VN - Ren'Py - Completed - Christmas Eve [v0.4.1] [Jonesy]

I need more stories with this format. Its great. Eve is hot and the dad is just enough reluctant/willing. having Eve have cosplay be a passion is great not just because the costumes are great but because it gives her more character outside "i want my dads cock"

I liked very much the story and all the situations. It may be a little fast how the the daughter starts to have sex, but the story tells that she was preparing for it. The animations are right. I'm now reading the sequel New Year Eve, which is much more complex but I hope it will be as good as this one.

This is not a game. It is a ilustraded story. There isn't even the ilusion of choice, except the name of MC and age of the daughter and friend. And NO animations. But it is a pleasant story. And it is short. And it is ok ilustrated. So 4 stars is stretching... but still for me it is worth the time...

I just finished Christmas Eve today and it's an almost weird mix of comfy and hot. At least in the top 5 of all erotic VNs I ever played, maybe even the best. Thanks for that.

P.S. I played through it nonstop without breaks ;D

[Reviewed [v0.4.1]; Final version at the time of review]

Christmas Eve is a good game that demonstrates the creator’s talent but is hamstrung by substandard production. It has a decent core experience but is rough around the edges. Unfortunately, one of those edges is the sex scenes, which brings the experience down considerably.

Positives

Story: You, a long-time widower, and your daughter are driving to a cosplay convention several days before Christmas when a winter storm causes you to crash. You are then forced to take shelter in an unoccupied house. As it turns out, the house is a frequent vacation spot for romantic couples. This makes it the perfect place for your daughter to reveal her hidden feelings to you.

Like much of this game, the story first appears basic and easy to understand. However, as the story progresses, more elements are introduced, giving the narrative slightly more depth. The unique relationship between your daughters and deceased wife is explored through flashbacks; you and your wife’s long-time friend have an unspoken desire for one another and a young girl with a troubled family situation seeking stability and compassion. Sadly, the game does not capitalize on all these story elements; ultimately, you may leave unfulfilled.

Characters: Solid all around. They are sometimes a bit one-note and bland, but they have distinctive voices and personalities. Their relationships with the MC and each other are well-realized and believable, helped by the writing quality.

Writing: Functional at its weakest with some really great stand-out moments. This might seem like meagre praise, but writing is an oft-neglected aspect of production. However, much like modelling, animating, or any other creative endeavour, it requires much work to be average. The fact that the writing in Christmas Eve never falls to a mediocre level, while sometimes even managing some clever lines here and there, is worthy of being celebrated. Said cleverness is found in the dialogue, which is occasionally thoughtful and engaging and helps the characters endear themselves to the player.

Mise-en-scène: This aspect punched well above its weight compared to the other elements. The creator was knowledgeable enough to arrange scenes in ways that were aesthetically pleasing or trying to embody a certain feeling. One such example is the use of close-up shots. Done poorly, they could be awkward and ugly, but they were executed in a way that created a sense of intimacy with the girls and the MC. Another stand-out moment is the Christmas gift scene, A simple scene with all the characters that show how lighting and composition can create a beautiful scene of people who love each other enjoying each other’s company.

Neutral

Setting: A mixed bag. There are two main settings. A picturesque lodge leased often as a vacation/getaway spot. And the house where the main character and his “family” live. Ironically, the lodge is a boring location. Its sterility and near-flawless interiors make it seem like a movie set, but it is not particularly impressive. On the other hand, the house seems warm, inviting, and lived in; pleasant, but not too much so, with all the furniture and personal touches that make me believe that this is a place where people live. Altogether a much more exciting place for our characters to interact.

Negatives

Sex Scenes: The fly in the ointment. What, ostensibly, we’re here to experience. And what, unfortunately, brings everything down. The sex scenes have two main components: images and animations. The single pictures attached to particular text are fine, but the animation is sorely lacking. It’s two images roughly switching back and forth, a poor simulation of moving imagery. It looks all the while like two wooden puppets smashing against each other. This ends up curbing much of the player’s enjoyment.

Additionally, they are animations rather than scenes going back and forth, meaning it is difficult to skip through them using the “Skip” button or mouse clicks. This means you are forced to experience them in all their “glory.”

Conclusion

A valiant effort that falls at perhaps the most crucial hurdle. A good game marred by poor animations that make sex scenes awkward and unwanted, a near-death sentence for an adult game. It is only through the efforts of the character, story, and dialogue that a good experience can be found regardless of this deficiency.

That was a good experience of a game.
While not my favorite kind of model for the girls (Eve and Kaylee the most), it is overall very good in this department.
Animations are simple but ok. The only thing I'd change here is for the loop to stop only when we'd choose to.
Story is also good, has enough details for immersion.

