VN - Ren'Py - Being a DIK [v0.10.1] [DrPinkCake]

A college-themed AVN about an incoming freshman. While that theme may be played out, this is the very best of its type. Absolutely the best writing and graphics of any AVN I have experienced. The models and graphics are excellent quality. No really taboo themes. No Harem possible, though limited opportunities for multiple partners are viable for certain paths. (Any of the paths for the "main" girls force the MC to choose at a specific point.) The character development is outstanding. Dr. Pinkcake has real talent at story telling. My #1 AVN of all time.

The praise and love for this game is well deserved. I can't think of another project that has stuck with me as hard as this.

Through the current 10 episodes you get plenty to invest your time into, the different choices you get and the branches you go on feel natural and rewarding. After finishing my first/blind playthrough, I felt good with where the story went and how my choices altered the interactions with the cast and only by going back and choosing different major decisions did it fully click just how much is out there. One aspect that I really appreciate is that even some early decisions evolve naturally and come up much later in the story, like they should, which highlights the wonderful writing by DrPinkCake. It never felt like important plot points were abandoned, which can happen in this genre, with Being a DIK, it was the opposite, I wasn't expecting certain decisions to actually hold weight and alter a dynamic between characters. From smaller to bigger changes (different dialogue to completely different scenes), the decisions you end up making feel really solid.

I've seen many people repeat the sentiment that to fully experience this game you have to play it a couple of times and give both DIK and Chick routes a try (and everything in between) - and I couldn't agree more. While I'm usually reluctant to try different paths, especially when it comes to implied morality, or picking love interests, I was too hooked on this game to not give it a try, and I'm happy I did. Every single branch, path and character is worth it, they are all great in their own ways and the writing is great throughout.

The renders are great, characters provide a good spectrum for you to find ''the one'', minigames are enjoyable and are not mandatory, even some of the smallest decisions get rewarded and enrich the experience, genuinely a must try.

Here's my take on ep 10 the story is again 5 star rating. My only problem on this game is the math mini game. Other than that the other mini games are great especially the brawler which I enjoy the most.

Additionally the music are some of the best I have ever heard in a AVN. Especially the one playing on the opening of ep10. The music's alone deserves 5⭐ rating

Regarding the stories of the main L.I. for me Sage story stands out the most and Jill is number 2 in this update. Some of the review I read is bum because Bella and Jill sex scene are limited to 1 but for me the story building is what makes it one of the best game I have ever play. I play alot of game with the same genre which I'm not sure is I'm allowed to say but Being a Dik is by far the best.

Have not played too many AVN games, usually not my thing. But I am glad I gave this one a try.

The writing is great, like really really great, was not expecting the story and character development to be this good. The story has its flaws but despite that it is extremely well written, specially considering who the writing of entertainment industry went downhill in recent time this provides great entertainment. And it is possible to get attached to get some characters. A great deal of character variation, engaging side characters.

I had very low expectation in terms of gameplay I will be honest, I am one of those freaks who enjoyes punishing challenge, Dark Souls, Sekiro, Baldur's Gate 3 on hardcore mode sort of person. And the basic gameplay of this game was simple (what you would generally expect from an interactive novel) but to my surprise the mini games and ingame mobile games provided a nice blend for me. I first played this game just when I got into wordle as a result the english test was fun for me, the old math challenge was okay, but the new math challenge is more fun for me, the brawler game is okay.

The graphics is good, but I will be honest, I am past graphics for this game because of how much I am invested in the plot right now.

Music is good, again exceeded my expectation here tbh.

Also a high replayability is a major turn on for me in any game.

Some negative points, mini games might not be a thing for everyone (and it can be turned off), you lose a babe mid game (hope she makes a comeback). MC having a baseball bat between his leg is pretty typical.

I hope the developer(s) still have enough passion for this project to give us a great ending, and not become G R R Martin.

And finally thank you DPC for changing my view on AVN games, which made me try out few other games after playing this.

Like many others, I consider this game to be the gold standard for AVNs. Wonderful writing, excellent pacing, realistic characters, incredible renders, the works! I've already purchased this on Steam and played through what's available there multiple times on different paths. Can't wait to see more from DrPinkCake!

I came for the "plot", but stayed for the plot.

The cons:
- The 3D character models sometimes look uncanny, especially in the earlier episodes.
- The first 20 minutes of the game is kinda dull and it's easy to drop the game when you start.

The pros:
- The sex scenes are very good, the animations are nice.
- Excellent immersion. This game really takes you to an exaggerated college life that you wish you had.
- The writing for this game is top notch. The characters feel very human, even AAA titles don't have such complex characters. It's like a very good drama TV series and you are part of it. I literally laughed out loud at a few jokes in the game.
- the mini games make sense, which is very odd and rare for hentai games.

