VN - Ren'Py - Completed - Between Salvation and Abyss [Final] [Ethan Krautz]

Abrupt ending that leaves a bunch of things open ended with no resolution and some vague tie up to the dev's other game. This story started off silly enough but got way too wordy and introduced a bunch of things in the final act that weren't congruent to the overall mythos. Our MC is suddenly a reincarnation of some ancient mythical being and all the girls he was dominating(incestual or not) are connected to his past life where he was betrayed. The original plot of there being an evil institute after the MC gets lost in the poorly introduced greek mythology.
The mother is the main focus here but I liked the younger girls way better. The neighborhood redhead and her mom were my favorites. Fetish wise, there are some weird fixations in the game that you are forced to indulge in even if you're not interested in them, but I liked that our self insert is not a wimp. Some might say he's too forceful but I don't mind a little edge. Perks of not being on Patreon.
The renders are inconsistent but get better with time. Overall, the rushed ending brings this down a star for me. Still, not a bad package.

Good Game Worth more then 3 stars I'm give it a 5 star if you take your time and read all of it its worth it then just skipping the reading part most people that rate these type of games bad just don't have a good taste

⠀⠀I've tried playing this twice, both times died of cringe. Writing in this title is absolutely abysmal. If you came here for the tags, I'd strongly advise to reconsider.
⠀⠀This plot is an acid trip, a mish mash of random, incompatible and poorly executed ideas. The dialogue is mind-numbingly idiotic, grammar's nonexistent and the proofreader was on vacation for entire development cycle. It feels like a puppet talk staged by a child from Bangladesh that tries to speak broken English.
⠀⠀Earlier author foreshadows that you will be able to either seduce or blackmail a certain woman to achieve your goals, but then MC proceeds to blackmail her anyways without giving players any agency. That's literally false advertisement, as there are no meaningful choices presented to the player, the only binary choices that you're given, either increase your love or corruption stat, which will maybe decide your ending I guess, but I really couldn't be bothered to prove this theory. Either way the bulk of the game stays the same regardless of what you've been choosing.

⠀⠀I will not comment on the fetishes themselves, but their visual implementation here looks either goofy or straight up disgusting, depending on your tolerance levels.
⠀⠀Those "landlady" curves are a "bit" too much. Lots of characters in general look extremely obnoxious with horrific body proportions.
⠀⠀Speaking of proportions, MC's penis is way too big, especially for his build. It's pretty much the size of his forearm. It doesn't help the fact that he's obsessed with anal and throat-fucking, and there is no way it would fit either holes without some kind of injuries. I get it, that's the theme, but suspension of disbelief is simply not there.
⠀⠀Renders are super scuffed - blurry with visual artifacts. This game is just generally ugly, and that's another key point to make, since many people play these games for pretty picture and don't really care about the quality of script. Well, this project has neither.

Ive been checking the thread of this game and I am not surprised to see so much criticism towards it most of it was warranted though, this game has many flaws but I ended up enjoying it in the end.

The negatives, lets start with the whole prolapse stufff. Dev, the technology just isnt there yet, the prolapses look justawful because you cant really do them well with Daz, that makes them much worse. And I dont even like prolapses, but even I know it looks awful. this kink should have been made avoidable.

I was enjoying the intial focus on anal sex but from the mid game to the end it seems like there stops being anal sex, I dont know if it was the constant criticism in this thread abou things being unavoidable and such but anal sex just doesnt exist from the mid point of the game, which is a shame seeing the kind of big booty girls this game has, specially the albino werewolf that gets introduced later on.

Finally, the name, I know it is plot related, but I always prefer to change the name of the portagonist, I think that little detail is causing the game not being as popular as it should....... that and the prolapses.

Aside from all this I did enjoy the rest of the game,. the women are great and mostly virgins which is so fuycking good. A lot of devs are just scared to include even a single virgin in their games, here all of them are (except for the milfs with kids), I did like the rough sex aspects of the game and the renders were ok. there was a missed opportunity to fcuk the girls as a werewolf though, which only happened off camera iirc, a waste.

