VN - Ren'Py - Completed - City of Broken Dreamers [v1.15.0 Ch. 15] [PhillyGames]

This game is gold standard for visual novels. The renders are beautiful, the girls are great and have their own personality. Your choices matter in a story that is extremely well written and exciting. It really catches the Cyberpunk-vibes (and I loved the genre before Cyberpunk 2077 nearly ruined it and then made it cool). Hard to find anything better and I really hope devs will continue their great work!

WOW! A movie in slideshow format and I mean that in a positive way.
Every scene looks so damn good and has an absolutely high quality, including shadow and post-processing effects, depth of field and particle effects that you could easily use every image as wallpaper.

The music in the game is also perfectly staged. There were moments when I just let the song with the current scene play for 5 minutes without clicking any further because it created such a good atmosphere.

I really hope that the developer/creator delivers what is promised (as many characters in the game more than obviously say and also give reasons for it like Todd) at the end of the game. That this is not the end and that you will see everyone again.

In the end, I wish I could have chosen Chandy and Abby as the LI ending. The two characters broke me the most. Especially the last scene with them - I would have loved to never get up again and stay in bed with them forever - if I had the chance to do so as a player.

I don't know why does this game have 5 stars.
The dialogues were useless and repetitive most of the time and sometimes cringy. The characters are ugly and I don't know why would the dev chose to do that, they clearly can make good looking ones. The MC felt like a spectator to me I was looking forward to john wick type MC too bad. Finally the choices were unclear and useless most of the times why even bother.
this game gets 1 star for Chandra.

9/10

Hands down the best experience I ever had with a Novel.
Great MC, great characters, very good characterization (could have worked a little more with it because it makes no sense that every girl has no problem being naked in front of MC and the other girls), great musics too (2 of them especially, Beyond Memory and Doves).

H-Scenes, great. There were a lot of scenes and even though I would have liked if there were even more, what I would have liked the most was there being scenes with the main antagonist (you can't give me hope by letting us see her masturbating while screaming our name and then nothing), which I'm not going to spoil the name of.

I dunno how all the endings are but I got the one with Gloria and it was great, there's just one problem which I'm going to explain now.
So for some reasons the game pushes you to follow Gloria's route, and nothing bad 'till here, problem is that MC has "special" relationships even with other girls, especially with Ellen and Katie. The game other than pushing for Gloria route really seemed to push at the same time for Katie and Ellen so 3 together... Which is bad. I don't quite like this decision because it doesn't make sense in terms of characterization (but it may just be me so I didn't count this at all in the final rating).
At the end of the game, now again I'm talking about Gloria ending, you have the chance to fuck other characters, which I'm not going to spoil, but that doesn't make sense because you take much before a choice that BLOCKS other routes and point I want to make is, you said several times that you love Gloria, why tf would you cheat on her? I don't judge it but it makes no sense to me.

Another 3 problems, Red Moon guy at the end, everyone that played the game knows what I'm talking about. You don't talk out a guy like that. He got convinced BEFORE you showed him proof... I won't spoil anything. Who played understood.
Another problem, sound... This is a HUGE problem for eroge games. It doesn't need to be voiced and it doesn't need to have moans but AT LEAST sex-sound... I mean any eroge needs to HAVE them, otherwise H-Scenes don't feel the same at all.
Least but not last at the end of the game, this is no spoiler so no worries, while you fight you have the choice to either shoot most of your ammos or to throw your LAST grenade... I decided to shoot the ammos and to use the last grenade later in case it was needed, problem is that it seems like MC totally forgot he had a grenade...

Overall the game is nearly perfect, the animations are good and I'm gonna replay it now, using MODs of course, so that I can see what the other choices take you at.

Congrats to the DEV for making this. The amount of time he put behind everything, especially the animations (not talking about the H-scenes) is unbelievable and makes everything just better.

VERSION: 1.15.0
SUMMARY: Very good, story driven VN with brilliant models.

PROS:

1. Models are gorgeous, some are obviously more attractive than others, but this is entirely subjective, I found only a handful really appealed to me though.
2. Animations are very nice, physics and effects are impressive.
3. Story and writing are excellent, it flows very nicely, pacing is very good and apart from the scifi elements it very realistic.
4. Game length is good and there is plenty of "playtime"
5. Significant impact of choices makes them more meaningful.

