VN Ren'Py Culture Shock [Ch. 3 v0.1] [King of lust]

[DA22]

The two paths are not the same, so neither are the people. The character development on the paths is very different. On beta, the girls are corrupted into sluts by chauvinistic playboys. On alpha, the women become loving partners of a caring, respectful man. Very different character arcs.

In beta, you have very skilled "seducers" going after the ladies. Getting girls into bed is what Lucas and Marcus DO, it's what they're really good at.

On alpha, Philip starts off not even knowing what part of his dick goes in first. Plus, he's their FAMILY, so there's a bigger social taboo to overcome. So if you combine a big taboo with someone who doesn't know how to seduce women, then yeah, it's going to take longer.

Anyway, as you said: you feel the game balance is off because the girls' sexual behavior is inconsistent between paths whereas I think the dev is trying to tell a good story with meaningful character development. To each their own.

That works for NTR that tends to have reasonable shallow chars, but romance games need characters that have the same characteristics over the whole game whether MC interferes or not also including the other paths to keep those characters romanceable for players. That is one reason why so few games that try to combine both genres succeed in making both player bases happy. There are a few exceptions though, one where Burt Reynolds Mustache wrote for, even if that one was not close to perfect yet as he would himself admit. Romance games also have their rules, memes and tropes and those need to be respected as well for a good romance game, though you can always play with them a bit or subvert them some.

 

[disimulated]

Well I have given up on this game as a love or alpha path since devs made the cardinal mistake for every romance based game to let the main girls be NTRéd before they were romantically and sexual involved on the more romantically path. Which does make sense for the NTR path, but destroys the other one.

Why does it destroy the other one?

 

[PinkGoddess]

Well I have given up on this game as a love or alpha path since devs made the cardinal mistake for every romance based game to let the main girls be NTRéd before they were romantically and sexual involved on the more romantically path. Which does make sense for the NTR path, but destroys the other one. I understood though the team has acquired an extra writer so for those still following, there is a hope he or she has more love for the alpha/love path.

Yay, and as thorin said, if the next update is again NTR >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> love path I will left the game too. Sadly, because I really love some characters like Emma, but dude, no sense play this if u wanna go for the love path srsly, vanilla scenes, boring and only with two girls that are not interesting at all imho (karla is nice, but is so unrealistic that she goes too easy with the mc too when she is the teacher and before the hispanic teacher who always flirts with the MC for example)

 

[disimulated]

That works for NTR that tends to have reasonable shallow chars, but romance games need characters that have the same characteristics over the whole game whether MC interferes or not also including the other paths to keep those characters romanceable for players.

Interesting. I agree that their fundamental character (good/evil, generous/selfish, happy/depressed, etc) should remain mostly consistent, except where the story intentionally affects them (e.g. corruption, hardship, wins lottery, etc). But in a sex game, I would think that sexual behavior would be quite malleable - it's one of the key plot parts of the game.

I'd also argue that only the "diplomat" path of this game is romance. alpha path is the harem path and beta path is the cuck path - neither of which are romance.

 

[DA22]

Why does it destroy the other one?

Because when you notice that a woman is a complete and utter mindless bimbo that is fully ruled by her sex organs, she makes very bad GF or even harem material. Like Sunny going for a player like Marcus that she knows has a Gf and cheats with every hole on the Island she is happy enough to become another of his sex addicted slaves after one look at the BBC. Would you want to be in a long relation with a girl like that? No, you may want to fuck her if she is easy and for every romance player that is who Sunny is now since they either read it here or saw it in the gallery before they even could connect to her. Even for the most White knight of player it is no fun to have a LI that you have to lock up in the cellar every time you have to go to school or work since you just cannot trust her. (Besides locking up your LI in a cellar would rather make you a black knight)

 

[disimulated]

Because when you notice that a woman is a complete and utter mindless bimbo that is fully ruled by her sex organs, she makes very bad GF or even harem material. Like Sunny going for a player like Marcus that she knows has a Gf and cheats with every hole on the Island she is happy enough to become another of his sex addicted slaves after one look at the BBC. Would you want to be in a long relation with a girl like that? No, you may want to fuck her if she is easy and for every romance player that is who Sunny is now since they either read it here or saw it in the gallery before they even could connect to her. Even for the most White knight of player it is no fun to have a LI that you have to lock up in the cellar every time you have to go to school or work since you just cannot trust her. (Besides locking up your LI in a cellar would rather make you a black knight)

I understand now what you mean. It's an issue of not being able to separate the character in one path from another, but I get how once you've seen her skewered it's hard to unsee. I rarely have that problem because I try to play the "good girl" paths first (and try to avoid spoilers).

