VN - Ren'Py - Between Salvation and Abyss [Ch.10 P2] [Ethan Krautz]

This is a horrible game, ugly models, bad story and horrible dialog writing

The models are bad, like the mom's boobs and ass is soo big it looks obviously unreal and to the point it starts looking less attractive and more disfigured

And what's with those pimples/spots all over the face with other girls?



And the writing is extremely horrible

Dialogues feel extremely dry

When the MC returns home after so long time, the family members reaction feels overdone, and the conversations feels extremely dry, it has no depth, feels like generic dialogue writing by a grade schooler.

It's obvious that this game wasn't created with passion rather created just to catch on the hype train of AVNs and milk that patron cow for as long as possible

The game proved to be a disappointment for me. I went as far as Ch7 part 1 so maybe some things will change from now on but I doubt it.

Right off the bat I need to tell you that Between Salvation and Abyss is not a game where you can be either good or bad when it comes to sex. 80-90% of content is about vanilla stuff that just repeats itself with almost every woman you meet. If that wasn't enough they are all almost begging you to bed them and despite this things move painfully slow with them. You get no satisfaction that you've done something (except for the 2 sex slaves) because of how they are throwing themselves at you. The dark side (a couple of sex slaves) is barely 10% -20% of the content and it's there as a side note and always rushed. The choices (in general not jut for the dark stuff) are non existent even when compared to the average XXX visual novel. The story is fine but it gets overly complicated without adding anything for the XXX content so it's hard to keep interested.

So despite the effort put in it and the decent amount of content I can't recommend it.

It's an interesting story, reasonably well-developed. Some of the models are cute and sexy, and the renders are done well. My main complaint about the game is similar to that in some other reviews -- lack of choice about sexual content. I am totally uninterested in sex that results in anal prolapse, but that's what most sex in this game is. If that floats your boat, this is the game for you, but not me.

*story: 5 stars

*script: 3 stars I see a lot of grammar/sentence errors and sometimes someone is talking and it will have another persons name instead of the correct person .

*lewd scenes: 2 stars. lack of sexual preferences is very annoying. just about every time it is auto anal. Anal, anal, and more anal. I never pick anal in VN's but in here you are forced. Had to start skipping the lewd scenes. It would be 5 stars if it let you pick vaginal on the people you love. Leave the anal raping for the slaves/enemies!

Goofy meandering narrative with some decently fappable scenes. If you like male dom and incest you can probably get something out of this as there are a lot of decent scenes with the standards: mom, sis, aunt. The models are nice looking and have a bit of variety to them and the animations are passable, though the scenes tend to be on the short side. Lots of anal, which is good but the dev seems to have a thing for prolapsing anuses that i could have done without.
recommended for anyone who likes incest and male dom and is just looking for a fap
not recommended for people who need a solid narrative and deep characterizations.

I had a good time with this, nice story and good quality renders. Though not a lot of choices in this, it more like reading a story.

It was a bit hard to get in the story at the beginning, but that got better in time and as I said earlier there's not a lot of choices to make so story/gameplay wise it doesn't really matter.

I can get the other reviews saying the mc is being used and is oblivious to it, but I think it works story wise. It fits the character and his story. From his point of view with his background and history I think it makes sense he act's the way he does.

All in all I would play this again and can't wait to see how it all plays out in the end.

This VN was reasonably enjoyable the first couple of chapters.

Some mystery and tragedy was very nice and interesting.

the character personalities was pretty alive and varying, the females are pretty hot and well designed.

MCs personality is great, hes ruthless and an asshole which makes it far more interesting than the typical emotional mary sue simp MC that everyone seem so obsessed with.

writing was great, not perfect mind you, but at least readable.


Then it all falls apart, the mystery aspect of the VN becomes tedious and annoying because its drawn out for too long and more and more mysteries is introduced into the story which ends up piling on top of the old ones.

the female characters all become a bundle of issues where every single chick has some tragedy or boho thing going for them which would've been interesting if it wasn't present in every single one of them


the MC turns out to be a puppet for some organization yet too dumb to realize it even when people VERY clearly keeps hinting at it.