Okay.. yeah.. it totally borrows STRONGLY from another certain game.. BUT the renders are amazing.. the girl is beautiful.. and the writing is nice.. it's not overly flowery like the source game was.

I really really really hope that the dev continues on this borrowing material trend and we get to meet the sister on the phone in a future game
Update: So I reviewed too early

Looking forward to the next game and sub'd via Patreon

It's a good game overall. Quite sexy.

The negative thing for me was it's quite quick, and i don't mean short, although that is also kind of true, but probably because the dev wanted to split the story in different parts, while. take this one as chapter 1. What i mean is that the characters "move" quickly. at one point MC is like "what the hell have i done" (when making out with his daughter, acting like the world collapsed around him. and the next second he is like "ah, i guess it's fine". I don't mind games that moves quickly. it's just that this was quick and sudden. It distracted me a little from the story. Still it was enjoyable.

as for positives - the models are sexy, the writing is ok/good, the daughter is kind of perverted.

on a side note, i can not pass to mention that this seemed a lot like another game - A Petal Among Thorns - father daughter in a cabin alone, exploring their feelings. the name of the daughter is a word play, the name of his other daughter is another word play. the owner of the cabin have the same name. it has A LOT of similarities, even the models follow the same style - big eyes, cute faces. with one exception - that other game is quite slow. it's a slow burn and although i like slow burn games as well, i struggle with it, because of the filling - it feels like the author didn't know how to manage the slow burn so they kind of started repeating the same topic in the character conversations almost word to word. But enough talking about another game, i kind of slipped here . So I'm glad there is a similar game without those issues.

Dude, this game is awesome, the models are very good, I think I have a thing for big eyes in AVNs and this is on point.
The story progresses a little to quick at the end, but aside that, everything works perfectly.

The story though not 'long' did not feel rushed. It actually didn't feel 'forced' which I must say is its biggest plus from me. The story flowed nicely into the scenes. which isn't something I can always say for this genre.

Visually speaking, The Renders were very nice as well as the animations the BGA and audio wise the BGM fit nicely.

Christmas Eve [v4.0] [Jonesy]

I played this gem with the incest patch installed and I really liked it.

Really cute incest romance between a father and his daughter.

I can't wait for the sequel, I would hope the dev makes the sequel true incest. Stepcest in itself is kinda meh and not necessary for the story.

If you like wholesome incest romance I would recommend it. It's kinetic though which can be off-putting for some people.

This game is really good. The graphics are amazing, the music fits the scenes, the renders clearly have a lot of thought and effort put into them, the girl is cute and sexy as fuck, the writing flows decently and comes across as being written by a native speaker, etc. etc. I could go on but basically you should just play it

As many others mentioned, this is clearly inspired by Petal Among Thorns and I'd also say Single Again. Unlike those 2 games, MC quickly accepts his stepdaughters affection and get out of his own way. The characters are rendered ambiguously young and this game also lets you choose their age and there is nothing in the story that conflicts with your choice of low to high teens(like the girls having a job or discussing their grade in school) so you can play it as a early teen loli game if that's your preference.

You aren't the biological father which seems to upset some incest fans so here's notice of that.

Entertaining, well rendered, decent pacing, likeable characters, good english, and the dialog matches the characters.

So I just finished playing through this game and ultimately I ended up enjoying it. Although in the beginning I wasn't so sure I would. It started out with noisy renders with distracting white pixels, a slow start with the long car ride and then the image for the car crashed into the snow looked like a real image that didn't match the car they were driving.

After they made it to the Cabin I couldn't help but wonder if this game was just a copy and paste of "A Petal Among Thorns" by Lockheart. It's impossible not to notice the similarities between the two games, especially since its even the same cabin interior.

(I also think the whole spider joke was unnecessary, but I am biased there because I hate those damn things!)

However the story got better and I ended up liking the daughter and enjoying it overall. The sexual progression between the two characters is pretty quick but clearly that is because it is a rather short game to begin with.

I think the game could have easily ended after Chapter 3, but I am really glad it didn't because the 4th chapter ended up being my favorite. The scene at the dinner table, and the following scene in the bathroom (with the rest of the cast outside listening), had me laughing my ass off. The introduction of and interaction with the additional characters made the story a lot more interesting. Sure, most of the lewd scenes happen during the cabin chapters. However I am the type of person that likes a little sex content to go with the story, not a little story to go with bunch of sex content.

I will also note that the end credits do mention "Lockheart", so apparently him and his games were being used as inspiration for Christmas Eve as apposed to a ripoff of them.

Ultimately I am looking forward to the announced sequel by Jonesy. I might wait for it's completion first, but I will definitely play it at some point.

If I were to have a "wish list" for the next game, I would simply ask for the dev to improve the render quality a little (at least get rid of those noisy white pixels) and maybe look into better animations for the lewd scenes. Other than that, I think there is a good cast of characters and a decent story to build on.