CONS:

1. Animations are a bit short, making the loops often a bit apparent and noticeable.
2. Vanilla in terms of lewd, there is not much variety and this game could easily have incorporated even the more shall we say "twisted" or more kinky lewd.
3. On point 2, the depravity system didnt really make much of an impact for me, not noticeably at least in my play through. This could have worked very nicely into the more "depraved" lewd I mentioned in the above point. To me this is wasted opportunity that could have made this game a much more adult VN.
4. Continuing on the above points, adding more options like pregnancy would have made the game also better IMO, especially since the MC has the option to dump his load in the woman often and not all woman would be on contraceptives (realistically speaking) making this a very viable option and either complicating the story and by extension making it more interesting and having different endings. In some cases even very interesting endings with potential future implications e.g., knocking up Gloria.

TLDR: Very good game in general, kudos to the developer, though I would have liked more variety, its the future and people are already so depraved, it would have been worse in the future and the depravity system would have tied in nicely into that.

A flawed masterpiece! Engaging story, awesome setting and beautiful renders. NSFW scenes are a bit too short sometimes and the story drags a little sometimes, but it is a great great great game!

The models are extremelly gorgeous, MC is a giga chad, just play the game.

This VN would deserve a 5/5 for its writing, the great quality of its renders and animations, the variety of girls and LIs, each with a different personally. So, again, it would deserve a 5/5 for being one of the top-notch VNs here on F95 if only:

• The story would have been consistent from start to finish. Most of the second half of the game focuses on getting the maximum of sex scenes with a maximum of women, not on the story anymore. If I had to guess why, I would say this VN was initially made for 10 chapters, but the developer being as successful as he is on Patreon, he added 5 more, sex-filled, just to please all the demands.

• The story would be really completed, because at this stage it’s clearly not, and it calls for an episode 2. I mean, the protagonists still have to hide, the evil Corp is now an even bigger evil Corp, and the segregation is still there, life in Mil-Town will not change anytime soon.

• The 6 endings were real endings. They feel rushed, you get to fuck your LI one more time and that’s it, The End. And if you don’t have any LI, you don’t even have the choice to get an ending with your wife Sonja except for the fact that they mention that they don’t want to divorce. And no ending for Chandra and Abby either, I guess it was too much to ask.

Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed playing this VN, especially because, for once, the choices matter a lot, the mod is not enough to see all the different paths, I recommend using both the mod and the PDF walkthrough at the same time if you want to see everything. But as I said I couldn’t give it a 5/5 because it’s not perfect, and 4.5/5 is not possible so my only choice was 4/5, sorry Philly.

This is seriously one of the best games I have ever played might be even the best. The story is connected together to the best level. And the choices here impact the game strongly not just a slight branch that gets into the same line again. And the characters are good and so damn well chosen for their task in the game. This game is truly a masterpiece and the best VN I have ever played.

I will start off by saying that this game is like something straight out of a movie lasting more than a day's worth of gameplay. Amazing plot line that is filled with twists and turns, without getting boring but attracts you into the story even more. The animations are pretty good and same goes for details (shading, character design) / renderings. However, I feel that the design of the MC is bland, (bald, no face reveal, etc). The endings are also I feel a bit too short, could be maybe expanded on a bit more with each character or the lone wolf path as well. Despite the small cons, I believe this game is completely deserved a high rating and worth the try.

Thank you for an unbelievably wild ride Philly! I loved every moment of the game from start to finish! Sad to see it end but.... wow! Desert island pick for sure. Thanks again for your incredible work and all the best going forward.

The ambience, music, renders and animations are high quality/well fitting.
It's a shame the writing went downhill during the second part of the story, it feels like the LIs lost their personalities and a lot of sex scenes were there just to fill the "lewd quota".
The lack of closure in the end was also a bit disappointing...
An honest rating would be something like:
Graphics, ambience and music: 5/5
Writing: 3/5.
All in all, it's a really good AVN, well above average.

The graphic, animations and renders are one of the best I've seen.
Also, good UI and music - I would rate it 5 stars easily.
But, the story-line bored me so much that I haven't even finish the game.
so I'll give it 1/5 for the story, and 5/5 for the rest.

Triple A game quality: came for the wank, stayed for the story. Not to mention the renders, music, UI are all great. Only weak spot is the "find the secret" mechanic, because there's no logic to where hotspot is hidden.

