VN - Ren'Py - Defending Lydia Collier [v0.17 Beta 1.3] [White Phantom Games]

(review for v0.13.06).
This game is a gem, in the sense that deals with a lot of adult themes -- and not all necessarily sexual! Not only the characters are all adults (with the exception of some really young females), such as the MC himself, the story develops as a murder mystery but also as a political thriller.
More of a VN with multiple paths than a true "game", the fact is that that our choices will impact paths and possible endings. In turn, this also makes it possible for multiple re-plays of the game in search of alternative realities according to our choices.
The companion official walkthrough PDF is a must and will show the several ways the story can develop, and also shows the correct answers to some really tricky legal advice dialog!
A very well written game (this is not one of those that you just want to skip dialog and running for the next sex scene!) only let down, IMHO, for some rushed sex scenes.
Although sexy and well baked into the story, most of the sex scenes seem to be too quick, almost as if the author felt obliged to pay fan service, so he just can continue to write the rest of the thriller.
Although not heavy on animations and with the sex scenes caveats, I still feel it deserves a 5 star rating.

(Version Reviewed: v0.13.06)

Defending Lydia Collier (DLC) has one of the most interesting stories among the AVNs that I've played. With good art to complement it, DLC makes it into one of my favorite AVNs to play. Something to complain about would be the framing of the scenes, but that has been steadily improving in each version. The kinks offered are note-worthy. Pretty much one of the few games that offer such a wide variety of kinks without sacrificing on the story content. Also, Steph is pretty much one of my favorite AVN LIs. Great game all around. Definitely suggest playing it.

5/10 Overall
4/10 Animations
5/10 Story
6/10 Character design
6/10 Character development
5/10 Quality

I really liked the game, it has a unique story with more than one path for it, pretty interesting

Now this is a quality game! First of all, it is interesting by itself as a game, which is quite rare. Secondly, it is diverse in characters and playstyles, not forcing anything onto the player. Lastly, it is simply excellently done from the point of view of graphics, sound and everything else. The easiest 5 stars I gave out.

This one is hard to rate...

Story - Very interesting so far (that's the mainreason for me to recomment it to anyone)

Renders - average, not bad not impressive, just average.

Models - yeah, have to be carefull about what i say here - let's say, I didn't like 99% of them at all since they all look like bimbos/botox aliens to me - ofc that doesn't mean they are ugly per say, depends on taste.

The only 2 female models I kinda liked never had a big appearence in my playthrough since I got locked out of the policechicks path for not looking at her ass in the restaurant and the second woman hasn't much content yet (danielle).

Over all that means I sure did miss a huge portion of the sidestorys just because I didn't find any girls attractive or appealing at all - worst sadly is the one we are suppose to be defending wich makes it really hard to want to play again and try other paths or outcomes.

I would rate this VN somewhere between 3 or 4 stars, but since it isn't the dev's fault that I have clearly another taste in woman, and there is clearly put much thought and work into this project, I will give it the higher rating.

4/5 - good read, best of luck for the future updates and projects.

Cheers

When I first saw the renders I thought it was going to be another good render bad story game...man was I wrong game has great renders and a great story too and well worth the support on patreon. Beep boop 200

White Phantom is one of the best devs out there. Been a fan since the first episode of Shadows... Defending Lydia Collier is my favorite game. Fantastic graphics, great story and the most beautiful British babes in gaming. This is a MUST have game. If you are able please support this dev. He brings you the very best this medium has to offer!
P.S. Spent three years in the U.K. Missing it a lot

This is my review for Defending Lydia Collier by White Phantom Games version 0.13.2.

The good

• Renders are looking really good
• Characters have different personalities
• Music
• Writing
• Gameplay
• Big amout of content 5+ hours
• Story is interesting
• Big updates

The bad

• Some bugs with laptop UI
• Phone and laptop UI could be better

In conclusion, 5 stars worth playing.

Amazing game. Although girls' routes may conflict, player can only choose other girls by playing the game again, but each girl's route is very attractive .
There are so many fetishists and they are so interesting that you can choose how to make these girls. And my favorite character is Steph . This character is really perfect. She satisfies a lot of my fetishism.

v0.13

Maybe this game has potential, but it's let down by bad writing.

Virtually the first line of the game, the writer's already missed a comma. In fact, even before that, the game has randomly capitalised words in the warnings/disclosures. That pretty much sets the tone for the quality of this game.