Nice little story. Decent writing that does the job without any glaring missteps. The pacing is faster than stories of this type usually are but it isn't bad.

Nice to see the Dev made the girls without unrealistic ginormous boobs and butts not to mention pretty cute.

The scenes and renders do the job just fine, not bad looking. It had the feel of a quicker paced Petal Among Thorns but still different enough not to be a copy.

Interesting to see Ka-bars mentioned, we were issued those when I was in the Marines.

I look forward to seeing what the Dev does with the sequel. I hope the relationship between Eve and the MC continues and she isn't pushed to the side.

Is it predictable? More or less. Is it realistic? Definitely not. But is it good? Hell yeah it is! The models are really cute and it's obvious that the creator put a lot of heart into making this. Just finished chapters 1-3 and I can't wait for the next one. Glad to hear the creator has a lot more story to tell because I'll for sure be looking forward to it.

Very well done.
Nice touch with the isolated and stranded in a strange but welcoming place.... where feelings blossom and inhibitions melt away as the two grow closer from shared loss, and the undeniable urge of attraction unable to restrain itself without the distractions from the outside world holding back desire... *chef's kiss*
looking forward to future updates/projects. 5/5 easy

Review v0.3.1

The setting is a young daughter getting stuck inside a cabin with her (step) dad.

I didn't see the patch in time, so I played without it and it was a bit off-putting. But a patch exists, so it's my fault I guess, but the dev could also have the player define the relationship in the beginning, like a lot of other games do. In the version I played, the non-blood-related thing was emphasized a number of times in the dialogue so I don't know how the patch handles that.

This has been done before, most notably in the game/VN "A Petal Among Thorns (APAT)." It has so much similarity that it's hard not to compare the two. The similarity even extends to the art style (big eyes!) in some ways.

Compared to APAT, the pacing is a bit faster here and the power is more balanced. In APAT, the daughter was the main instigator, seducing her rather reluctant dad. Here, the daughter is still the initial instigator but her father is a lot less reluctant. Objectively, it's fine. It feels a bit rushed but APAT was perhaps a bit too slow/reluctant/indecisive. In my personal opinion, the pay-off in APAT was a bit stronger though. On the other hand, this game does not contain any sci-fi elements or unneccesary side characters, which is a bonus. The game does contain some strong hints about the other family members who are left at home eagerly awaiting their return, and, apparently, the MC's cock, hinting to a sequel, like, again, APAT.

The art style: the body of Eve is really nice. I'm not sure such girls exist in real life, but if they don't somebody needs to invent them . It's really great, petite but not creepy. Curvy but not too much so. The eyes are unnaturally big, which is a stylistic decision by the dev. It's unnatural but it still looks attractive to me, so my verdict is rather neutral. I didn't overly like the amount of make-up that Eve wears (also during shower scenes...) but that's my opinion. The problems start with the way the light is reflected in those eyes, which is not done well. Also facial expressions could use some work. They are there and they are appropriate, which is more than some other devs achieve, but they are not fully natural in several cases. The biggest problem I have is with Eve's pussy and ass, which look pretty undetailed and unnatural. This kind of ruins the close up scenes. Daz can do much better nowadays.

The renders of the cabin are OK. At least the scenery used in the game is not overused like in so many other games. However it is not the most beautiful or detailed scenery. The MC is hardly seen, so there is not much to comment on, but at least he doesn't detract from the experience, which is I think a good thing. However the game does not go out of it's way to avoid showing the MC when it's necessary. I personally think that the game pretty much hits the sweet spot here in that respect, although others may have different opinions.

Verdict: 4/5.

Despite the game's art issues, I did thoroughly enjoy playing it. So I am detracting one point for the art. I am not detracting any points to the similarity to APAT, because, again, I did enjoy playing this game and I realise that there are only that many ways to write a slice-of-life F/D game and most games need to use one trope or another.

This game is really great. I really like the dialogue between the characters. It just seems more natural than most VNs. The renders are pretty good for the most part. Not perfect, but overall pretty great for a first title. This is a really fun game, even if it is a little derivative of other games, it seems to go it's own way eventually. Lot's more good to outweigh any bad in my opinion. I look forward to seeing more from this dev.

Wow, very impressive game! I love the interaction between the characters, and this AVN strikes a nice balance of pacing between H scenes that are unrealistically quick to happen or drag you along taking forever to get to the fun parts. It also does an excellent job of introducing you to some of the other ladies, a realistic reason to add them to the fun times in future updates, and even some opportunities for flashbacks to other sexy times. All the ladies shown were super attractive and fresh. I loved the intensity of the H scenes so far. They are more what you might fantasize them to be, hang ups be damned. Take the seed that made you, and all that.