Ren'Py - Astral Lust [v0.3.1c] [Victorius]

The game has a premise you've prob. seen a million times before, but it manages to actually be very unique in its execution. Still rough around the edges and clearly in active development, but already shines as a secret gem among this style of games. The girls are cute not just as renders, but as personalities too. I recommend it, even in this unfinished state it's a refreshing game to immerse yourself in.

If I was a random billionaire, I'd give the dev of this game a full time 50 person team of artists and coders without hesitation, so he can rapidly flesh out his great vision for what the game can be.

Fun card based combat and amazing world building makes this game on of my all time favorites on the site! If you like your visual novels a little on the scary/creepy side this is a most have. The only flaw is that some monster encounters especially early on you can't possibly win and its best to run from them but this is easily fixed later in the game when you get much stronger with better cards. Over all its a fun and difficult game that will keep you interested for hours and then having you eagerly await new updates.

I love this game, not just the sex parts. The story is cool and interesting, the dreams and murmurs are creepy. The haunting atmosphere outside contrasts perfectly with the warmth and security of the hotel.

I just love the way things go between the girls and the MC

If I had to criticize something it would be that the soft music sounds even in the tension scenes, which removes much of the fear that they should give, but for the rest I can only hope that the whole game maintains this perfection

Although still in the early stages, the game has a dark, dreary atmosphere that isn't overbearing and an enjoyable story, cast, and card combat system.

The cast is an enjoyable group, although their personalities can be exaggerated at times. The MC (who has one of the better HS models I've seen) has good dialogue for the most part, and the story segments have interested me. The encounters are varied and usually interesting, although this does have segments of grind and RNG which can drag it down.

The negatives mostly come from the clunky feel of various systems. The menu UI has to be closed manually, meaning when you click away it remains popped open, leaving you often advancing story or gameplay with menus in the way, which can stack on top of each other. Being able to click outside the menus would ideally close it. The hints on how to advance can be vague at times and it's unclear if you should wait for the next scene to trigger or if there's something you need to do. There's no way to organize your cards, which is frustrating from an OCD standpoint, but more importantly you can only destroy cards to change your deck, which could be problematic if future enemies counter your current deck and force you to grind resources to do so and fight monsters for new cards (I hope the unavailable options correct this, I played on v0.1.4c).

While it does have some clunk that hopefully can be sorted, the game is promising enough to give it a try if you enjoy the theme.

Inconvenient. That was the first word coming to my mind when playing the game. Too many rooms paired with a rather bad navigation (there are much better solutions for navigation, like a drop-down-menu with a room selection). There is no hint what the skills are needed for (for ex. "charisma").
The female characters almost look alike, there is no real difference.
The renders are ok/ mediocre, not very detailled. And the story is another generic one, with a failed attempt to implement a survival game.

I didn't like or enjoy it at all. No recommendation.

For now this game lands on 3/5 because of tedious grind, RNG on events outdoors which is crucial for the story to proceed and more things mentioned below.

The 3d art in the game is made with Honey Select with it's inherited flaws. But regardless of this the scenes are hot but too few at the moment.
The game has a premise to be outstanding if the dungeon and leisure area is actually used.
And finally there are a lot of objects with "Coming soon" which is also boring because I want it now!

I wish this game proceeds smoothly with regular updates because it could be wonderful.
Let's see after the next update as I'm considering being a Patreon.

Rated: 3/5
Rating based on: v.0.1.3b

It has a good game direction with good themes. I found the card-building aspect of the game to be very interactive compared to other games of this type. The girls are super cute and the writing is decent.

There is an option to enable story-mode in which you won't have to fight so many monsters while exploring, allowing you to get through the story easier which was nice.

Pretty fun game, I can say it’s a somewhat Slay the spire sex game, still kinda raw, but I am eagered to see the updates.
Writing is good, characters are nice, plot is mysterious and the tension is palpable.
Graphics are good, even if there are some odd choices of styles and renders, but I guess they make the atmosphere of weird things.
It’s good, worth your time

It's a solid game. Screen shake is the only reason that I won't rate it any higher than a 3.5.

Animations 5/5 and 1/5
Combat 5/5
Combat balance 2/5
Grind balance 3/5
Story 5/5
Horror 5/5
Characters 5/5
Screen Shake -5/5

Review based on 1.3
The story is well written, has an excellent theme, and an impressive horror element. The combat is turn-based and skills are based on which card you choose. The characters all have great and varied personalities. There are many choices, some of which increase your corruption. The sanity element is well done.

Animations is where this game starts to dip to me. The animations are well done and very smooth, but many rely heavily on screen shake which is a bad thing. POV animations can't even be enjoyed due to the volitivity of the screen shake.

In short, I don't like Screen Shake, it's bad for the brain, equilibrium, and can cause potential motion sickness even in people with no history of it >> enough said.

Edit >> I forgot to include the combat and grind balances. The combat is rough in this game. You start out weak and stay there for a long time. The enemies can range from somewhat stronger than you to death sentence levels of difficult. The grind is also rough to a point. You need a lot of materials to build some things, and the amount of stuff that you get from scavenging can range from very low to ok.

Due to these factors I have reduced my rating from a 4 to a 3-star.

Play with caution and if you have issues with motion sickness, then I'd recommend avoiding this game.


1.9.g
So the story and horror elements are things that I have no issues with. I like that the dev is finally starting to use scenes without nausea inducing screen shake more >> I have no problem with some scenes having shakes, but was a bit much in the early stages of this game.