The prose is very flat and the grammar often comes across as weird or unnatural, as if English isn't the writer's first language. The shot selection and character rigging/posing is also unimpressive and adds to the blandness. And the limited and poor use of music doesn't help at all. With all that said, this game doesn't exactly have killer renders or unique character models either to make up for it.

So yeah, interesting concept but it plays as your run-of-the-mill game with nothing really good about it,

Version reviewed:
v0.13

I kept this on my personal favorite list but I finally decided to remove it from it.

The pros:
+Fantastic storytelling
+Nonlinear story
+Real choice-effects
+Fun minigames about your job as a lawyer

The cons:
-Unimpressed with the quality of character models. In the new version I didn't see any improvement. It got worse IMO.
-Most of the characters look too similar (not just the sisters) using a model is well known from other AVN's. To be honest when I saw this model I know the project is low quality and loose interest instant but with this I made an exception due to the pros above.
-Sex scenes are poor quality and boring. MC's private part for example looks like he roasted it.

If creator drop the sex aspect it would be an excellent 5 star Visual Novel.
As an AVN the character models and animations are in the focus so I lost interest on this but I can't rate it worse than 3 (average).

Wow, loved this update (v0.13P1) as well as the rest of the game so much!
Gotta be honest, I'm mostly here for the relationships and the scenes and the story is a nice bonus, and I'm happy with how the things are going.

Love the part of the game with Ellie and her family, they actually feel like a family, albeit a slightly crazy one, and most games fail with that.

Not really too much else to say, just that I enjoyed it a lot and hope for more, definitely gets a recommendation from me!

Amazing storytelling and character development which is very rare to see. The only game I don't use ctrl to skip at all.
Every character is lovable. Even NPC ones without paths. The game feels real.
When the game is finished it may has a chance to challenge the best renpy novel game of all time.

One of the most underrated visual novels ever played! This should be more popular!
Loved Steph character and loved the different attributes of her and and the VN, played most of the paths in a short time and looking forward for more updates.
Good luck!

This is an enjoyable game. I actually enjoy "doing some work" as a lawyer. A lot of games set up activities that your character does, but skips the activities, and then give you a single line about wow what a day or something to that effect. It breaks the immersion for me somewhat. So I enjoyed that we could "do" the things the character is doing.

That aside, the characters are great, and the different paths have a unique and interesting feel, making the different paths a joy to play.

A hidden gem. Just an all round fantastic game that kept growing on me the more I played. The story is engaging interesting and very unique compared to other VNs, the women are diverse and interesting and the game as a whole is very replayable. Looking forward to playing more

This VN is fantastic, I am glad to of found a British VN (as most have an american theme). The story is immersive and charactors are very believable.
I also like the fact that the story has relationship development side to it (wine and dine) and is not a conveyor style pump and dump.

The dev has done a fantastic job and cant wait to see the wrap up when it is finished!

Fantastic game! Would have in my top 3 for certain. It has a great story overarching story as well multiple LI with differing paths for each. I can't think of many games that really let you set how you progress with the LI as well. Whether you're looking for the romantic or a depraved you can get it in this game. It's also nice have a MC that isn't 18 years old.

An absolute must play! The game not only offers 3 different Love Interessts (ignoring side chicks) with their own interests, personalities and kinks, but also an interesting storyline that keeps you on your toes.
As a lawyer in London, the main character is assigned to a case whose solution drives the story forward.
What sets this game apart from others, however, is on the one hand the depth of the story, which is brought closer to the player through quite a few "newspaper articles", and on the other hand the credibility of the location (London feels like london) and the credibility of the MC's actions (I actually learned something about the british common law while playing the game).

I must say, this game has blew my mind. I honestly thought I've played every good erotic game on this site but this one is beyond words. The main advantage it has over dozens of other titles is that it offers not only vanilla sex but also something more kinky, sometimes even hardcore stuff and it does so with taste. Some games are way too agressive on hardcore stuff, often they're way too disgusting and one must skip too much to enjoy it (IMO of course) but this game caters to people looking for something more unique while at the same time it does so with proper refinement.

Edit: It was a good VN, while a bit aggressive, never stepped into anyone's toes. Nowadays the dev is stalling, adding controversial content out of nowhere. I can't recommend it in the current state.