VN - Ren'Py - Defending Lydia Collier [v0.16] [White Phantom Games]

STAY AWAY FROM THIS GAME.

I really wanted to write something short and concise, but honestly, this game is so atrocious that I don't even know where to begin. I've played every path, interacted with every character, and explored everything the game has to offer. The game starts off pretty decent, but the further you progress into the story, the more it falls apart and shows its ugly true colors. While it can be very sexy and turn you on, these moments are so brief and lifeless that you'll forget them in a minute.

First of all, this game suffers from a severe gameplay problem. The developer has chosen to lock each girl's individual path behind a vague veil of subtle text. In the first few days of the game, you're presented with opportunities to interact with all the girls. You can even ask them all out on a date, which is usually fine in most games. However, in this one, it leads to a significant problem. Eventually, without warning or explanation, all the girls except one will simply vanish from the MC's life without a trace—no texts, calls, or anything. You'll miss out on a significant amount of content without even realizing it.

The replayability of this game is by far and away the worst I've ever experienced. You're constantly halted by this fucking awful and extremely irritating virtual computer that you absolutely have to use to progress. I hate it with such a rampant passion; I want to scream and strangle the developer. What the fuck were they thinking, honestly? The computer does nothing for the player, it has no value, no purpose; it's completely fucking useless. It doesn't even work properly; it's unintuitive, and you will, with a guarantee, accidentally use the back function, which is infuriating because you have to redo everything. When you're on the computer, there aren't any cues, tasks, or notifications, so you're not sure how much you're supposed to do, which means you spend way too much time on it. It kills all of your momentum, and it feels terrible to use.

Unfortunately, that isn't the end of it, though. Because there's also the mobile phone that's equally worthless that you have to use to progress the narrative. I will say, the phone is more intuitive; the buttons do what you expect them to, and you can use it fairly quickly. I just don't understand why it exists; it's not necessary. The only function on the phone that's actually purposeful is the messages app, which could have easily just been made a bunch of jpgs that you read normally. It's not like you message a lot of people anyway. It drives me mad how incompetent this developer is.

Then there's this idiotic mechanic where you have to send people on missions? What is the purpose of this? It amounts to nothing; it's like it's there just to piss you off. You don't receive anything special by selecting different people and teams, other than some generic dialogue that you're not interested in.

At the beginning, all the characters seem normal and somewhat sweet, but as you progress through their paths, they suddenly transform into freaks and creeps. Stephanie turns into a hentai sex slave overnight, Ellie becomes extremely hateful bitch, Vanessa, the prude and innocent single mom, turns into a succubus, and Lydia were apparently a kidnapper and a total psycho.

All of the characters' skin tones are off, making them look like corpses. Many character models also appear overly muscular, like they're on steroids. Like, I'm sorry, but I don't think a 19-year-old girl could look like Proxima Midnight.

To summarize:
+Lewd scenes can be quite sexy at times

-Poor writing
-Locked and hidden paths
-Worst replayability of all time
-The hateful virtual computer and mobile phone
-The teams and the "missions"
-Terrible character models
-The skin color of all the girls looks like corpses
-Filler content
-The game takes place in London, England, but none of the characters speak proper English
-Dialogue choices are vague
-Poor profiling of the girls sexual nature. Which leads to a exasperating reading experience. For instance, Ellie is depicted as dominant, which contradicts her bratty personality (definitive of a submissive). Stephanie's portrayal as submissive contradicts her potential as a dominant character, given her abusive relationship and job.

What an absolute piece of work this game is, utterly infuriating.

Pretty good! Decent writing if you can ignore a smattering of grammar issues, which fortunately I can. Renders are largely serviceable. Animations are few and not that great, but they aren't bad or frequent enough to be a deal breaker.

Not that I'm inherently against such things - wouldn't/couldn't play so many of these games if I were - but I appreciate that the MC isn't a young, vaguely twinky, barely adult as seems to be the norm. And along those lines I also appreciate the UK setting. Makes a nice change of pace from the usual, generic American suburb or a fake US city stand in.