This is the standard all VNs should aim for, especially if they have been in development longer. Heck, please wanna devs should follow this one to learn how it's done

I absolutly love sex scenes in this game, how variable they are, how hot dialogs, renders, animations etc.
But story is so pretentious with boring lust/love minmaxing again, that I don't want to play the game.
Also only Katie was somewhat intresting from all love interests, everyone else just bitches in heat.

So up until update 7/8 this was my favorite game on this site. No competition, the plot, writing, cyberpunk setting, music, ambience, characters, all as perfect as the limited resources and constraints of porn genre allow. Easy 5 stars.

However later, it started going downhill. The quality of writing dropped, we moved away from the typical cyberpunk things and settings that build atmosphere in my opinion, plus philly started pushing multiple side characters, dedicating less scenes to the main cast. I remember staying up late at night to play the first 8 chapters and later on that passion completely evaporated. The whole story frankly got less and less interesting towards the end.

Now, let's talk about Chandra. She was a side girl, eleveted to the LI position due to being fan favorite, and she didn't get an ending, not even a real path. And he knows full well how many people love her. She is the mascot of the game, she is in his ads, his steam page, she is the only girl from the game in his steam ad of the game. That's bc Philly knows Chandy screams Cyberpunk with her looks. You see her and instantly think of clubs, neon streets and cyberpunk as a whole. She is the most cyberpunk girl in this game. She is like JOI in Blade Runner 2049. There is no other way to look at it other than that he's using her as bait but refused to give her a proper path and ending bc he doesn't like her that much or he was rushing.

Moving on to endings, it sure does seem like they were rushed. They were really not great and not conclusive. Compare that to the excellent endings of depraved awakening, and see the difference. Let's compare Chandy and christina from DA, who play similar roles. We meet them both as slutty brats, we learn there is more to them, they end up helping us... And christina gets an excellent ending, where not only do we see what became of our relationship, but that she wrote a book and set her life straight. Meanwhile Chandy has no such complete character arc. Other endings were also not up to par. Overall I would rate this as 3 stars, but the excellent start warrants at least 4 stars.
Hoping for the dlc but I'm not holding my breath.

The first third of the game ( 1 - 5 chapters ) is excellent and quite enjoyable.

The second third of the story, however, starts to drift towards pure fanservice, slowly but steadily.

The last third was the death of it as a decent read, and an utter degradation to the level of being a mere fuck-gallery.


The ENDINGS. Is a fucking joke, nothing much to say here.

Also, for this one-liner ending for the woman, which I personally consider to be The BEST due to her connection with the MC, her mental state after all the drama in Caracas, and her potential for growth, development and transformation, which your incompetent ass couldn't deliver — get fucked, Philly.

The visual quality only improves towards the end, I also like environment and cinematics. Mostly.
2 Pegged Phillys out of 5.

City of Broken Dreamers has me conflicted on how to give it a final rating. Ultimately I think it ends up a 3.5 for me, based on all available factors.

++ Game starts out with a very strong story
+ Some interesting characters with good body types are introduced slowly
++ High quality still renders with a lot of varying backdrops
+ Some good animations, some bad animations - almost makes it an indifferent addition to the game
++ Sex scene position choices were varied, and involved some kinks occasionally
+ Music, but no sounds other than gunfire/explosions (no sex scene sounds)

-- Story that started strong, gets weaker as the game progresses
--- The ending of the story felt rushed, weak, and highly unfulfilling
-- Wrap-up of different character arcs was similarly rushed, and unrewarding
- Sex scene animations were meh compared to a lot of other games, with rough edges and mechanical animations for some of them. Camera angles were sometimes less than good. Overall, just not fulfilling, and usually too short.
---- Sex scene writing was atrocious. The author needs to play a bunch of other AVNs to learn how to get the viewer engaged in the moment and hot 'n bothered by what they are viewing.
----- No love interest choices for some of the hottest girls in the game (Chandra/Abby) as far as endings go. Even though they were "side characters", they should have been viable as a choice for the MC to end the game with. It is an utter travesty they were not available in that regard, and shows the developer wasn't really in tune with the fans.

CoBD had the potential to be one of the all-time greats, but it just didn't deliver for the last 4-5 chapters. It felt rushed, unfinished, and like it pidgeon-holed the player at the end. That is perhaps due to how strong it started out.. it just ran out of steam halfway through.

I wondered what score to give and it's tough because there's so many aspects of the game that are 5/5 for me, but some are not there, especially the endings. It's kind a subjective, arbitrary number. It's maybe 4.5 or so, it is really awesome and I'm glad I played it, just there's some criticism.