Honestly i would list a dozen more bad things but i dont have the energy for it.
This was an amazing VN turned garbage because the dev couldnt come up with something new and instead repeats things over and over just slightly differently.

At the start my first thought was while it is rough the game has potential but unfortunately the longer you play the worse the game gets.

One of the biggest problems of the game is technical, some scenes are repeated, dream sequences didn't work for me and some text has the wrong person attached, the art and spelling/grammar is passable but needs some work, mostly background and animations for the art.

For once the characters are the big plus for the game with the MC being a realistic interpenetration of someone who would have gone through what he did, honestly is great just to not have a simp MC, the women are quite varied in both art style and personalities(on a personal note, 80's pubic hair should stay in the 80's), sex scenes are good with a nice verity of positions and kinks.

I didn't find any choices that changed or directed the game but for once i think this game would be better as a pure kinetic novel without any choices as it fits the story better to just follow one direction.

While the story here is actually quite interesting and at the start very good it quickly develops problems, the first being it gets quite confusing figuring who is who and who is on which side and how many sides there are(a character guide would help with this or at least a recap every now and then), second is the story becomes lazy and things start to make less and less sense once the MC meets the woman in red,
As a side note the whole Katya forced sex thing is a total 180 of the MCs tough guy, take charge, dom personality which is disappointing and shows again how the game gets worse the longer it goes on.

Story 3/5 (good at the start)
Sex 3/5 (OK)
Characters 4/5 (Realistic)
Art 3/5 (passable)
Choices 1/5 (none but not really needed)
Kinks 3/5 (some but no huge focus on them)

Version played: Ch 6, part 1

Interesting story with many variations (of body type) for the female characters. The renders are not very HD but it is fine and serves along well with the tone of the story. Recommended to use the multi-mod for mostly the ambient music.

As for the negatives I think it is more of a taste that is not for me because the sex scenes are mostly the rough and violent type and consist (mostly) of anal scenes. I understand it is part of the dark story tone, it is just not to my flavor.

Still give it a high score because the story piqued my interest.

This is an interesting VN. Saying that, it's not quite 5 star material.
PROS
Renders are good
Female models are good
Story is interesting

CONS
MC looks like a mid teen.
Time line doesn't seem to add up to me
Dialogue needs some grammar fixes.

Overall
So, the MC was away for what I believe was 3 years, but he committed the crime when he was a child. This doesn't really add up to where we are now with the story. Could be just that my math is awful though.
There are loads of dialogue problems. I had to re-read several scenes to understand what was trying to be said. I stopped at Episode 4 to submit this review. I'll finish up the rest shortly
OUTSIDE of what I have listed above, I like the actual story. It pulls you in on some level and I'm left enjoying it more and more.
I do recommend this VN because it's a good story. Very few sex scenes, but that's not a big hit to the overall flow of things. They are worth the wait. Good luck to the dev and I look forward to the next update and where the story goes from here

Actually one of the best games out there. The concept is unique and very well suited to someone who's into SM things. I hope you continue the works and not abandoned it like the others. I will consider to become one of your patrons when i got the money. Thanks for the games, it is really satisfying concept, not an ordinary incest family things, but also great fetishes.

Overall, a great game that combines dark themes with romance fairly well.

Pros
Renders are good
Story is somewhat interesting
Characters are well done (cute red heads)

Neutral
MC can be a bit psychotic at times

Cons
Kinetic novel. There are choices, but it does not affect the overall story/most sex scenes. Since some of the fetishes are extreme, this is a negative.

Solid game that deals in some uncommon fets. If the one chick that tries to hurt your family wasn't so ugly (I like hardcore content but damn, looking at her is tough) I'd probably give it a 5. The abyss scenes are good, as are most of the adult scenes. Still want to see where it goes from here but liking it enough so far. If you're not a fan of rougher content probably move on but if you can handle it or dig it, again solid game.