You're right that it's weird that Sunny would go for Marcus, knowing that he's a player and male slut, but that's part of her corruption. She starts out as an innocent that isn't really interested in a boyfriend, and then Marcus comes along and starts whispering to her about pleasure and feeling good and living in the moment, and she succumbs to his lewd allure. She falls right past romance and faithfulness into hedonism and pleasure-seeking. That's Marcus' influence, not Sunny's natural behavior. (If she continues to hang out with Marcus and sleep around, then by the end of the story that may end up being part of her natural self, making her a lot like Sophie, but she did not start the story like that.)

 

[DA22]

I understand now what you mean. It's an issue of not being able to separate the character in one path from another, but I get how once you've seen her skewered it's hard to unsee. I rarely have that problem because I try to play the "good girl" paths first (and try to avoid spoilers).

You're right that it's weird that Sunny would go for Marcus, knowing that he's a player and male slut, but that's part of her corruption. She starts out as an innocent that isn't really interested in a boyfriend, and then Marcus comes along and starts whispering to her about pleasure and feeling good and living in the moment, and she succumbs to his lewd allure. She falls right past romance and faithfulness into hedonism and pleasure-seeking. That's Marcus' influence, not Sunny's natural behavior. (If she continues to hang out with Marcus and sleep around, then by the end of the story that may end up being part of her natural self, making her a lot like Sophie, but she did not start the story like that.)

Yeah but actually besides that a problem is Sunny lacks character on both paths and is more purely affected by the choices player makes (which is already a minus for a romance LI) the cardinal sin is that she is skewered on the NTR path before she was on the romance path for reasons i set out in my post before this one. Basically bringing together those two completely conflicting genres with each their own set of rules is very hard to do with the best of setups and becomes basically impossible if you let one path go fast and do a slow burn on the other. Even more so if go slow on the romance path. Perception of a girl matters in a love route and is in a way all that matters even more for some players then whether they will be able to have sex with her. You know those more romantic games that do have ecchi but no sex also exist and have quite a market.

Edit: Last I will try to say about it, cause i already said it before and no use to keep hammering on that, since the sin is now already committed. Before I left i concluded not for nothing that this game is a 5 star game as a NTR game, but unfortunately not even close on alpha/love path partly due to what happens on NTR path.

 

[Ranting Old Man]

Look it isn't hard. The reality is that, personality shifts are way too irresponsible between the paths. You can make the argument that Marcus is a expert suducer and it's still too hard to swallow. The part you seem to be missing is that even as someone who is seducing others to a life of Depravity it takes time. Life isn't a porno and if you just want a porno go fucking watch a porno where all of that unrealistic shit happens. If your trying to tell a good story and not a prono script then sorry. Marcus can't bang Sunny super fast it breaks character. If she started off more on the slutty side things would be different. But her character was established. END OF STORY. Now Marcus should have to WORK for it. I'm not saying it should be easier for "Alpha" path to hook up with Sunny. I think it also needs to still be slower than with Marcus because the incest barrier would be more difficult to break BUT. She shouldn't go full on slut so quickly for Marcus because that simply isn't immersive. And all he should have to work extra hard to make sure that the other girls don't find out about each other. I can tell the dev has NEVER played women before. His mindset of what works is that of a cheesy ass porno not of a player whom has mastered the art of seduction and corruption. 50 shades of Gray did a better job than Dev did. So yeah I think we have some valid criticisms. Basically Dev is a shit writer. No offense if you like this lackluster story line. But it simply reeks of someone desperate to take advantage of others, who lacks both real world experience and imagination as well as someone who's getting his ideas from porno.

Now I get people love their NTR, but frankly I think the reason I hate it so much is because of people's inability to tell a convincing story with NTR in it and the "NTR" fans are mostly in the same boat as the Dev which is why they eat this shit up so much. They basically enjoy watching porno. Well then go fucking watch porno. I watch porn too when I want to get off easily. I play a VN when I want to enjoy a story that has good build up for some rewarding scenes. I want to believe that this could really happen. I feel robbed when it's cheaply done. I want to believe that Marcus is a real threat that isn't some novice that has everything handed to him, but instead an expert of seduction and is able to hide everything expertly. Who makes very few mistakes and forces the MC to work twice as hard when he is around. Grooming takes time. Even if your rich, you can't just buy everyone. You nwould.be surprised how frequently that doesn't work. More importantly women who feel they are bought tend to have little troubles cheating or manipulating the person who is "buying" them.
This game just lacks class and it's fucking sad because all Dev had to do to make it FAR more believable is just slow down the Beta path a bit. Marcus could still have the same personality just takes him a little bit longer, show the corruption actually happening. Allow us to see the inner Turmoil of the characters and let us watch as their barriers break down and they SLOWLY give in.

