Finally had a chance to play latest and it was another fantastic episode! Actually more content than I was expecting. I continue to enjoy downtime at the villa and the visits to the homes of friends. That said, I do look forward to getting back into desert action and hopefully the return of Shani. I am excited to see faction politics evolve as well. Also, I am going to need another visit with the bitch queen before long. A fleeting secret groping in a dungeon was not nearly enough to satisfy.
I do have a single gripe that I must say (and this is purely a personal preference sort of thing and would not in any way take away from an overall rating). I absolutely hate this growing trend of auto-advancing animations where the camera angle switches without any input from the user. DPC started this goddamn trend (or at least popularised it) and now I see many more devs adopting this same method. Even my beloved Desert Stalker game. One of the reasons I play these games as opposed to just watching pron is user choice and the fact that there is some degree of control over what you are seeing. If I like a particular image or animation, I want to be able to linger on it instead of getting a quick flash and then it is gone then stuck waiting for the scenes to eventually cycle through again. Save the auto stuff for cutscenes or after one auto cycle, switch back to the regular individual animations that advance on input.
The Ain scene would have been amazing if I could have had a chance to actually enjoy each animation before it was ripped away. Being able to advance, pause, or go back on any image or animation is (or was) a key feature of renpy. Ah well, I guess I will have to get used to it. Another fucking thing that DPC has ruined for me. Hopefully other devs don't start copying his other obsession: mini-games.