Ren'Py - Echoes Of Mythria [v0.23] [Zesty]

Really wished I could give this a 4.5/5, but we can't win them all @_@

Reviewing at 0.23. At this early stage there's not a whole lot to write about just yet.

The dialogue has been good so far, nothing too glaring in terms of grammar or flow. It's also obvious that the story is just getting started as I can't really piece together where it's going to go next.

I'm still a little iffy on the whole AI cg thing, but it looks good and the one H-scene animation we've gotten thus far was good. Well, I guess two H-scenes, but still!

A few things to note that I found so far:

• Some times an image would get stuck
  • Example 1: Getting the tier breakdown for leveling up cards froze on screen even as the dialogue kept moving forward (including dialogue options for asking more questions)
  • Example 2: hopping from the garden to the university via the phone's GPS will leave the image of the garden on the screen even though the dialogue indicated I was speaking with Ed in the library.
• Going back while in the middle of the card game lets you play cards for free
  • Example: playing the Bruiser card and then going back leaves the Bruiser on the field, but not only do you get a Bruiser back in your hand, but you also get your crystals back. And the cards already in play all functioned. On my first turn I was able to fill every spot on my side of the field.

So I do think there's some potential here and I'm looking forward to getting to know the characters more.

Very fun game. I've played about 3 hrs.

Well written and quite amusing text, the ai artwork is good for what it is.

The card game holds up so far, although it's rather easy to start. Still seems set up to get quite complicated later on, and is fun to play already.

Then there is some point and click exploration for more lewds, good stuff.

Fantastic graphics and incredibly engaging gameplay truly set this game apart from the rest. I'm eagerly looking forward to future updates, new features, and exciting improvements. Keep up the amazing work—this game has so much potential and promises countless hours of enjoyment. Thank you for creating such an immersive experience

Underrated, Hidden Gem. But the only thing or main thing missing are H scenes but has a solid foundation and world to be build on. Hope we get more frequent updates.

(Will update review in future patch)

Version: 0.1

It's still the first release of the game, so it wouldnt't be fair nor I will make a "too detailed" rating in this one.

The first point that catches the attention in this game is the fact that the art is detailed and well done. It gives the feelings that it may be AI, but, honestly, as I mentioned many times before, I quite enjoy AI art when done the right way and this game, surely, uses it in the right way.

The story is about a "good-for-nothing" young man who is invited to study in a University in the big city, apparently a good university. Given the fact that he has been invited and has "no costs" whatsoever with living, tuition fees nor anything, his peers regard him as some kind of genius. As we arrive at the city, we undestand that we still need to study for an admission exam.

At the University, we are introduced to the "game" inside the game. Something that reminds me of Gwent, of The Witcher. A fun card game where your main objective is to destroy the adversary's hero, with a 5x2 field that you can use to summon both melee and ranged heroes.

I must say that this minigame aspect is quite interesting. I really did enjoy playing the game, I just hope it's not overused like most Yu-Gi-Oh! old games, that uses the card game itself as a excuse for a poor storyline and "underdeveloped" characters.

Other than that, I didn't really get any sex-scene in this update, but that doesn't really make me worried. The game seem to be well developed in matters of sex-story, so it's a good thing that there's no girl randomly throwing herself at us for no real good reason, as we see in most games nowadays. A system where we advance the story and get the sex-scenes as we're getting closer to the girl, or as a viable situation pops up, it's the ideal. Just like real life.

Concluding, I really enjoy the game so far. It's well done, well polished and it has a lot of potential. Good job and good luck for the devs!

Very fun. Great potential.

The story so far let me chuckle quite a few times. And the included card game is quite engaging. Can't wait for the next update.

The imagery is very alluring. So far there is not a lot of NSFW content, but it is very promising. Especially a certain secretary.

I'll say first off that this had less than an hour's worth of content, but I'm rating it essentially as a preview, a taste of what the game could be. This is far more than a tech demo, there's a lot of story already written, and a lot of infrastructure already established (including a fully developed card battler game), which leaves me hopeful that this won't be one of those 0.1 uploads here that never go any further.

My initial perception of this just from the page here was that it seemed very similar to Echoes of Destiny. It has a similar AI art-style, a card game that you the real person play, but it's also a card game that exists (and has massive societal impact) within the world of the VN. And it's literally called "Echoes of [Blank]." So yeah, it probably drew some pretty heavy inspiration from Echoes of Destiny. But one thing I definitely like better about this is the actual card game. Echoes of Destiny just had that tired old "Triple Triad" game which has already been reused by other adult games before. That game, to me, seems to be mostly about just having better cards than your opponent. And hey, it certainly helps in this game too (as it should, or else there would be no point in trying to obtain better cards), but it feels like you still have a meaningful chance of winning just by out-thinking your opponent. Of course, out-thinking your opponent is easy when it's just a dumb bot, I don't exactly feel proud of beating the first two opponents on my first try. But I'm not a power gamer, so it's not about pride. It's about fun, and this game was a lot more fun for me than the one in Echoes of Destiny. I hope to see more.

I'm looking forward to seeing this progress. The artwork is stunning, the characters are at least moderately interesting, the plot and dialogue seem competently written, and the card game mechanics are simple but enjoyable. Not much here just yet (in v0.1), but I'll definitely check back on this one.

(v.0.1 Review)

There's some solid bones here, but as expected from such an early version there's a lot of improvements that could be made. Also, my typical "AI Art" disclaimer applies here; it passes my initial sniff check, but if AI art offends your sensibilities then best to move right along.

The core card-playing system is nothing new, but is certainly entertaining. It follows a winning strategy of keeping the core mechanics extremely simple, with layers of complexity being added within the cards themselves. New key-words and interactions introduced with new cards encountered serve to show rather than tell in building the potential depth. That being said, there was at least once where one of my unit's attack 'missed' with no explanation that I could find.

My biggest wish for the future of this game is to translate this concept of story-telling by action rather than exposition into all areas of the game - something that is currently lacking. Let's face it, many porn games are going to be pretty poorly written and I would say that Echos of Mythria is mediocre at best. What's interesting to me, however, is that there are glimmers of hope that peek through.

The author clearly knows how to lay out a plot, introduce interesting interactions, and set up the basic hook and breadcrumb story-telling. While the plot so far is nothing revolutionary, I would be lying if I said there weren't times when I was genuinely interested in seeing how things unfold. What really suffers here is the writing, the dialogue specifically.

The dialogue is not offensively bad, but definitely reads like it was written by someone who is a non-native, albeit proficient, speaker. Certain phrasing is jarring and unnatural sounding, especially when framed from an American setting. It wouldn't be such a distraction if the game's dialogue also wasn't overwritten.

There are far too many internal expositions in-between character dialogue that are unnecessary or uninteresting. It's almost as if the author doesn't have the confidence in the audience's ability to make sense of any of the MC's interactions and needs to spoon-feed you their interpretation everything. And I mean every-little-thing. It's this combination of being overwritten by someone who doesn't quite have the grasp of the language's nuances that made me stop playing early, despite being interested in the game overall. It became too immersion-breaking for me to really get into it.

The good news it, that it seems like the creator actually has the right ideas and generally knows how to execute them. Nobody is perfect at everything and if the dialogue could be massaged by someone better equipped to express these same ideas in a more compelling way (and isn't afraid to delete bland exposition) then I see a lot of potential here!