Although it is one of my favorite adult games, I started to see that the enthusiasm and development speed of the first seasons were no longer there when the developer started to make too much money from this game. I hope that he will give a good ending to this series with the third season as soon as possible. The quality of the episodes in the seasons has started to decline and the development process has become too long.

Not sure why there is hate for chapter 10 unless you despise the minigames cause chapter 10 is clearly the best chapter for me. It's when the game is starting to ramp up and get going from story to relationships. Where the relationships are starting to feel like relationships and there is finally some developments in the plot.

If this was just about the characters then easily a 4.5 or 5 / 5. But as a whole package I feel like somewhere in between 3 - 3.5 prior to season 3 but so far Season 3 is the best for me so I can say with that it's more like a 4. Depending where you sit on the minigames and free roam. For me about 1/2 of the mini are good but I do hate feeling forced to play them to manage my money. Also this game would be so much better without the test. But this game is very replayable and it does a bit of everything good and only excells at a few.
I'll be straight this isn't on my top 10 list atm it's #12 but after playing episode 10 might make it back onto it.

Story : 4/5

I don't get why so many so came for the porn and stayed for the story. It should be more like stayed for the characters. Because other than characters arcs there does not seem to much of a central main story line. As it's all in the setup phase in Season 1 and 2. End of Episode 9 and Episode is where it starts to finally pick up.
With that being said I do enjoy all the character story arc's so far. There isnt one I can say I dislike or wish wasnt in the game. I'll talk about that more in the next section. If I would to judge this purely based on the main story and not the characters arc's it would only be like a 1 or 2 / 5.
Characters : 5/5

This is easily the best part of the game. Very few other AVN's have a good cast of characters that are all well written and have decent or good story arcs. I'll talk about each character in the order I like them best.











Music : 4/5
Most AVN's I don't care about the music however in this one it's either okay or amazing depending on which part in the game you are at. I say it really shines during any of the parties.

Gameplay : 3/5
This is the worst and best part of the game at the same time. There is so much branching the it makes this game really replayable. Most of the minigames are okay and not a big deal since you can turn them off at the start of the game. I just wish you could do it at any point during the game. What makes the minigames bad is the need to play them everytime you can just to manage your money and keep it as high as possible. But in reality you don't even need to do that unless you want to collect everything. But it's enough to burn out and lose interest in multiple playthroughs. The free roams events in this game I enjoy for the most part. There is alot of content playing all paths up untill Season 3 took me about 2 weeks to beat.

Animations and renders :
not gonna give a number but rather just mention how much of an improvement they are in chapter 10 that it makes me really wish the entire game was like Chapter 10 in terms of looks and animation. But it never looks bad but never is amazing either.

BaDIK redefined the AVN genre, and it was daring enough to break the stigma and taboo these types of games had. An enganging story, lovable characters and a intricate connection to the player.
Simply the number one AVN there is.

This game is going from the best to the worst… I mean, who writes this kind of crappy text? Are you an 18y-old horndog? There’s absolutely nothing interesting about the interactions and conversations. It’s all blablabla. Not to mention the road the story has taken. You’re making shit up as you go and completely lost your original blueprint. Episode 9 blew the whole build-up from the entire first two seasons to pieces, and episode 10 tries to introduce a kind of new and interesting story-arch but fails to deliver, instead it becomes boring and meaningless. And btw, whats up with those weird faces? Certain emotions you want to emphasize, look like the person just realized he/she stepped in a giant turd.

I'll start this. off by saying that the production value of this game is amazing. The renders are good, the LIs are largely good, Music and effects are good, and the free roam is actually very well done, if way overused. I genuinely like the free roam but feel that putting long and unskippable fetch quests into a game with many, many paths really decreases the replayability. But overall the game is really good.

However the story is a cobbled together mess where things happen because the plot requires them, are either nonsensical or swiftly abandoned soon after, or are forcefully removed from the story in order to come back 6 chapters later as a "twist". Here be spoilers, though I try to censor the big twists as best I can.