 

[Ranting Old Man]

Is the MC doing the NTR?

Not even close. MC is a cuck who likes spying on other people getting laid.

 

[Irgendwie Irgendwo]

I still fail to grasp the point why sister dearest should be lost to me / should be turned off by her behaviour just because she fucks with Marcus on the Beta path. Why should I even care? I'm playing Culture Shock, not Schrödinger's visual novel. (Read: I looked into the box and she's a sweet person. Same with Mommy. And that means since I don't care for the othert path they are that for me. End of discussion.)

 

[DA22]

Look it isn't hard. The reality is that, personality shifts are way too irresponsible between the paths. You can make the argument that Marcus is a expert suducer and it's still too hard to swallow. The part you seem to be missing is that even as someone who is seducing others to a life of Depravity it takes time. Life isn't a porno and if you just want a porno go fucking watch a porno where all of that unrealistic shit happens. If your trying to tell a good story and not a prono script then sorry. Marcus can't bang Sunny super fast it breaks character. If she started off more on the slutty side things would be different. But her character was established. END OF STORY. Now Marcus should have to WORK for it. I'm not saying it should be easier for "Alpha" path to hook up with Sunny. I think it also needs to still be slower than with Marcus because the incest barrier would be more difficult to break BUT. She shouldn't go full on slut so quickly for Marcus because that simply isn't immersive. And all he should have to work extra hard to make sure that the other girls don't find out about each other. I can tell the dev has NEVER played women before. His mindset of what works is that of a cheesy ass porno not of a player whom has mastered the art of seduction and corruption. 50 shades of Gray did a better job than Dev did. So yeah I think we have some valid criticisms. Basically Dev is a shit writer. No offense if you like this lackluster story line. But it simply reeks of someone desperate to take advantage of others, who lacks both real world experience and imagination as well as someone who's getting his ideas from porno.

Now I get people love their NTR, but frankly I think the reason I hate it so much is because of people's inability to tell a convincing story with NTR in it and the "NTR" fans are mostly in the same boat as the Dev which is why they eat this shit up so much. They basically enjoy watching porno. Well then go fucking watch porno. I watch porn too when I want to get off easily. I play a VN when I want to enjoy a story that has good build up for some rewarding scenes. I want to believe that this could really happen. I feel robbed when it's cheaply done. I want to believe that Marcus is a real threat that isn't some novice that has everything handed to him, but instead an expert of seduction and is able to hide everything expertly. Who makes very few mistakes and forces the MC to work twice as hard when he is around. Grooming takes time. Even if your rich, you can't just buy everyone. You nwould.be surprised how frequently that doesn't work. More importantly women who feel they are bought tend to have little troubles cheating or manipulating the person who is "buying" them.
This game just lacks class and it's fucking sad because all Dev had to do to make it FAR more believable is just slow down the Beta path a bit. Marcus could still have the same personality just takes him a little bit longer, show the corruption actually happening. Allow us to see the inner Turmoil of the characters and let us watch as their barriers break down and they SLOWLY give in.

Well though I do not think per se incest games need to be slow, that depends on setup of characters and why they would want to be in a incestual relation with MC and what happened in the first 18 years of their relationship before the game began. I agree though many NTR games make bad corruption games since the antagonist is just set up too strong and gets everything to easy. One of the few times I will play an NTR game is if I want to have the ultimate power fantasy for a change and immerse in the NPC that does the NTR.

 

[DA22]

I still fail to grasp the point why sister dearest should be lost to me / should be turned off by her behaviour just because she fucks with Marcus on the Beta path. Why should I even care? I'm playing Culture Shock, not Schrödinger's visual novel. (Read: I looked into the box and she's a sweet person. Same with Mommy. And that means since I don't care for the othert path they are that for me. End of discussion.)

Well then you are an exception among the fervent romance players likely, which will help you to be able to play way more games as some.

 

[PinkGoddess]

Well though I do not think per se incest games need to be slow, that depends on setup of characters and why they would want to be in a incestual relation with MC and what happened in the first 18 years of their relationship before the game began. I agree though many NTR games make bad corruption games since the antagonist is just set up too strong and gets everything to easy. One of the few times I will play an NTR game is if I want to have the ultimate power fantasy for a change and immerse in the NPC that does the NTR.