Story 10/10 :is a detective story where you have
To solve a case as a lawyer for Lydia Collier
My kind of story

Renders 10/10: has great art and renders and best
Characters renders I have ever seen eg Veronica
And Ellie

Characters 10/10 : great characters eg Steph , Veronica
And Ellie
Choices 10/10 ; there are many kinks which are obviously
Optional like Steph bimbo path also there are many side
Routes

Conclusion:all in all a great game

I would rate this as 4.5 stars. One of the better executed plots as far as AVN games go. Writing is pretty good for the most part, characters are distinct instead of being written the same with different models. Sex scene dialogue is very corny though. Most of the game is pretty polished, in the newer updates there are some spelling mistakes and goofy looking scenes.

Not a harem game, which is nice and good for replayability. Most of the paths are pretty even on the amount of content available, which is also a plus. A negative is that its pretty easy to get stuck on a different characters path which locks you out of other characters paths early on in the story. Having choices matter is good, but ambiguous choices like staying at the bar or going home should not start you down a characters path.

Models are fairly typical - not bad, nothing special. This game is starting to get pretty old (5 years in the making), there is a fair amount of content relative to development time. Probably will take another 1.5-2 years to wrap up the game if prior development time holds

Good renders & nice story. First thought this was gonna be a story focused game later shifted to kink focused. Not a harem game main girls has separate path, that path again splits to another path sometimes collide with other girls. Each path has exclusive side girls. Even if your are not into kink you gonna love this game. I'm more of vanilla romance guy but now loving the kinks in this game. Cause girls are written in such a way. Seems like dev loves bimbos, but this is not your usual bimbos. Steph's bimbo path is way better than steph normal path.

NB : This is the only game where I loved the bimbo even though I'm more of vanilla and romance guy. This route is kinkier and got nice romance too. In other games i avoid corruption, slut, bimbo paths in this game it got nice charm. All hail to dev for this


If you love lot of kinks this game is perfect for you. Nice story is a bonus. But to enjoy full gaming experience you surely need a mod or walkthrough, walkthrough is better

Defending Lydia Collier is a sometimes rewarding, sometimes frustrating experience. The first thing you'll notice is that this is an extremely high quality AVN. The renders, the story, the world building, the characters, the gameplay, even the occasional voice acting on the radio; it's all had a lot of work put into it, and it shows. Perhaps most impressive is pulling off a true mystery/thriller in the AVN format without it becoming boring or predictable. I can't adequately summarise everything that makes this game impressive.

Why am I only giving it 4 stars then? Because a central part of the experience of playing an AVN is how it tackles player choice. Some games opt for branching routes, others for a more linear approach. Both are fine. But Defending Lydia Collier looks less like a branching tree and more like a messy bush which hasn't been trimmed in years. The sheer quantity of choices is overwhelming, and it isn't at all clear to the player which routes their choices will send them down, or even which routes exist. To some players this is fine; they don't much care about whether they miss content, they just want to immerse themselves in the story and experience whatever comes of their decisions. Players like me, however, want to be able to experience the best a game has to offer without having to do lots of playthroughs, and that involves some degree of planning. Normally I would rely on a walkthrough, written or in-game, to do this. However the ones that exist for this game are woefully inadequate, because while they tell you the immediate effects of your actions, they don't tell you where those actions will take you in the long run. And indeed they can't, because the game's decision tree is so messy. If you're a completionist and want to experience every girl's scenes, including variations such as bimbo or not, you have to either be prepared to play through hours with the skip button on before you reach new content, or keep an exhaustive history of saves at crucial decision moments, and you'll have to figure out where those are yourself. It's also not entirely clear from the walkthrough how much interacting with optional elements like the newspaper articles and betting matters; it probably doesn't, but be prepared to either waste your time clicking through fake buggy websites or worry about whether you should have.

There are no good or bad games, there are only preferences, which are entirely subjective. For many people this is a 5 star game, and I envy them, because while I deeply enjoyed it, I was unable to overcome my aversion to the gameplay.