Overall it is a great game, it would have been even greater if it didnt have all just vaginal sex for half of it, but I digress

The poor way of showing the content of the story killed this game especially after the transformation and them still lying on him for just make the game unnecessarily longer,


honestly if he stayed human and the same person we will not feel much different because u didn't add anything we could benefit from being a werewolf of vampire etc,

even u didn't show any kind of battles using these characteristics, a remake would do the desired changes but I know a lot of these current projects are making it even worse

Even the mod that added music stops in chapter 8 lol

This is a very average game, I wanted to enjoy it but its lacking in a few areas

The story: boring
The writing: There are quite a few grammical errors or translation issues
The renders: Look very low quality
The models: Need work

Overall I'd give this a 5/10 , there is alot to be learn't about designing games going forward based on this one. Its playable but I couldn't finish it, it never once grabbed me with a gripping story

This is my jam. Everything I love is in this game. It has really good fantasy plot. The problems I felt was,
1) The lore could have expanded even more.
2) Hera and Zeus fight could have been more epic.
3) Needed more sex scenes.
4) More extreme scenes would have been great.
5) Ending was good, but felt rushed and it could have been better.
Good luck to the makers and hope they make more good game like this.

One of the best games on my list .It has good story .good sex scenes and everything makes sense ,unlike other bad games.It has proper creampie scenes where pussy with cum is shown ,just the way it should be shown .many games don't show creampie scenes .I hope u make games like these more .some errors are there in english but still good enough .

I say this is better than the recent reviews say.

Go into it expecting some lesser writing, but I would not call it nonsensical.
I think the author was not good at transitioning, and imo clearly had a different idea to start with and changed part way in.

Honestly, I skipped a lot of the text. But even so I picked up a lot of what was going on with a little skimming and all the visuals.

The thing that bothered me was the arbitrary stomach bulge. One scene it bulges, the next it doesn't. I love stomach bulge, but omitting it randomly just made it seem odd.

I enjoyed some of the girls particularly. Little non-sis was cute af. And Sophia was a beauty. I also loved that there was pregnancy, as that adds a bit of story progress/completion for me.

There were too many characters I felt like. That led to a lot of them not getting enough focus and the main ones missing out due to them being there. Could easily have cut half of them out and made it a more personal story for all the characters.

Love the greek stuff. Not the biggest fan of the half assed use of it though.

I don't recommend this if you're in it for the reading.
I don't really recommend it for the porn either, but it isn't awful. I found it pretty hot quite a few times.
I do recommend it if you're bored and want to skim through a raunchy debaucherous power fantasy.

Honestly, this game is bad. Like, on so many levels of bad. Story makes less sense the further you go. Multiple Deus Ex machinas throughout the latter half of the game. MC becomes almost omnipotent and invincible overnight. Some of the fetishes are weird (but I don't kink-shame so whatever gets the author off is okay but this game misses the mark for me).
Also, horse-sized MC dick (I don't like unrealistic genitalia) magically disappearing inside girls' mouths, asses and pussies breaks immersion. I get that the story is about magic and stuff but there's no magic being used during most of the sex scenes.
Some of the girls have insanely big boobs and weird hip/waist proportions. This breaks immersion even further and makes the game look like a freak show and turns sex scenes into doll-fucking.

I would probably rate it 0/5 but some of the models were well-done and I like harem games with multiple scenes of anal sex in general so I'm settling on 2/5. Also, Euphor is so fucking hot (both body and personality), and "eyes thing" is well-done for all the girls that have it.

"What if Twilight was torture porn?"

It's really hard for me to judge this game fairly. I review it now after completion and have followed it on and off throughout its development. There are things to like, things to hate, and things that I don't even know what to think about.

First of all, this game features explicit scenes of violence and torture (that I don't think are optional, even if you follow the 'good' path - correct me if I'm wrong). That's a no-go for many and - to a degree - me, too. What I appreciate is a certain realism in the portrayal of violent acts. For example, there are so many games where the MC does anal without lube (no, honey, spit doesn't work) and it's a clean affair. It isn't, and this game shows the bloody consequences. It's also one of the very few games that features anal prolapse. This isn't strictly my thing but I appreciate the approach to not sugarcoat acts of violence. That being said, the victims of this abuse are the shallowest of one-dimensional characters. They are simply there to be abused and forget about.

The game doesn't discuss these acts of violence the MC unleashes - not to a meaningful degree anyway. The author continues to concoct a - let's say 'outlandish' (some might say 'ridiculous') - plot twist to explain these bouts of anger and violence, but it's a bit of a cheap trick in my book.

Anyway - if you're a fan of rape fantasies and gratuitously assaulting people to a degree of mutilation then - hey! - this is your game. (You also need therapy, you sick fuck :*)

In spite of all of this, I still somehow appreciate the effort, originality, and creativity that went into creating the sex scenes - and if you leave out the heavy gaslighting, the MC does have consenting sex as well, sort of.

