B. I didn't like this.
-There's no gallery. This game needs a gallery function that's not tied to a specific save.
-The dev isn't respecting the players' time enough. To go to the strip club you need about 11 clicks just to get in. When you need to go there 10 times or more it really gets tedious. Why isn't there a "season pass" so I don't have to talk to the guard and buy tickets every time!?!
-Grinding for money wasn't fun. Here's a tip to the dev: For grind to make sense and feel rewarding it needs to be challenging and skill-based. Clicking on the computer to work is neither.
-The "Energy" and "Arousal" mechanics felt like a chore to manage in general, but also led to some really cool interactions where my MC fucked himself unconcious, or came in his pants from watching a strip show. Those interactions definitely gave me a chuckle. These interactions were really cool and I hope the dev can expand on situations where having a high arousal / low energy can lead to specific outcomes in certain scenarios.
-The Karma system felt redundant. It's a good idea on paper, but there aren't enough high karma/low karma options throughout the game to make it worthwile.
-The game is filled with items which have no function. What's the beer for? Why did I buy it? Who knows!
-The game hints at MC needing a lockpick early on, but these can't be purchased until the Alley has been discovered. This makes no sense. Don't hint that the player needs an item they can't get. Also why are lockpicks single-use?
-Items which probably could have a stack count can only be bought 1 at a time. Why can't I have 3 lockpicks and 3 bottles of sleeping pills? That's just bad coding.
-Some scenes can only be accessed at 1 particular time of the day (I'm looking at you, Olivia!) Because this interaction has a branching structure, it means you'll have to talk to her at exactly 14.00 many days in a row to get all the achievements. Skipping time isn't a fun mechaninc, especially if it can only be done 1 hour at a time. And if you happened to click on the wrong character and hit a dead end during this timeslot then fuck you, because rollback is specifically disabled here! This is so very dumb.
-The game mixes between European and English time notation. Either stick to 2pm or 14.00, don't do both, that's just confusing for no reason!
-Confusing timeslots: Why is school starting at 1pm? Why isn't the gym open on weekends? This makes no sense.

Closing thoughts:
All in all, despite my nitpicking at the end, this is a QUALITY game with tons of hot content. I know my sub-section scores don't add up to 4.5/5 but I feel I need to bump the score up just because of how fun and sexy this game is. It really drew me in and got me invested in a way I'm not used to. This game is definitely an example where the finished product is more than the sum of its' parts.
It's very fappable and many boners were had. Unless you're particularily bothered by watching characters that aren't the MC banging from time to time then you need to play this, right fucking now! Use the cheat mod so you don't have to do the money/sleep grind. Very recommended.

Now let's hope for a juicy Lucy update soon!

/Popa

I love this game. If you like paranormal things, this game is for you .

Hot characters of all ages and builds 10/10

mature women and older

The plot of 9/10

mass of tasks to be completed, expanding with each new content of the
edition

Elections 10/10
a whole lot


Routes 9/10


You can play as good or bad

Sex scenes 9/10

hot with different choices

Graphics 10/10

Game mechanics 7/10
There are bugs and the game can cut, I don't know why

Music 7/10

waiting for the new 5/10 release


I can recommend the game, I am looking forward to the new release

I've been keeping up with this game for a while now. (As of v0.73 at the time of this review) While I won't say it's flawless, I will say that this game is really well done. As I have done with previous reviews, I will list the negatives, then the positives.

-I don't feel like the animations are terrible. I just wish they were smoother and more in-depth. Some characters get more scenes and positions, but I think it's because some characters are more popular than others. And that's okay, too. All of the characters are very unique and for the most part, interesting.

-The "point and click" aspect of the game can get in the way of a more fluid gameplay experience. It's not terrible or unbearable, though. And with this comment, I'm also trying to relax my excitement to get into the sexual content.

-For a new player, I feel like the "grind" for money could discourage them. Not a huge deal.

-When your arousal meter is almost maxed, the screen is full of...semen. I don't mind that it's semen (I'm a guy, I've seen it), it just can be annoying at times to go through the game or scenes and see most of the screen covered in goo.

The good:

+Back to the animations, while they aren't always as smooth and fluid as I like, they are still very hot. The different positions give variety. And most of the scenes are very different from each other, which is great.

+The game is silly. It doesn't always take itself serious and I like that. You will notice that the game will break the 4th wall or reference something IRL and find it funny. So that's cool.

+Most of the great scenes are either repeatable when you're in your room or you can just go visit the person and do it.

+The story isn't perfect, but it does stand out and it's also original. Very hard to predict what may happen next, especially if you have played a lot of VNs.


+The game will guide you on what to do next. You will never feel like you don't know how to complete parts of the story because the game will tell you where to go, when to go there, and how to do it.