-Writing is horrible
- story a cringefest and a total mess all over the place
-could be a kinetic VN since the choices do not matter at all
- renders look average - neither good nor bad
- forced content all over the place and the game refers to "you" as you would actually be the mc (for immersion right?) - well let me at least change the mc's name then please, because refering to me as the mc and giving me no choice of the name , makes it redundant to say "you yadda yadda yadda"

would give 0/5 if I could. Not my taste. cheers

There is a lot to unpack here, it's not that good. And there's also a lot of irony in the fact that you don't actually learn anything until the most recent update, but the english completely falls apart after Chapter 5. The English starts okay, but every update it legitimately get worse. So once again, I have to shout this for the developers in the back.
IF YOU ARE TRYING TO MAKE MONEY OFF OF SOMETHING, AND MARKETING IT TO ANOTHER LANGUAGE, IT IS UNACCEPTABLE TO NOT HAVE A TRANSLATOR, PROOFREADER AND EDITOR THAT NATIVELY SPEAK THAT LANGUAGE.

So I will try to break down the story as I know it, but everything is so purposefully vague that there isn't anything to learn from the story. You "play" as Ethan(or MC if you renamed him) and every update you learn a little more about how much of a sob story he's lived. He killed his abusive father, fell in love with his immediate family (absolutely no pretense there), and is a psychotic, abusive, controlling, obsessive asshole. After killing his dad, he goes to juvie. And for no real reason (that is retconned later)he is scouted by a group called "The Hunters." They want to use him for an ability he apparently has. To see someone's last moments before death. Then they trained a child to kill people for... Reasons? The goals of all organizations in this story aren't made apparent. In fact, no one has any real goals outside of MC's "I want to marry my family."

So, circling back, MC kills people or seduces women for whatever jobs he does. He never really says anything meaningful or expository about the jobs or the hunters conveniently, due to amnesia they somehow gave him while the writer figures out what to write for this disjointed story. Everyone else knows more than MC and they won't tell him because.... Reasons? They won't tell him any expository dialog AND they won't tell him why. Even YOU, the reader, aren't given any information even though you're given the thoughts of other characters. Which is an issue I will talk about later. Finally, MC learns that people born in his family are special, they all have abilities, and are important. WHAT ANY OF THAT MEANS WHO KNOWS. Also, his family is "Pure blood" which means his lineage is just his family inbreeding. Made apparent by a character telling MC she wants him to breed with his family members. And that's about as far as the story goes up to this update. The rest is all character drama between MC and the girls he's having sex with.

Before I get into my complaints, I'll talk a bit about the characters, I guess. Alysha, the mother that was abused and is scared of everything. Monica, older sister who, now that I think about it, all I know about her is she loves MC. She's in a "gang" or group of witches. THEY DON'T EVEN SAY WHAT KIND OF STUPID ORGANIZATION OR GROUP THEY'RE IN. Anyway. Alessia, the younger sister that acts like an actual child and is also in the gang. Euphor, a torture victim that fell in love with MC in captivity and is just as sadistic as MC. Also she's the only one with any real visual appeal. Maya, MC's handler in the hunters is largely absent. Honestly, the rest of the characters aren't important. Or at least you won't know until the Dev gets to the exposition dump he's been teasing for a while now. They all knew MC before gaps in his memory that he's only mentioned in passing. Hell, most of the characters know he has amnesia more than MC does. And all of the characters involved in that are already in love with him. And won't tell him not only what happened during his amnesia, but why he has amnesia at all.

Onto my issues. Oh boy. First off, the content and themes in this story are "edgy for edginess' sake." That is all. I honestly believe the Dev only wants to one up the depravity every chapter instead of tell you the reader what is going on. We're lead to believe that during a bunch of the jobs MC doesn't talk about he seduces mothers for "reasons" but AT MOST he's 20. So all these women are just sleeping with an underage, baby faced, psycho. Sure. And I need to reiterate, EVERYONE speaks so ambiguously that you can't learn what the hell is going on. My biggest gripe, to do with the writing, is the Dev makes it seem like its a first person perspective, but then gives you the reader the omniscient point of view. Meaning you know the thoughts of the other characters. However, ALL THE THOUGHTS YOU READ ARE STILL VERBAL NOTHINGS THAT GIVE NO INFORMATION. What I mean is MC will ask a girl a question, and first she'll pause, second the reader will hear her thoughts "I can't tell him because I'm just not allowed...", then she will say "I can't tell you yet." WHAT WAS THE POINT OF HEARING WHAT SHE'S THINKING??? And finally, the "romance" is done the same with every girl. MC bluntly states how much he cares for whoever he's trying to get with, walks up to her, holds her chin up so she looks at him, grabs the sides of her face, tells her how she feels about him, then they wrap their snake tongues around each others for a makeout session. And she just decides that he's right. Not very romantic...