If u dont play yet, play long story short, is one of the few games with good NTR, and I agree with u with incest game doesnt need go slow, everything depends in how u create the bg between the characters and MC as u said, and although is so immoral, incest exists in our world, so is not a surprise that the games go fast in some incest games (like parental love for example)

What bothers me is the incongruity of the bg created for the characters with the subsequent development of the game with according to which scenes to give rise to them to happen (for more detail, Kat from deliverance and her cuck path, which they call share for that non-ntr lovers are not offended)

For me, these things destroy the whole game, although be the best game, these things ruins everything I saw in this game, I saw in deliverance, I saw in some more games, and is so sadly because are potential games srsly, but.. imho, of course.

 

[disimulated]

Look it isn't hard. The reality is that, personality shifts are way too irresponsible between the paths. You can make the argument that Marcus is a expert suducer and it's still too hard to swallow. The part you seem to be missing is that even as someone who is seducing others to a life of Depravity it takes time. Life isn't a porno and if you just want a porno go fucking watch a porno where all of that unrealistic shit happens. If your trying to tell a good story and not a prono script then sorry. Marcus can't bang Sunny super fast it breaks character. If she started off more on the slutty side things would be different. But her character was established. END OF STORY. Now Marcus should have to WORK for it. I'm not saying it should be easier for "Alpha" path to hook up with Sunny. I think it also needs to still be slower than with Marcus because the incest barrier would be more difficult to break BUT. She shouldn't go full on slut so quickly for Marcus because that simply isn't immersive.

You do make good points. Sunny probably did fall for Marcus too fast, based on her straight-arrow, school-first personality. After all, Weiku, who has far more direct influence over Tracy and far more experience than Marcus, hasn't got anywhere near as far with his target (Tracy).

On the other hand, it did take Marcus 20 full days working on her and the story does hint (actually it straight up tells us in the character pages) that the ladies Philip lives with have very strong sex drives. We are told they've been repressed until now and we saw the impact of that repression when Tracy fell into bed with Lucas right away after being loosened up by drink. Philip also observes during the Sunny-Marcus fuck in his house that "It's like there was this perfect slut hidden below the surface", another direct reference to their highly sexual nature. Maybe, just like beta Philip was unsettled by the move (the game's not called Culture Shock for nothing), Sunny also kind of lost her character footing - 'Everyone in Hawai'i seems to ball, so maybe I should too to fit in', kind of thing.

Part of Marcus' speed may have also been due to the beta Philip's inaction. In a place where he might have played the good brother and helped his sister, he simply let Marcus continue to charm her. Before they moved and Philip felt more comfortable, he may have more actively helped Sunny stay pure.

However, all that said, I'm a fan of long, slow seductions and corruptions, so I would have been happy with Sunny-Marcus going slower too and it probably would have fit the story better, especially if as I said earlier, the story is only half over.

(Well, maybe not, because the 60-75 day release cycle for this game drives me crazy. Talking about this makes me want the next episode now.)

 

[Burt Reynolds Mustache]

I understood though the team has acquired an extra writer so for those still following, there is a hope he or she has more love for the alpha/love path.

I have a feeling they might.

 

[☆Jonathan Wick♤]

I have a feeling they might.

Sincerely let me doubt it, since the addition of this new writer does not mean that he will dedicate himself completely to balancing or improving the alpha path, besides that already some time ago we had been told that with the inclusion of Throwaway to the team as a writer there would be a story improvement for those unhappy with the alpha path but with the passage of time and updates that did not happen.

 

[giqui]

I like NTR, but not in this game. The alpha path can improve if incest is in equal proportion. The romance between the MC and his mother is advanced, while with Sunny it is slow. The dosage could be the same.

 

[disimulated]

I like NTR, but not in this game. The alpha path can improve if incest is in equal proportion. The romance between the MC and his mother is advanced, while with Sunny it is slow. The dosage could be the same.

The romance is more advanced with Tracy, but the lewd is further with Sunny. I think the story is building toward a different kind of relationship with each woman.

 

[Eist9]

Guys, who gonna bang mc's mom?

 

[disimulated]

Guys, who gonna bang mc's mom?

Alpha: Philip (MC)
Diplomat: Lucas and maybe Weiku (this assumes Philip does not pick Tracy as his waifu)
Beta: Lucas and Weiku, maybe Marcus