+The branching storylines usually warn you to save before making a big decision, so you can play through the game without feeling like it's too late to go back. If you've ever played any RPG ever, you should know that saving often is important. But the game warns you, so there.

+Having a good or bad personality does not punish you for choosing certain things. You can play how you want.

+Doing the quests can be done in the order that you want to. For most players that wait for each update, this may not be always true. For newer players, you can do the quests in whatever order you feel like.


Overall, Kuervo has made a very fun, very original game. I thank him and his team for putting together a very great game with a lot of attractive models. Thank you for your time and thank you for reading.

v0.70

Good - Spooky, twilight zone themed game with varied story threads and models sets it apart from most other more vanilla games.

Bad - Some stories include borderline ntr, cuckold and even some slightly gay content which is not tagged in the game description.

I first tried the game on my mobile phone and was a bit disappointed because it was quite difficult for me to play it on a smaller smartphone.
But when I tried it on a normal Windows PC, I was really excited.
In particular, I find the realistic graphics of the women in different age groups very well done.
They are very individually designed models and that stands out wonderfully from the soft-washed "uniformity" of many games.
I also enjoy playing the game itself. Admittedly, I played the game with the cheat, but I really loved it. Both in terms of graphics, as well as with the gameplay itself and the story. I really do hope that there will be a sequel soon and I am very much looking forward to seeing how it will continue.
And yes, one more thing... an IC patch would of course be the crowning glory ;-). But according to everything I've read, that's unfortunately only possible (if at all) when the game is completely finished.

Version Played: 0.71 Test
Time played: Maybe 4-5 hours. Have seen about 70% of available scenes.

Sex and horror have a long history of being intertwined in fiction. I'm sure much smarter people than I have written about this at length probing as to why this is the case, but in my case, it's never been something I enjoy. In fact, it's a downright turnoff for me. That said, while I don't relish it here, I surprisingly don't mind it in spite of some pretty creepy, uncomfortable stuff.
So, what do I relish? Well, this game has some great bush and hot ladies of a certain age and I find them all very attractive. I also like how there are multiple storylines to follow.

Positives
+ Hot girls of various ages and body types. The devs can go a bit hard on the stretch marks and blemishes, but still very hot overall and definitely adds some realism!
+ Fairly easy to progress and unlock new scenes and continue routes (though none of the routes are complete as of yet, which is honestly a little blue-bally)
+ Bush!

Negative
- Writing is a little stiff and unnatural (I understand that the devs aren't native speakers, but this could really benefit from a punchy edit.)
- In spite of there being several plots to follow, none of them seem to really relate to each other and the game feels disjointed because of it.
- Horror theme might not be for everyone

To speak a bit more to the horror theme and its integration here, the game has everything! Werewolves, vampires, ghosts, aliens, demons, you name it, there's probably a plotline featuring it. I would say what keeps it tolerable overall is that, in spite of some darker storylines, the game is a bit goofy and plays it mainly like a campy B-movie rather than something hyper serious. If you like what you see in the screens, but are put off by the horror element, I would definitely still give this one a look and see for yourself.

Note to devs: Fantastic game! Keep that bush coming and please try to finish at least one story line rather than jumping around to others or starting something new. (Though if that goes against your design philosophy, ignore me.)

i like how this game has variety of supernatural things to see,
animation is sometimes weird 3.8/5
but renders are amazing=5/5
gameplay= random events made some quest not progressing i hope that fixes (milf quest ithink) 4/5
potential=5/5

This game has the potential of 5 stars, but without any animation I can not give more than 4 stars. This is a very detailed game in detail.
The characters are quite diverse and of all kinds. And really well designed
It's a good start, the graphics are great, it has a good mystical environment, but running around in vain is worth the time for me as long as there are hints or tips.

I was super excited to play this VN, not gonna' lie.

The Good:

I love the aesthetic. The very beginning of the game has a like, cheesy movie vibe to it, with the whole "introduce the cast" thing, and I adored that.

It's a VN that never takes itself too seriously as well, and you gotta' respect that aspect.

The character models are great. They don't look 100% flawless all of the time, which is a plus to me, because who does, IRL?

Something about the quests and how they're introduced really appealed to me. It triggered some sandbox nostalgia for me when I'd wander in somewhere and get hit with a new quest screen.

I love the paranormal/horror aspects of the game so much. We need more horror VNS!

The Meh:

The energy meter is pretty annoying, but I played with a mod on, so it was never too big a deal for me. I'd highly recommend anyone do the same to avoid frustration.

Everything leads to sex. Yeah, I get it's an adult VN, but it still gets a bit redundant.

The English could use a bit of work, not the worst, but not the best either.

The Bad:

This game is absolute death to my laptop for some reason, which is weird. The main menu is especially harsh.

The title of the VN is a little too on-the-nose. Kinda' dates the game a bit from the jump, imo.