Some examples of nonsensical plot points include:

- No less than three twists that were only twists because the MC was unaware of someone's last name, despite dating some of them for months.
- A character who was being controlled by a parent who threatened to default on a co-signed tuition loan if they didn't do as they said. Doing this would also destroy the credit rating of the parent, but apparently he's willing to do it anyway. Also, that's not how loans work.
- A drug and prostitution (and arguably sex trafficking) ring being run out of the HOTs sorority in which literally every member is involved except the president, who has zero idea. The leader is literally adversing her wares to people who she just met yet the President, a LI who is shown to be very intelligent and also genuinly cares about the members of the sorority, has no idea because the plot requires it.
- One new girl refuses to take part and leaves, and is promptly erased from the story after deciding to "ignore" literally everyone including ones who weren't involved . She would just ruin the plot if she told anyone so she was silenced due to plot reasons.
- Maya's entire storyline revolves around a (true) rumour of free tuition offered by the sorority (as a form of extortion into prostitution), which she needs. This secret is both so secret that the sorority president and the rest of the university is completely unaware, but yet random people outside of the entire university are aware of it. There is no explanation as to how Maya knows about this.
- The main plot involves a certain person who can give or take scholarships to and from students, at any time including during the school year, and for apparently any reason without any oversight.
- On the MCs first day he is given a weggie by the jocks. But he's also a pro boxer and a week later fights 3 jocks at once and wrecks them. So there's some really inconsistent bullying going on because the plot required it.
- A certain teacher makes the MC jump through 18 hoops for a secret sexual encounter, but then allows him to film it that same night without a second thought despite the frat he's in posting a nude photo online of another teacher that very same day.

- The most egregious example is with the Josy/Maya reveal. You have 3 ways of romancing the girls. 1. You romance them both. 2. You romance neither of them. 3. You romance one but not the other.
The problem is that the game forces your character to storm out and get really angry with them after the reveal. Except this makes no sense for two of the three choices. If you didn't romance either of them, why would the MC be angry that they are dating each other? He would not care at all. If you romanced them both and then get upset, well now you are a huge hypocrite because you did the exact same thing as them. It only works if you only romance one, as then it actually feels like a betrayal. Giving us player agency with a love interest and then yanking it away like that undermines the entire point of being able to romance someone.

Then there's the story straight up abandoning plot threads.
- You meet Maya because you need a new dorm after your guitar was stolen and your asshole roommate was beaten up and lashes out at you. You meet Sage because she is given the guitar (despite not knowing how to play). It is never explained who stole it and beat up your roommate and he effectively ceases to exist afterwards anyways so it doesn't matter.
- The Jock president gets sent blackmail pictures and blames the MC, resulting in him assaulting the MC and getting removed from the leadership of the Jock frat. It is never explained who sent those pictures, why, or what they even were pictures of. And that Jock then all but vanishes from the story as well from that point on.
- A teacher has a nude posted online and feels ashamed, but the MC and others help her overcome it only for her to do a 180 and abruptly resign. She also disappears from the story after this point.

- I'll add in that the photos and alleged blackmail does get revisited in Episode 10 and looks to become major plot point now. But it still doesn't excuse the results. I was expecting the MC to talk to the teacher about why she did a 180 and quit after she has sorted it out. Or why the Jock thought that the MC was blackmailing him (the Jock shouted it during the fight). But both characters simply disappear after these scenes and they are never mentioned again. Plot threads that realistically should have been followed up on were forcibly removed from the story until DPC decided that they were allowed to be talked about again several chapters later. That's not good storytelling. I can guarantee that after 6 in game months the sorority girl who left is going to magical appear again just in time to blow the whole prostitution ring wide open.

- After the Jock president beats up the MC, the frat is on thin ice and are warned that any misstep could result in them getting shut down. This is brought up multiple times and the DIKs even mock the jocks because they know that they can't fight back. Then this whole thing is promptly ignored as the jocks literally destroy the DIK house and both the school and the DIKs themselves don't seem to care and no one even brings it up again.

Are you sensing a theme yet?

The main plot, as much as their is one, seems to revolve around Quinn setting up the drug and prostitution ring because she "needs money". Why? Fucked if I know. 5 years in and we have almost no insight into the motivations of the main antagonist.

In all these cases, the plot required something and it just happened. There was no logic or consequences, the story just needed something to happen so it made it happen and then ignored every consequence that could have resulted from it except the one that it wanted. Key details that anyone would realistically know are hidden for the story, threads get introduced and abandoned all the time because the story requires it, and other threads are forcibly ignored until the plot requires someone to give a shit about them again. The main plot hasn't advanced in any meaningful way since the second chapter and at this point I just don't really care anymore. Quinn needs money. Whatever. Honestly the secondary plot with the photos and the people behind it is far better and actually makes sense, so why didn't DPC just run with that one?

This game has a ton of splitting paths that make for great replayability, but is also chock full of minigames and long unskippable free roam events that make it a daunting task to go through it again. That said, I think that the free roam events are very clever and well done but they need to be used in moderation. Chapter 9 was a single multi-hour long event comprising of 5 parts, and honestly by the end I was just skipping through the tasks wanting it to be done. I really don't want to replay that event but I'm going to have to for every LI path now, which just sucks.