Don't read if you mind spoilers.

I liked the world. It's different from the usual 'horny boy goes to college' type of cliches most stories seem to follow. I don't necessarily like grim stories and this world is certainly not a happy place (although we see a small section of it only; for all I know there could be billions of people living ok). However it's depicted pretty well, a shitty world that feels kind of a likely outcome seeing the direction today's politics and quasi-monopolistic corporations are heading towards. Still there's regular people that are not without faults, but somewhere on the scale, but certainly neither absolute evil or good for the most part, itás just in this setting you do what you need to survive so it's even harder to find the line morally where you can still feel ok with your choices.

I really liked the characters and their backstories. I felt the whole story was somehow too short (as timespan at least) and indeed there was perhaps not enough character development due to this, but the way things unfolded for the main characters and how we got to know them was pretty good. I would have enjoyed to stay more with the 'full' versions of these characters.
My favourite was Victoria, character's story was quite believable to me - being raised and trained by Baynard, and not being in on the most confidential projects it's easy to see how one can not really be aware of other perspectives and hins happening.
Gloria was not my first choice but it was cool khm, teaching her a bit and getting friendly, she's not a clueless little girl she's a young woman and that's great.
Katie seemed very similar to Gloria, that much naivity was a bit weird to me but if she represents hope for the society then be it, she carried that well.
Ellen was probably one of the characters that were closer to me, realistic and wearing a mask that must be normal in that kind of society but very sweet and 'everyday person' with 2 feet on the ground in a good sense of the word.
Not my type, but Sonja was pretty cool, physically strong women with a 'soft' (feminine) side can be very sexy, the guilt she carried and MC's guilt over allowing her to do that was pretty strong and could have used a bit more dialogue; resolution was too quick on that, would have enjoyed some private moments getting in detail and clearing up all that once and for all.
I didn't really connect with Chandra even tho her character was sweet and fun.
Who I'm sorry not to see more is in fact Abby, wow that woman, very balanced; a bit of mystery, smart, quite pragmatic but not cynical and resigned at all. Tough cookie that remained very sensitive. I know story wise irrelevant, but I found her very pretty, expressive face, maybe it's all in my head
Sasha was also a great side character, very fun and hot woman. A perfect partner in this kind of world.
Shanlon and Teri were fun as well. Not into that kind of thing but as a fantasy the rough sex scenes were very hot.
Hell I would have even liked to give Meredith a good spanking if I had the chance.
Venus was an intriguing character, there were some hints into why is she so self aware compared to othe bots, could almost see her as a main character if the story had more time, it's a pity we didn't have that. Dream wife, huh.

I only did Victoria ending. Seemed rushed. Considering how she lived her entire life without love and trust I would have hoped for some more romantic / cuddly scenes, something to show that there is a path of a lot of gentleness and regularly expressed affection that could get here to open up and relax and experience a relationship the way it should be, down the line. Reclaim her humanity and find what is her personality inbetween the original person, augmentation, training, previous life experiences and the newfound, radically different kind of life she leads. Some hope through short and lonmg term plans that would suggest it's all possible.

I plan to look into the other endings as well, but overall I find the ending was kinda cut short and didn't do the rest of the story justice.

Scenes and animations are pretty amazing, I don't care about the actual sexual act animations but the 'entrance' (walk ins, or top to bottom, bottom to top looks at the ladies) are absolutely gorgeus!

I think it's a good story everyone should pick up. Don't expect perfection but it's good.

It's been over four years since I first launched this game, and it has truly evolved in remarkable ways. There's something indescribable about it that captivates you from the start. The writing, animations, story, and soundtrack are all flawless. Personally, I chose Gloria's route and never once doubted my decision, it felt incredibly natural for both me and the main character.

Towards the end of the game, I couldn't shake a slight sense of emptiness, feeling like there could have been more to the conclusion. Nevertheless, thanks to Philly, this game stands as one of the closest to "perfection" in its genre. There's a bittersweet feeling that it's over, but as they say, all good things must come to an end.

To anyone reading this review who hasn't experienced this masterpiece yet, do yourselves a favor and savor every moment of it.

5/5

Renders are great, story is fantastic, love the characters. I'm here to read great stories, with adult themes and content. This one is one of the best. The doctor is a sweetheart and my favourite, but all the LIs are wonderful in their own ways. I don't have any negatives of the game, I just enjoyed it.