Having played the game a fair bit now, I feel compelled to write this review. (And on a sidenote, I honestly cannot help but wonder now if the developer is entirely sane.) The idea of an Escape From Tarkov clone that is singleplayer only is certainly not a bad one, and having a game with porn in it is (as we all know) a good one. But combining these two concepts? The result is just awful.
First and foremost, what the bloody Hell is the point of having bandits and the like rush up to to the main character (named Ivy) and take advantage of her instead of killing her, when more often than not, they do so after riddling her with a dozen or more bullets? Unlike every other game that features "sexual violence" or the like, this game has a needlessly intricate injury system, so every single wound causes Ivy to bleed and draw ever closer to dying.
Adding to that, the dying process does not pause at all when Ivy is giving a bandit a blowjob or the like in exchange for him "sparing her life," so you inevitably have to spam click the "next stage" button during these animations in order to just freaking stay alive! And of course, even if you manage to treat her injuries afterwards, there is essentially little to no chance of her recovering quickly enough to survive at all afterwards, simply because of that stupid bandit wanting his (quite literally) bloody blowjob.
Even on the absolutely lowest possible difficulty, enemies have laser accuracy and deal ridiculous amounts of damage whenever they hit Ivy, even if she has cyber implants and good armour, meaning she absolutely cannot survive in any straight firefight, even against a single enemy! That alone means the game is inordinately punishing for no real reason. And yes, I know Escape From Tarkov was just like that as well, but here is the thing: That game was based solely around that concept. This is a porn game, first and foremost. Moreover, why even have difficulty settings at all if the easiest one is more punishing than Doom 2016 was on the hardest difficulty level?
Adding to that, the hacking "minigame" is by far the worst one I have ever experienced in any game. The whole "move the slide to fit it into the slots in the bar below" concept is not without merit, but the extremely punishing time limit essentially means that even the easiest, most basic electronic locks in the game can eat up several hacking tools before you succeed. There is also the fact that the slides you can select during any one stage of the hacking process can very much be wasted on the wrong stage, meaning a slide you absolutely needed on the third stage could accidentally be used up by you during the first or second stage, with no way of intuiting that beforehand, meaning you literally cannot succeed. Allowing players to soft-lock their progress completely, even in a compartmentalised fashion, is just plain bad game design.
Worse yet, every single time you fail at hacking anything, Ivy gets injured. One single failure is hardly crippling, but two or three of them? That will either leave Ivy with an extreme injury or a severe shortage of medical supplies, depending on if you bothered treating her injuries between each attempt.
I enjoy being challenged in games, but that really only counts for the ones I play when I am not looking to get off. As it is, this game is simply either outright unplayable or just entirely unenjoyable without using the god mode cheat among several other cheats. And that is most definitely not a good thing for any manner of game.
All in all, I really wish the developer would pick one of the core concepts of this game and just stick with that and that alone.
-Mal
First and foremost, what the bloody Hell is the point of having bandits and the like rush up to to the main character (named Ivy) and take advantage of her instead of killing her, when more often than not, they do so after riddling her with a dozen or more bullets? Unlike every other game that features "sexual violence" or the like, this game has a needlessly intricate injury system, so every single wound causes Ivy to bleed and draw ever closer to dying.
Adding to that, the dying process does not pause at all when Ivy is giving a bandit a blowjob or the like in exchange for him "sparing her life," so you inevitably have to spam click the "next stage" button during these animations in order to just freaking stay alive! And of course, even if you manage to treat her injuries afterwards, there is essentially little to no chance of her recovering quickly enough to survive at all afterwards, simply because of that stupid bandit wanting his (quite literally) bloody blowjob.
Even on the absolutely lowest possible difficulty, enemies have laser accuracy and deal ridiculous amounts of damage whenever they hit Ivy, even if she has cyber implants and good armour, meaning she absolutely cannot survive in any straight firefight, even against a single enemy! That alone means the game is inordinately punishing for no real reason. And yes, I know Escape From Tarkov was just like that as well, but here is the thing: That game was based solely around that concept. This is a porn game, first and foremost. Moreover, why even have difficulty settings at all if the easiest one is more punishing than Doom 2016 was on the hardest difficulty level?
Adding to that, the hacking "minigame" is by far the worst one I have ever experienced in any game. The whole "move the slide to fit it into the slots in the bar below" concept is not without merit, but the extremely punishing time limit essentially means that even the easiest, most basic electronic locks in the game can eat up several hacking tools before you succeed. There is also the fact that the slides you can select during any one stage of the hacking process can very much be wasted on the wrong stage, meaning a slide you absolutely needed on the third stage could accidentally be used up by you during the first or second stage, with no way of intuiting that beforehand, meaning you literally cannot succeed. Allowing players to soft-lock their progress completely, even in a compartmentalised fashion, is just plain bad game design.
Worse yet, every single time you fail at hacking anything, Ivy gets injured. One single failure is hardly crippling, but two or three of them? That will either leave Ivy with an extreme injury or a severe shortage of medical supplies, depending on if you bothered treating her injuries between each attempt.
I enjoy being challenged in games, but that really only counts for the ones I play when I am not looking to get off. As it is, this game is simply either outright unplayable or just entirely unenjoyable without using the god mode cheat among several other cheats. And that is most definitely not a good thing for any manner of game.
All in all, I really wish the developer would pick one of the core concepts of this game and just stick with that and that alone.
-Mal