This AVN is extremely well-written. The character development and plot are both very good. The renders and models are above average and attractive. The most impressive thing is the multiple branching paths and how well the Dev is keeping them all straight, with respect to events and passage of time in the story. There are so many different ways to play this, so many paths/options, such a variety of women, and a bunch of different fetishes to explore. This game explores some darker sexual themes, fetishes, and a tin-foil hat style government conspiracy. Most of the more questionable/dark/fetish-y story elements are completely avoidable, so no need to skip this game if you aren't into those kinds of things. No true Harem content, but there are opportunities for multiple sexual partners, including several limited multi-partner relationships. This has something for almost everyone and the story draws you in almost as much as chasing all the hot women.

Renders: 4/5
Story: 4.5/5 (so far)
Sex scenes: 4/5

I prefer non-fantasy, non-scifi games, and this is definitely one of the better ones. Plus it has a different theme than the usual college student games.

There is a lot to say about this game, and I'm still working through my first playthrough, I will be editing this review in the future, but i think we can all agree that using the term "willy" is unacceptable in every context, every time. It is just.not.ok. It makes you as bad as the extreme loli devs. Its just damn weird.

This story has an interesting premise. There is a lot of potential here. Most of the girls are very attractive, the namesake "Lydia" is weirdly not. I'm not sure why this billionaires girlfriend was given such awful skin. She looks like a roady, for no reason at all. The way this story is carried through is quite strange, your choices are mostly "do you wan to fuck this girl or not" so not terribly impactful. There are a few areas where the dev tries to make things difficult, but it honestly comes across as more trying to be a PITA than actually being interesting. Its not really relationship building, more so were you paying attention to this flavor text because i feel like i'm clever, or were you not.

The renders are for the most part good, the animations are few and either ok or quite bad.

When it comes to the story, as i said the premise is somewhat interesting, I can't really say its good, yet. The dev has started to really sprawl trying to bring in intrigue. It will either wrap up nicely, or it will feel like a really disappointing jerk off.

I mentioned choices previously, there IS significant pathing in this one. So far as I can tell 3 distinct LI paths. But having played through once, it didn't really make sense. You get the chance to meet some girls, and go on some dates, and have some lewd scenes....but then you can easily get locked out of someone without a real good reason. You're a few times put in a position where you have to choose one over the other, and whomever you don't choose just sort of disappears with no real reason or conflict, no resolution.

So if you want to see all the lewds, you'll need proooobaly 4 playthroughs. I wouldn't normally recommend this, but with this game I'd probably recommend doing a skim of the guide before bothering to playthrough. I haven't played it yet, but I suspect with current content that the Steph path is the most fun. I though the corrupting Elise path would offer the best content, but it seems the dev really loves Steph. The pure romance Elise path could be good for you warm hearts. Vanessa seems like the most wholesome, but again I haven't played that yet. If the monk path is your beat, maybe just stop playing VNs, because wtf.? Seriously?

Blew me away. Replayed maybe four times after the initial game play. Can't wait for the update. I love the professional middle age virile man gameplay so much more than the unbelievable young man banging every woman in sight cliche on most games.

Everything about this game is really good, the story, music, characters, scenes, etc. Haven't finished it yet but it's already really good with a lot of content so, it's perfect and i'm eager to see the rest

I really suggest dev to try a game "Steps of Debauchery". This game is very suitable for a staged mode. Every major investigation or revenge operation is a checkpoint. MC is free to explore some sideroads or girls when he is free.

When he want to get into next stage, just open the computer and push the program.

This mode will save works and people can get all the stuff by exploring.

Dev can just focus one two parts : main or side. The update can be released one by one, main/side/main. This approach allows you to better fine-tune your game development and overall strategy. The latest version makes me feel that the author is very good at promoting small stories, but the game as a whole is a bit bloated, and the framework of the game has been a bit inflated.

That's what i want to share. Keep going my lord.

Essentially my favourite game of this style, although I do tend to ignore the mysterious plot in favour of concentrating on the girls instead. Well fleshed out romance characters, with different points of view, plots and distinctive looks.

I honestly have no clue as to why this game have so high reviews.

The story and models areokay but quite outdated. Some of the story doesn't seem to fit or maybe put there to add kinks and maybe not for everyone but hey atleast it's avoidable if you want.

Putting the "animation" tag here seems almost more of a scam than NFTs.

If you are looking for a decent or good looking game with animation this is not for you.
But if you're looking an old looking game with a loooooooong story, humiliation and scat you're in the right place.