Overall:

A clunky, but fun game. Would give it 5* but I'll knock one off for the slight flaws the game does have, and for it almost bricking my laptop anytime I run the thing.

5* potential, though.

Edit: Rating bumped down to 3* for having random game over screens (ones without continues. You literally have to reload from your last save. And heavy NTR. Though they are just dream scenarios, an NTR tag should really be added here.

3*

pretty good game
with hq render(art/pict) and also i though the story will be boring but no, this game like a parody(u know if u have play the game) but hey dev theres one thing i dont really like it ingame n theres no option to avoid it,guess what if u dont interact this girl u wont get another scene for the other girl n for what when u get the other girl their scene just a blink of eye not much like the other girl u dont like, well yes theres plenty tiime to change for the future for me now is im playing v0.70
dont forget u will love the romance of fantasy[fiction] story in this game, i bet, oh btw actually u dont really need the incest pattch theres not many scene go for incest but yeah if u want see bet bettter not play with the patch
*myenglishbad well at least im giving my opinion

(trial no. 3)
Girls are good rather it's mc who's more creeper than all other creepy characters, sandbox is okayish, animations aren't that well made but bearable, looked promising at the beginning but now it's all over the place.
I couldn't go further some scenes were turnoff, well if it's your genre then go for it. Girls you like getting raped, molested is what happening.

The sandbox is entertaning and gameplay elements are very interesting like the contacts list wher you can message people to gain relationship points, that is interesting.
The questlog an the inventory stuff is decent to look at and item that have several uses have a healthbar. Items in general are quite expensive, but is not hard to make money.

The girls look decent and there is a lot of variety, there are a lot of "normal" woman that i think look kind of gross but to each their own.

Lewd scenes are not the best from a technical point of view, but somehow they work , at least for me, but to actually be good and have impact they need a little something extra visual storytelling, and some added render. The game is full of NTR, there is more NTR sex than player sex, the player as of 0.7 does stuff but i only recall 1 actual sex scene that looks like it, the rest look like a circus and if you add Benny hill music you would probably laugh.(Im not kidding)

Cause of this approach the dev took i can not say that i am excited to play the game, its kind of Nah!, hit and miss so far. There are interesting things but seriously that kind of parodic approach kills the mood for me.

And if the game had a good amount of actual content, it wouldnt matter much, but with the current amount, there are few decent scenes, and a good part of the game is ocuppied by the navigation.
It also needs proofreading cause there are many parts without translation.

Overal there is potential and interesting ideas there like when the guy masturbates actually recalls past scenes of the selected person, but it is not enough for me to put my faith in the fulfillment of that potential, and thats why the rating.

now this is just me, I may be highly mistaken or confused. Take it with a pinch of salt.

This game seems to be very specifically designed around ntr and for ntr. I am a late comer so I got to avoid some of the ntr scenes I heard about.
However blood moon seems to be bringing that element back real strong. I'm not sure what's with the doctor, but that voyeur scene was not quite what I expected. nothing wrong with the scene, but almost every additional male character is more impressive than the mc. at the moment, he doesn't stand a chance.
The red choices (based on the first ntr scene) seem to lead to a very willing and asshole like cuck path, while also taking advantage of any vulnerability (based on some of the other red choices). The blue choices seem to lead to a good guy mc but somehow it also seems to make him submissive to most opposition unless it's do or die.
He really stands no chance at the moment. I haven't finished the current content, but the only vaginal sex scenes involving the MC are with the hooker, the sacred sex haunted household, a teacher and the librarian so far. Maybe more if I grind enough or somehow get the sharp fangs quest while avoiding any and all ntr that seems to be possible (one implied moment; heavily implied based on the story and it seems unavoidable).
But I've heard of what seems to be proportionally more scenes in the ntr path or more scenes not involving the MC. Hell, the "non ntr" has already shown a few penetration scenes (with other female characters and then blood moon features the mental pictures of the alpha wolf taking Lucy on maybe two diffferent occasions.)
So to me. This seems to be a game made for ntr but provided with "non ntr" paths to quell outrage. Or at least, based on some other games I've played, the ntr scene will be the first to be released while the alternative will be released after a while.

If anyone's going to say I got no rights to say anything if I'm not paying for this. To be fair, this is posted on what I've heard others call a piracy site. And I'm here too. So that's an obvious point. But all of us get to put our thoughts here. And I dare say I've been quite civil here, maybe even more than.

Imma put this in the reviews. This is just here if anyone wants to discuss this opinion (discuss, not quite argue. Maybe debate by sharing points) as one can't really comment on a review

This game has some of the best animations and character designs out there! The missions and character development is just top notch! Especially all of the hidden scenes you can discover! I was laughing so hard during most of the hilarious dialogue scenes at times. Only downside is no guidance for completing certain achievements.