In the end, that's what kept my interest going, but I have to say that I just skipped the text for the sex scenes at some point (and there are at least many). The story sprawls into this mythological abyss (figuratively and literally, I guess) and pulls all of these deus-ex-machina contraptions out of its own prolapsed anus. I'm not a fan of that, especially not the nonsensical writing in the later chapters.

All in all, I can't give more than 2 stars. It's a 'game', it's 'finished', sure, and there are some levels of orginality and creativity to the sex scenes, but that's about it. Heavy minus points for all the unconsequential rape stuff and nonsensical plot. Play at your own peril.

Love the fetishes and their execution but I have to give it 3 stars. The story is nonsensical. You read some and just wanna skip the rest.
On the positive note it is one of the very few games with extreme anal gape and prolapse..

POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD

Review based on Version: Chapter 10 Part 2.

TL;DR is available at the bottom of this post.

Preface
First of all, I came across Ethan Krautz through his other game, The Sunset Fairies. To be frank, TSF and BSAA were practically in the same shape. I played TSF and BSAA as I'm a softie for redheads. IMHO both would've got at least 4 stars if not for the disastrous writing. Will be explained further later on.

Story
After spending years in a correctional facility for killing his father in retaliation for abusing his mother, the protagonist joined the "Hunters" due to his unique ability to witness the final moments of the deceased by touching their bodies. His life takes a dramatic turn when a vision from a dead colleague reveals a shocking truth: he has been a pawn of the "Hunters" all along, and he is a reincarnation of himself, having died 500 years prior. Now, driven by vengeance, he embarks on a relentless quest to destroy those who have wronged him once and for all.

Views on Story
The game's starting trope is pretty straightforward. MC kills his abusive father after witnessing years of suffering inflicted on his mother. After serving time in prison, he begins working with a parole officer, only to discover that the officer is linked to the same people who had ordered his father to break him mentally at any cost, raping included. MC then finds out that magic, witches, vampires, and werewolves exist. This is where the story starts to go off the rails.

MC is turned into a werewolf and learns that he is the reincarnation of himself and that he once had goddesses as lovers. He also discovers that many of the people he knew 500 years ago are reincarnated in the present day. MC also begins using the church’s mausoleum to break and manipulate the female "villains". On one side, I don't mind mind control, mind break, and abuse, but on the other hand, it is very repetitive here, it takes away the "fun" aspect.

The game has pretty much little to no story, despite the 10 Chapters. Most of it is just sex, sex, hardcore sex, and sex. I can confidently say about 75% of the game is just about ejaculating and evacuating. Story-wise, 2/5.

The thing that bugs me is the writing. Very poor grammar, constantly wrong pronouns, wrong words and phrasing, with very unnatural dialogue that it feels like robots are the ones doing the talking. Paired with a hard-to-follow story, practically a disaster waiting to happen. Dev should get a proofreader. Writing-wise, 1.5/5.

Renders and Animations
BSAA's renders are pretty good, even without the fancy schmancy stuff you can see on higher-quality games. Blood and Cum textures are good, Animations are good, and Setting work can be better since some inconsistencies can be observed. But otherwise, I won't complain. Good renders, models, and animations. Render-wise, 4/5.

Gameplay
Pretty much straightforward gameplay, no bullshit, no character love points, only corruption and love points. But I fail to notice what both do here in BSAA, as they can change scenes in TSF. Choices here mean little to nothing, as there are no consequences in choosing one over the other as far as I can notice. Pretty much a skip-spammable game. No relationship to build, no nothing. Girls drool for MC's dick and want to constantly be filled. Romantic scenes were cringe-inducing when we know the final destination is to fuck girls into submission. Again, very confusing dialogues. Gameplay-wise, 1.5/5.

Content
Content-wise, BSAA is all about violence. Both in the killing and sex sense. If you played TSF before, BSAA is the same, but worse. Most girls MC gets to rail are virgins, so blood during sex is very much expected. However, some fetishes such as granny sex and prolapses are very much forced. The MC is also a manipulative asshole, he goes around and gives anal and vaginal prolapses to the girls he claimed he loves, while narcissistically forcing the girls to smile and such, but not doing shit that actually makes them happy. Pretty ironic and absolute nonsense. MC also rapes "villains" with revenge being the motive.