What can I say just poor performance all around even in the few seconds of animations there is an I have no clue why the game files are this big with nothing to show for it.

Story is a bit long and there is alot to read, if you like law stuff you might like this, but i found it a bit drawn out and boring really, it gets a bit more fun very late in game with the girls. so if you can get to that part it does seem to improve.

MC dosent have the biggest brain, at one point in finds a note about Eve which could have something to do with the murder and first thing MC does it show it to her, it tells her to destroy everyting, what that is who knows but sounds like evidence of some sort, so dident feel like a bright idea to show it.

Also MC finds a video of Lydia collecting the car after her husbon got kidnapped and MC say its destroys her story and he needs to talk to her about the lies, but he never ask not once....not sure if dev forgot to put it into the game but its just very weird.

Story 3/5
Long and boring and alot of law stuf, and MC is a lawyer who tried to play a cop investergating a murder case, he should proberly stick with hes day job.

Girls 2/5
I really did find any of them hot, even the youngest girls looks like milfs which dident help, faces also look alot alike on most of them, so i mostly played on just to see how the story went.

Animation 2/5
For a animated game there just isent enough animations, most sex scenes are just pictures, atleast in my route with Ellie and her familie, its simply just not good enough with just pictures in animated games.

Music 3/5
Average music not really mood setting but alot better then silent.

Choices 5/5
You have full controle over who you want to be with or have sex with and it seems to work perfectly.

I will check it out later once more updates is here, then update my review if its gotten better or worse.

One of the best games with one of the best storylines. Multiple endings which are completely different so you must play the game at least 2-3 times to get those endings. The content of the game is great, and most important is the badass storyline it has. Top notch! The sound design and overall environment the scenes are taking place in is also good.

This is a good game. It has a lot of content. It has nice graphics and many erotic scenes. It has choices that matter and can be played several times to discover all the stuff. The writing style is good and it feels like coming from a with some life experience. It even has its own built-in internet with political news included.

So why not 5 stars? Well, I just couldn't get into the story. I tried and I failed. There is some crime story present but it's a rather slow burner. And you can't just skip the boring parts as you have to check your phone or laptop all the time and your fast-forwarding stops there. You play as a lawyer and the game at moments begins to resemble being a real lawyer too much which is not so much fun You must answer mails and smses, read and analyse legalese and so on.

Amazing game! A lot of different choices and outcomes. The characters are amazing and you don’t feel like talking to npcs when you interact with them. A concern I have is that since there are a lot of different branches, some will stay stagnant for a while since the dev will need a lot of time to update them all. However I trust that the dev will keep up the great work!

Overall, I enjoy Lydia Collier very much. The plot is well told and for the most part very captivating. The way secrets are discovered is unique and although the puzzles are easy enough to circumvent, they are still interesting if you decide to solve them on your own. Many characters are likable, have interesting secrets and sometimes even goals that are not related to the MC. Not all of them though.

The thing that keeps me from awarding five instead of four stars is basically the "lewd instead of storytelling" that is going on for some branches of the plot. Like switching into dating paths just because you want to go out with someone, suddenly it's a date. No other ways to have a good time apart from dating and fucking apparently. Shame since that means you cannot spend any meaningful time with Ellie unless you intend to shake her world. That's oddly creepy for a plot that started out as sophisticated.
Another thing are the slut and bimbo routes that serve no purpose other than satisfying a particular gaming crowd but they stick out like a sore thumb. In fact, if you switch on one of the perv paths, it does derail the entire character arc. From aspiring cop to airhead in one surgery is sure pornographic but it's not good storytelling.

It is my humble opinion that those excesses would have been better served in a different game. It feels oddly out of place and dissuades the suspense of the actual plot surrounding Lydia. In fact, these excesses often mean that the main plot is entirely on hold or that life and death scenarios and lewd desires require the same degree of attention from the MC. It really broke my immersion at times.

This game is so very fun. I enjoy so many aspects of this game from the various characters, plots, sub-plots, and the over all main story. I enjoy the freedom to follow the various characters and pick their paths. I also really enjoy the fact that when you pick one path you open up unique things for that path. Makes for great replay value, to which I have done many times. a top 10 game for me.