In summary, the game is artistically very good, but the story is a mess and it feels like it's adding small plot arcs one at a time that have little to no effect on the main story.

That said, I still recommend this game. It's good, really good actually, but it's far from deserving of the perfect praise that it receives.

This developer has been doing so well since the first game he release which is acting lesson. Now with BiD i gotta say im in love with content that has been produce by Dev. Great storyline, great dialogue, great renders, animation and yeah especially the girls. I love them all and trying them all.

Keep up the good work. Patreon support here lets go!

This might be a porn game, but it's more a game than a porn game. Good story, good characters, long and impactful. Ironically, a lot of times, I'm more interested in the story than the porn part because these are rich and feeling characters. It's not a perfect story, no story ever is. But it is really, really good.

There is no doubt that the full score works, if it is not no nfsw can reach, multi-route choice network narrative, three-dimensional character shaping, good use of bgm, this is the ceiling level works, I cleared more than ten archived routes, accumulated 200 hours, never tired

The crown jewel of adult games. Graphics are top tier as is the writing. Perfect mix of sandbox and VN. If mini games are activated, they aren't repetitive and "grindy" - nor do you need to play them at all. Even side characters have fairly flushed out plot lines.

Only knock on the game...30+ gigabytes and counting! Development has slowed a bit since the game first came out (updates are now ~yearly) but its understandable given how much content each update packs. It is also because the developer is actually finishing each path the player can take rather than rushing to the finish line.


5 stars do not do this game justice

I feel this game consistently does everything to a high level. The game doesn't do any of the stuff that's foundational to an AVN badly it does all of it well. That's not something you really see there is usually something whether it be visuals, sex, story etc that's just not that good. Here everything is genuinely done well. I've not played a an AVN where consistently every single aspect is done to a quality level it is in this game and that's what has made it stand out for me.

The only real bad points is the minigames and sandbox parts and I can forgive the sandbox because Ren'py is a bitch to do big events in with branching if you don't have it laid out like that. While minigames can be turned off. Some optional minigames or sandbox just really just didn't have an impact on my enjoyment especially since I was having fun even in the sandbox parts. I was surprised when I realized I was having fun since I usually detest sandbox parts.

So you essentially have a game where there's 10 episodes where everything is done to a high standard with a bunch of choice and hot girls and fun characters. I don't know how long it can keep the title but right now this does feel like the best AVN I've played simply because it manages to do everything well across the board consistently.

Still the gold standard for AVNs, especially school setting dating sims. It's very clear DPC takes this very seriously and is very proud of it;as he should be.

Top notch dialogue and characters compared to other visual novels.
The game does a great job making you care about even the most minor of characters. As the story progresses the characters get more depth and it's been looking good so far. As the episodes go on we get to truly explore the nuances of our relationships, although we're in the baby stages for now.

The renders have come a long way-not just sex scenes but the look of the free roams has gotten more polished with each episode, and I thought he peaked in the latest episodes party free roam.

The overall story is obviously the highlight. Constant events to keep the ball rolling. Just the right amount of mystery to keep the player engaged. A clear driving force in the story. I think the amount of discussion and theories speaks for itself. The amount of pathing makes it feel like every decision counts.

Lastly, the attention to detail in this game is everything. Dialogue, decisions,
or even just people in the background-they all come together to make the world a whole lot more immersive.

Yes, it's not perfect. Development time, the # of mini games, etc, we all have our gripes with this game-but nothing really does come close. It will be interesting to see where DPC takes these characters and their relationships.

This game is missing a lot of my fetishes - it's relatively vanilla (to me) - and it's still my favorite game on this site.

That's how well written, interesting and likeable the characters are. They all have very distinctive personalities and backstories, even the side girls and male characters. Though there are 5 "main girls", many of the side girls also have a lot of development and content and most of them are interesting in different ways.

The story itself is very fun and well done. Good balance of drama, humour and sexy - and depending on your choices you can tilt it more toward one or the other as you like. Its a classic, spicy teen-comedy type story but since it's a porn game, it's turned up to 11. Despite that, the writing still feels believable. One thing in particular that i've noticed several times is how well edited the scenes in this game are - something i've never considered noteworthy in any other porn game. At some points the editing, along with the writing and music choice feels like a legitimately good "serious" game.