I don't judge kinks, but more extreme kinks should be optional. If I hadn't known better, I'd say BSAA is pretty much trying to normalize abuse, violence, and rape. MC does them as naturally as breathing. If he's not abusing, raping, and fucking girls, he'll go about killing his enemies and vice versa. Content-wise, 3/5.

Characters, Love Interests and Paths
Character-wise, I will only say 1 thing. THERE ARE TOO MANY CHARACTERS! I can count around 30 characters that are currently in BSAA. Who knows how many more the dev will add in the future? To add to the confusion, Some characters have very similar names such as Alysha, Aysha, Alessia (the mom, aunt, and sister), and Maya and Mary (colleague and sister's friend). No offense but the dev lacks the common sense to name his characters differently enough to avoid the player's confusion. Some characters also have very very large boobs, not my cup of tea.

There are no also paths, but pretty much all the girls in the game are fuckable, borderline begging to be dicked, save for a few that will probably get their turn in the later updates. There are currently so many girls the MC dicked that I lost count but it should be around 20, and there are still a handful more that have yet to receive a dicking from MC. Just goes to show the absurd amount of characters. Character-wise, 2/5.

Conclusion
Firstly, BSAA is a confusing, janky mess. I want to continue playing, but there is so much nonsense I kinda lost interest halfway through the game. The tropes are getting nonsensical the further in, and the players are also left in the dark as the information the game gives you is very damn cryptic, the script even acknowledges it at one point. You get 1 question answered to just have another 5 unanswered questions. Dev throws whatever he wants into BSAA, it's getting out of hand. At this point, the dev giving answers to all the questions I have would be considered a miracle.

Secondly, BSAA URGENTLY and SORELY needs a proofreader. Everything is very messy. The English used is on par with an elementary student. Wrong pronouns, off-putting, unnatural and robotic dialogue, wrong speaker, characters unnecessarily narrating their actions, wrong MC name if renamed (one transition screen and one sex scene show the default name).

Thirdly, the story needs streamlining, and the pacing needs to be improved. At this point, the story is very messy, with no clear directions. You're a human one day, then you get turned into a werewolf out of nowhere while going on a date with a girl. I am tempted to just wait for the final release and just play it instead. I want answers to the cryptic information the game gives, not add another 5 to the already massive pile of questions that needs to be answered.

Fourthly, dev should make kinks like prolapses, rape, and granny sex optional. I don't feel like seeing a character I fancy getting prolapses. Leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Just let characters do stuff normally. Rape is also very prominent here, I can stomach rape, but it's not for everyone. Granny sex is well... it depends on the character but here? no thanks.

All in all, BSAA is a mediocre game. It's not THAT bad if you can look past the absolute mess of dialogue, story, kinks and the manipulative MC it offers. IMHO, the renders and models are not exactly half bad. However, at the state it's in, I cannot recommend the game. I can stomach what the MC does, but the disastrous grammar is what killed my interest.

TL;DR:
Rating for BSAA:
Story - 2/5, Hard to follow, very cryptic information given to players, not even enough contextual hints.

Writing - 1.5/5, Janky grammar, wrong words, wrong pronouns, overall confusing dialogue.

Render - 4/5, Pretty good. Looks very nice, on par with better games.

Gameplay - 1.5/5, Confusing. Choices don't matter. No relationship points.

Content - 3/5, Violent. Forced kinks, Borderline whitewashing abuse, violence, and rape. Rapes "villains" with revenge as motive.

Character - 2/5, Very confusing names. Too many characters. Girls practically begging to be dicked by MC.

Overall - 2.3/5, Good renders alone can't salvage the disaster the game is. Could improve with the help of proofreaders and content writers.

Not recommended for those who can't stand the forced kinks stated in this review.

I played this game because sometimes I enjoy being evil in a visual novel but this game is just poorly made. The MC has convenient friends and circumstances to manage every situation. He is never struggling, always in control and always trying to portray rape and abuse as some form honorable deed in the name of his family. It's a laughable attempt to whitewash rape and violence at best.

Ultimately this game is interesting for people who are sadistic and thrive in extreme debauchery. There is little story to find here, no meaningful choices to make, no relationships to build, it's all about a twisted desire to spread the MCs ego and genes. Family relationships are deeply twisted and shallow with the single aim to be both protector and ultimately owner of them. Literally every female villain gets sexually abused until they reach a breaking point like it's the only language the MC understands.

I'm sure this type of game has its fans but if you have any morals when playing visual novels, if you like to choose the path you are walking, or if you expect a story that is more than a string of perverse exercises, this is not a game you will enjoy. I didn't enjoy any of it.