The grind is still heavy >> combat still has a major balance issue >> areas in the hotel need functionality (a working shower to use, a working bathroom to use, use of the hot tub) . That's it. If the combat and grind were balanced better and functionality added to places in the hotel, this game would get at least a 4 star from me. A 5 star if screen shakes were removed entirely.

@Victorius Astral


~>Good game

~>The story is good and decent

~>The music is not my cup of tea though.

~>The girls is definitely unique and totally my cup of tea.

~>Combat is good and decent totally different game than others.

~>free roam and freedom to choose be sadistic or gentleman

~>Though lack of variety of sex option.

~>Worth to play if ever you got tired of clicking so on and so forth without combat.

~>Good luck with the game worth to support in my opinion

The game has decent quality. Interesting characters and the dialog is good.
The settings common enough but it lets you take choices though to do things that effects the MC's characteristics.

I do not normally like card like combat but is not bad as combat is fast and does not drag on and on and the strat elements are good as there are many types of builds to use/create with pros and cons.

There is not much content yet though, which is why I think thats why there is not much support for the game though. If the dev just had a large push in content I think a lot more people will take notice of this game.

I would almost give this game an averge in its current state but the potential I see being set up edges it up a bit I feel. But will probably review again in like a month and see if anything has improved or its time to just forget about the game for like a year+ and check then for its current state.

Honestly the game was better than what I expected to find.
- History is interesting and you feel part of it
- Exploration and combat are not boring and seems balanced for what they should represent. I was worried since description said that will need some balances in combat, but comparing with other games looks fair to me maybe more atractive when you can upgrade and custom your decks
- Characters for my personal taste is the weakest point of the game, I'm not a fan of the designs, style or bodies can't reach my primal insticts
- A strong point for me is the potential of future updates, game already prepared the way for some scenes and situations that feed my inner monster

What a pleasant surprise this was. Might be the 2nd game where I actually didn't skip past all of the dialogue. I checked it out for the weird surreal sounding story and the 'slay the spire' type cardgame bit. Both were really enjoyable, hats off to the dev for putting this much effort into a 'porn game' .

The more intimate and romantic parts were refreshing, nice touch. I could go for more stuff like this.

Normally I don't go for honey select games, but this was pretty good, wasn't bothered by the renders.

Visuals: 8/10
Story: 9/10
Coom: 7/10
Feels: 8/10

great game, can't wait for more of it. especially the sleeping interactions. amazing story, great graphics, and phenomenal music. fsdaf dsaf ds ad saf da sd as d saf dsa fdsaf dsf dsf dsf dsf dsf sdaf ds s fds fdfs fd sdfds fs f sa f sdf dsaf dsf s af dsa fd sf ds fdsf dsf adf sa as s

Lots of potential here, you can tell the dev has a great vision for this game and I'm very excited for where it will go in the future. Not much content as of yet, but everything so far is high quality and interesting. First thing I noticed, aside from how adorable the girls are, is that this game just oozes atmosphere. The bleak and mysterious apocalyptic setting, corruption/sanity mechanics, and dangerous exploration/combat give it a very unique feeling compared to other erotic games.

Astral Lust is definitely a game to keep your eyes on and consider supporting. I'm positive that future updates will lead to this game getting an explosion of popularity and funding so the dev can dedicate more of their time and resources to it.

[Review of 0.1.1]
Great Card Battle mystery game!
MC isn't a Teenager and he makes grown up choices.
Optional Dark path available (blackmail/coercion/rape) in a post apocalypse world (strongest gets to decide).

Still early days, some mechanics have been developed but not implemented but still playable.

V0.1.1 review
A great game so far, I like the girls, the gameplay, and the story.
So far, there is no NTR (that I have found) and a little corruption, so I like this a lot.
Keep an eye on this, it's very promising

Pretty early without a ton of sexual content but it looks very promising. Hints throughout of exact planned releases for interactions per patch is always very inspiring.

I love the explore animation looks really cool. Card combat is my jam, even if its a bit wonky for the setting. But better rewards for defeating scarier monsters so thats cool.

Upgrades and stuff is kinda grindy, but I cheat that shit anyways. All the character interactions are fun and exciting, and theres already branching story elements that close back up which means lots of fun content without it getting bogged down into an excel spreadsheet of figuring out how to interact with every character


4 stars since its early, but I expect this to be a 5 star game easily. Pretty much just depends on content output rate. Much love

ps let us rape the Asian bandit chick model after winning instead of getting a card

Written as of [v0.1.1]

I'm giving the game 5 stars: the graphics are rather good (I've played 1080p version), the girls are cute and lovable. They mostly have distinct personalities.

The game is a sandbox but I don't think it's too grindy, at least to progress through story; I'm not sure if the battle system requires you to grind a lot, since I've skipped this part. The battle system is card-based, and I think its UI is the only bigger downside of the game for now.
It feels like this will be a lovable story without major drama, but we will see about that.

The other downsides of the game is that sometimes you don't know what you should do next or if something is supposed to be happening, but in most cases it was not an issue.

The pacing seems alright as well.

Really loved the release. Even tho I'm not a big fan of those "apocalyptic" games, this one caught my eyes.
Beaultiful renders, sounds, interesting story and the girls personality are great, especially the main one.

My only negative point is to forcing combat system to progress, unless we cheat.
Wish the best luck to the dev.