Additionally I wish there was an option to turn off the sleep/energy requirement. It became super annoying when I would be in the middle of a scene and then the MC would pass out and wake up in the hospital. You can go a day without sleep, and it's especially annoying when I just slept, then 10 hrs later the MC passes out. Comeon now

The third pet peeve is having literally only one of the missions be fully complete as in you're able to fully finish the mission without the game saying "Mission Pending", and this is the learning to program mission. Dev I would rather wait longer for fully completed missions, than for 98% of them to just stop halfway. You have about 10 missions and out of them all only 1 is complete and the rest just say "pending".

This wouldn't be an issue if you had a good track record of the saves from previous updates being compatible with new ones, but since this is not the case spending all that time doing missions only to have them incomplete seems like a huge waste of time especially if I have to keep restarting the game from scratch each update.

The final input is the deal with the sister and her whole "i'm shy routine" what's the point of going through lockpicking the door slipping her sleeping pills into drink just to have the dude fap in front of her saying how much he wants to screw her. And for the love of all that is holy please include better instructions for starting missions.

Genius! it has just enough story to keep this from being braindead, but not too much to make you ashamed of wasting too much time on masturbating. Renders are top notch, writing is good, UI design is exceptional and unique. Quests are intriguing enough, not too long and boring.

My only slight complaint is that pacing can be a bit fast with Julia..

I fell in love with this after playing it. Various milf characters and dynamic animations stimulate the desire to play. Compared to other games, there are so many heroines, so I'm slightly worried if they'll all be updated in the future, but I believe the developer will do enough.

Really well executed themes. Enjoy the gameplay. Love the extras in trophies and cards. Wish there was more NTR happening in the background. Have just patreoned and look forward to more material. Really appreciate the variety of character models. Could start going for more peers the MC's purported age. Great job!

Pretty good game! Basically a mashup of every horror/sci-fi thing you can think of: aliens, vampires, demons, fitness teachers, you name it. None of the storylines are very finished, but there's plenty of content and it's a good mix of story quests and optional/repeatable stuff.

A nice variety of models, there are some that you might not find conventionally attractive but that's the spice of life!

I don't have any problems with the sandbox implementation because most things are low-stakes. There's not really a failure condition and after the first couple weeks of training stats you can have all the money you want.

I do think the Arousal mechanic is annoying. The MC will jizz in his pants if the arousal meter hits 100%, which has the potential of interrupting the current scene. It's just a pointless addition that causes needless friction if you trigger too many scenes in a day. I would suggest anyone similarly bothered by it should mod it out.

When I started playing I had low expectations but I am happy to say that I was positively surprised, an entertaining story with ridiculous moments, good renders, good animations, good characters, good sandbox.

In summary, do not hesitate to try it.

What do you do if you can't write a good quality story? Simple you make it an endless nightmare of point and clicks on a sandbox style map. Oh and then to make it all the more of a hair pulling experience for the player you make it a series of small tasks with small rewards that must also be completed as well to be able to achieve other tasks.

Lets talk about items that are in the game and able to added to the inventory but are never used and serve absolutley no purpose. Or we can also talk about one that is in the game and can be used but there is no benifit gained from it when there very well should be. First Item is the lockpick. Why is it there? You can spend a nice chunk of money on it but you never use the damn thing at all. Does not matter what his moral standing (personality?) is. Oh I could use this but I better not do it with them in there. WTF? Why have sleep sex if he isn't going to be able to do it? Sleeping pills so they can sleep the sleep of the angels as he put it. WHY? So you can just not use the lockpick to get in to have sex with them now that you knocked them out? And on that train of thought. Our boy can break the lock on the bathroom door but no option to do the same with their bedroom doors? Really?

So much potential is wasted with this game. Why does the programming never get checked off as completed. Do the job. Get paid. Skill is at maximum. Never clears out of objective list. Everything else is gone just not that. But its a point and click hell game so what do you expect.

The characters are interesting enough to keep you interested. The principle is vomit central though. The hooker is almost as bad. But it gets a bit overboard on the musclebound chicks in this game. Not my thing and I am not gonna knock it if its yours but 1 is sufficient. 3 is kind of overkill.

There are hints at activities that never occur in the game. Go find us someplace private and there is no place that meets those in game requirements. Apparently empty rooms don't count as you don't get to bang your cousin in school. Just a teaser. Lucy isn't bangable in the shower like her mom either. Neither is Daniels mom. Like I said so much wasted potential.

Hope if this gets continued there is an addition of pregnancy as well. And maybe the Dev will actually look up what sleep sex is and put the advertised item into the actual gameplay. Or is he counting the BJ from Julia at the late gameplay as MC is waking up as the sleep sex? Certainly hope that is not the case with lockpicks and sleeping pills actually being items in the game. Granted useless items but they are already there.