The technical issues I have are a little more sparse. We have another VN that uses the Default RenPy UI. I'm tired of repeating this, but if you can't take an hour or two to make a new textbox, choice background, and find a free font that's lazy. Or even better pay someone to make one for you, I don't know what you're doing. Also, the built in "narrator" that is used for descriptive dialogue is used for a total of 3 lines. And many many many times, the wrong character is said to be speaking. Or worse yet thinking. There's a line that Euphor is supposed to say and think but RenPy says it's MC and it makes the dialog weird.

There could be something here. There's (overdone) mystery. Mostly due to MC's forced amnesia. Some mysticism that isn't just suddenly medieval gowns everywhere. And there's an interesting plot way deep down in this, somewhere. But this is 100% just a reason for the Dev to put sadistic content in a VN and to let the story shine would need a huge rewrite that just won't happen. And I won't hold my breath.

TLDR - Vague story, bland characters, worse English as time goes on, sadism for the sake of sadism, default RenPy UI, and nonsensical MC. This is written as a fetish dump first with a half assed story to get from sex A to sex B.

Very good story and great characters, it's leaving me frustrated with anticipation to what's going to happen soon, most of the characters or sweet and kind Nd will melt your heart where as some will make you feel pissed off and feel justice when that get what they deserve, one thing I'm critical of is the rape, I don't like it and this isn't me defending the Dev but I understand why the MC does something like that given how he was taught things, can't go into specifics but you'll understand his motivation after playing, this isn't bad but the spelling and names can be wrong sometimes but it happens a lot so it's not that big of a problem

I Pretty much trust this Dev fetish wise after one sentence "others may like to share, but I don't" it did 2 things, it shows that the mc can be somewhat possessive but also warns that future fetishes like swinging/sharing isn't on the table

I'm also a current patron now since I love the story

Good luck krautz

Warning: This game contains graphic violence, such as: Rape, mutilated bodies, screaming nuns, more rape, skinless corpses and a guy name Drake. If that's not something you're into then, this game may not be for you.

I'm sure that message is presented in the game somewhere.

As far as this game goes, it has brutal scenes, a couple that may be stomach turning to some but overall I enjoy this game. Our MC has been screwed one way or another throughout his whole life. So it's no surprise that he's not this clean cut, squeaky clean guy some of you want him to be and that's a good thing. Not every Dev has to follow the standard procedure when creating a MC, the guy has had a fucked up life so yeah, that's going to spill out eventually.

The characters are likable, some more than the other. The dialogue is a problem but nothing that can't be corrected. Sex scenes are hot, especially the corruption scenes. This game just needs skip options for the squeamish crowd.

well holy smokes I fucking loved this game, the story, the characters, the scenes animations, everything is top notch perfect.. can't waste for the next update... Dev you have a banger with this one.... And smokes the Maledom scenes are top notch as well, hope to get more like these... Good Game

I love this game. A story with a dark twist but I like it. The character designs are great and well done. Animations could be a bit better but it's his first game so it's normal. Mommy is very hot can't wait to bang her. Can't wait to play more of this game. Keep it up dev you're doing a great job.

This is like a 2.5 for me. This visual novel takes multiple hours to play through, and you don't even fuck any of the main female characters yet. Footjob from one, handjob from another, and handjob/blowjob from the third. This VN is 95% story/reading, 5% sex. Maybe even worse. And, there is a "decent" amount of sex content, but there is just TONS of "story".

The story is... okay, technically unique. The dialog sucks in the beginning, but becomes okay. There are a lot of attractive women, but as is typical with a game that has a sex-to-game ratio as this one, you probably won't be able to sex all of them for another 2 years irl time. Maybe dev doesn't have plans for that to happen anyways.

And, I think the base game doesn't even have audio? Or, maybe it does... idk, I played the modded one.

In short, it's just a lot of fucking reading, for not much payoff.