There is a "morality/dominance" mechanic where you can make choices to be either a confident frat fuckboy on one side or a more subdued, polite nerdy guy on the other - and a good amount of overlap between them. The girls reactions toward you are affected by this mechanic and at some point even up to you being unable to have a relationship with some of them if youre too far or not far enough on either side. (a nice shy girl may not date you if you're a huge DIK, for example).
There are many different minigames throughout that you can choose to disable at the beginning. Most will probably not love these but they're not terrible, some are decent and they may offer a little change of pace here and there - though i'd prefer if they were less frequent. Besides them, the game is a pretty standard Visual Novel with reading and choices plus "free roam" sections where you have free movement between screens and some small "sidequests" which amount mostly to optional conversations/sex scenes and the like.

While the story and emotional connection to the characters are the strongest points of the game, that doesn't mean the porn isn't good - its great and plentiful.
Visually everything looks great. Most characters are very sexy (some incredibly so). A little technical/art jank here and there, especially in the earlier episodes - some clothing that doesnt fit perfectly etc. - but overall very high quality. Sex animations are relatively simple but nice and there is a lot of them. Particularly, there's a lot of kissing in the sex scenes that i don't see animated very often which i like here. The enviornments look really good too, clearly a ton of work went into them.

Great music choices for each scene, many are actual licensed songs and are very fitting. Other audio besides music is minimal. One thing i wish the game had was voices - though i get that almost none of these games have them, and if they do they suck. But everything in this game feels so nice and polished that sex scenes without some moaning noises feel a little incomplete.
Thats just a minor nitpick, i get how difficult it would be to give the characters unique voices that don't feel out of place.

The game is unfinished as of now (December 2023) but it's well worth playing - it has a lot of content, both story and sexual.

I can't wait to see the endings, hopefully not too much later than in a couple of years.

The king is dead.

BaDIK used to be the best game in literally all aspects, but instead of finishing it on a high note, the dev started artificially postponing updates, adding completely unnecessary minigames and events. And now, here we are, left with just another average game.

Models: 9/10
This where the game still actually shines. A lot of beutiful and memorable girls. Sage, Jill, Bella, Lily... you name it. A few years ago it was absolute top, but now there are already numerous games that have reached the same level and even surpassed it.

Plot: 6/10
Just a typical college setting. Not really annoying, but there's no depth in it.

Gameplay: 3/10
A LOT of stupid, completely unnecessary and unavoidable minigames. And so for free roams. The first ones were quite decent, but the last ones just plain bad.

Sex scenes: 4/10
Mostly boring. It's actually kind of disappointing to see such well-designed models with poorly animated and not memorable slideshow-like sex scenes. Bella is being the main disappointment.

Writing: 7/10
Again nothing special. There're some good moments and a few amount of humor here and there, but it's not even close to the top level

(As of 0.10)

Had I written this review when this game came out (early 2019!!) I would've given it 5 stars.

The early episodes showed a lot of potential aside from the obvious problems of a first release. Back then the graphics were among the best in this site and the storyline was intriguing and vague enough that it managed to capture my attention.

Fast forward to late 2023 when 0.10 was released, how the mighty have fallen, this game feels like a scam for the players. Let me explain, this game never again reaches the level of those first episodes.

The initial storylines go nowhere, instead we get uninspired plot that's extremely boring, characters that become uninteresting and new characters that I can't find myself caring about.

While the other games that come out get better in the graphics department this game remained freeze in time, no improvement whatsoever.

But the most annoying part is that the same enfuriating features that I had patiently put up with once because the game was in it's early stages, they never go away and instead become 90% of the game while actually getting worse (the freeroams get worse with every update, the mind-numbing point and click grind of unlocking renders wasn't fun the first time and still isn't, the mini-games are the biggest waste of time I can imagine).

And the thing is: you can't escape them. Sure, you can turn off mini-games and play half the game, but that won't save you from the other stuff. And if you want to try another path then you'd be trapped in this unnecessary bloat of non-content that is this game for the most part.

Even if you have a storyline or character you are interested in, you'll find yourself going through dozens of storylines and characters you couldn't care less about but simply can't avoid. So you'll have to go through walls and walls of poorly written dialogue just to get to those few storylines you actually want, and get at most some short minutes of actual content once per year.

So I can't score this game at this stage highly. Yes, the first episodes were pretty cool, some of the characters seemed interesting... but it has been downhill since then.

Bar some exceptions, everything has gotten worse to the point where I wish this game would've ended some episodes ago. then my score would've been in the middle: an okay game with unfulfilled potential.

But the game dragged on, and now it's not that it didn't reach it's potential, but it's gotten significantly worse and it's living in the glory of it's former days. if you could trim this game to leave the good parts then I would still recommend it, but as it is, I can't recommend to anyone to pick this up nowadays.