AVN Fantasy wins out against film noir convention
Up front, this game is right up my alley. The porn is to my taste, but even more than that, I love film noir. And from the first punch the MC takes to the face, you can tell it's written by someone who also loves it, and more than that, someone who understands the genre. It's campy in the right places, it's brutal in the right places, it's stylish everywhere.
Especially early on, that style does so much work. The atmosphere, the rhythm of the narration, the dialogue, it's all perfect. And then....
Well, the game really wants to deliver, and it does. It delivers a ton of raunchy sex, a ton of blockbuster action, and a ton of girls falling in love with the MC. I have no doubt that the developer loves these things too, as they're all executed beautifully.
But these things also replace the noir atmosphere that the game builds so well early on. Maybe they have to. Maybe no one wants to feel disempowered by a game, or betrayed by an ending. Just like noir, visual novels have their conventions, and one of the conventions seems to be that in a visual novel, women genuinely like you. And so the game moves from neo-noir to 80s action movie to, ultimately, what it is. A pornographic visual novel.
But man it's a good one.