(I'm still new to this reviewing business, so please bear with me.)

I sort of want to like this AVN more than I do, but the frankly crazy amounts of spelling, grammar, punctuation and overall formatting issues with the text really takes me out of the experience. Generally speaking, I feel like an AVN can (and maybe even should) be judged primarily on 2 things: The writing and the visuals. Both are more or less equally important, and while I definitely wouldn't say BSAA misses the mark with the visual elements, it definitely needs more work when it comes to improving the writing.

For starters, instead of having characters weakly "narrating" their actions with some supposed internal monologue, there really should just be a classic narration. No one thinks to themselves "I'm opening the door in front of me" or "I'm taking a walk in a park" while they are doing that very thing, at least not unless they are a very simplistic robot. Adding to that, spelling and grammar needs work, and a lot of it at that.

One last complaint I have about the writing is the off-puttingly janky dialogue. Little to none of it feels like it's spoken between actual people, and instead makes everyone in the story seem incredibly stiff, one-dimensional, and ultimately pretty much lifeless. And I am pretty damn sure there has never even once been a good story with universally lifeless characters.

Still. Thanks to some good visuals, decently kinky sexual scenes (though unfortunately every single sex scene I've seen so far has leant way too much into the rough stuff for my tastes) the game is not without merit. It's not like some other visual novels where the story was bland and uninspired on top of the sex being that as well. I wish I could give the game 2.5 stars instead of just 2, but since I can only award full stars, I am choosing to round it off downwards.

-Mal

Visual Novel, not much choices to be made, BUT it's perfect for those who like rape, incest and bloody sex.
The trill is perfect, envolves betrayal and passion. The character is not a "hero", he is evil, and it makes the game perfect for those who are bored with the same "hero" type.

Well this is the first kinetic novel that hook me enough to play past the first scene. The story is very edgy, kinda bonkers, yet it's consistent enough wit its tone and its characters to work, a sort of lesser and pornier Vistor Q. The renders are nice but it is to expetc cause the lest freedom had the player, the more pullish the renders tend to be

I'm really enjoying Between Salvation and Abyss! The story quite interesting, and the models are gorgeous especially the red head.

Renders 4/5
Characters 5/5
Story 4/5
Animations 4/5

Overall, this is a fantastic game! It easily gets 8 out of 10 from me. The story is interesting Definitely worth checking out!

(Review of Ch. 10 P2)

This is an AVN clearly designed to offer quantity over quality. A mindless fuckfest where you get to see all kinds of depravation exerted by the MC on every female in his family and beyond, including rape, violence, BDSM, pregnancy and other kinks. The story is pretty forgettable and since the writing is also abysmal, your best bet is to skip all that nonsense and go straight to the sex scenes, which are vanilla quality with "mechanical" animations but just good enough. The MC gets to deflower some petite girls, rape his foes without remorse, knock up his entire family including grandma and fuck them again for good measure when they look about ready to give birth.

It may not suit the most refined tastes but it sure offers plenty of content and variety especially for incest lovers.

Potential Wasted
Version reviewed: Ch10pt2

This had the potential to be great. Ultimately wasted by some forced fetishes and Broken language.

Lets Start with the positives:

* Great mix of diverse characters. All shapes and sizes which makes a nice change (Euphor and Sophia my faves)

* Large mix of fetishes (this is also a negative - as although its nice to see a range available.. as this is a KN rather than a VN - none are avoidable and you are forced to see all)

* Interesting story - i like the "war between humans, gods, vampires, warewolves, witches" kinda thing... done well its a great storyline

Onto the negatives:

* Forces fetishes - There is no choice, and basically you are an asshole to everyone even those you love. How can Forcing Anal and Vaginal prolapses to the ppl you are supposedly in love with be classed as a good thing?

* Horse cock - no idea why the MC in a lot of these games (generally the ones that are average or worse tbf tho) has to have a cock the size of his arm. Its unrealistic and unnessesary. Generally puts me off playing the games tbf.

* Needs a proofreader. The english isnt the worst i have seen but could definately do with someone who is better with the english language to give the text a once over.

OVERALL

The negatives (mainly the forced fetishes - and lack of "nice route") for me unfortunately outweigh the nice mix of characters. I did try and play this all the way through however if i am honest the more dark fetishes (especially when pushed on characters the MC supposedly loves) put me off the more i played.

Average at best because of that.