VN - Ren'Py - Elleria [v1.0] [M.C Games]

I really want to like this game, as the art work is really good, but this game feels like a poor man's Seeds of Chaos. The plot is kind of the same: MC is tasked by a powerful "evil" person to destroy a corrupt system of government. But unlike Seeds of Chaos, the MC's motives feel wrong.

In Seeds of Chaos, Rowan's motives are because he's wife is hostage to the evil force and/or he actually hates the nobles who rule the world because they looked down upon him despite being a literal Hero Who Saved The World. In this game, the MC starts as a guy who has lived for 1000 years after dying in a war for a god who never existed and now is just an adventurer who doesn't age. Until he dies from the dragon and meets Eris never once talks about the state of the world, those who rule it, or anything. He's just lost, living without purpose but make coin to eat. So his shift later after he dies to suddenly have an issue with the ruling class and wanting to burn society down makes no sense. And his sudden change of heart on gods also is dumb as he's spent 1000 years not believing in them or actively hating them to suddenly being willing to work with one of the "evil" gods is also a stretch. Then everyone around him is awful and annoying. Everyone's egos default to asshole, including the MC, and I would rather just kill everyone than deal with their Bullshit™, the MC included. And to be honest, once the game goes into "semi-freeroam" mode, I was done. There is no reason for it as really all you can do is do every scene that pops up and sleeps.

A small minor issue I also have is the "virgin lets you have an open relationship" trope here. Lyria tells you that Elves choose one partner for life, then chooses you but the moment your ex comes back into the picture, she's suddenly opened to you screwing around. I hate this trope in Fetish Locator, WVM, and others as it's never truly done right. It's always immediate and only is done to give the harem option without having to work for it. It's a lazy trope and I wish people would stop using it or learn how to build up to it. (Midlife Crisis kinda does this with the Wife route. It's slow, makes sense in the story, and feels more rewarding once it's played out. The MC nudges the wife towards the idea and lets her choose to experiment on this path. It's not perfect, but it's at least better done.)

The last thing that I really dislike is that choices don't feel like they got much weight to them. Maybe this will change later on, but when you talk about dealing with the village near you base, the choice is pretty much made for you to kill them, you just decide how you want to do it. Which sucks as someone does suggest talking to the leader and the MC completely dismisses it. It feels like every "choice" is less a choice and instead which mood you want to be in when you say "Yes". If that's what you are going for, I would suggest just making a Kinetic Novel instead of giving the illusion of choice.

All and all, this game really needs to be put back in the oven and let cook more. Right now, it's a concept of a story but I feel like the writer is making each chapter up as they go instead of building an outline then writing the story. The character's motives and personalities change scene to scene and choices don't feel like choices. The only good thing going for it right now is the art.

This comes down to two main things: the writing (mainly, the writer's lack of fluency in English), and the sex.
The good: the girls are solid looking, and have (I think - it can be hard to tell at times) reasonably fleshed out personalities.
the bad: The sex scenes are brief, and not very good, so they're unrewarding.
In chapter 1, the English is a bit clunky, but I can understand almost all of what the writer is trying to say. It was just good enough to keep me playing. In chapter 2, it suddenly lost coherency. I struggled to understand much of it, and what I could understand was poor. That ended things for me pretty quickly. Normally, novice writers get better as they progress. I'm not sure what happened here, but it got a lot worse.
So even if you start it and like it, there's a good chance you'll just end up more frustrated for it.

This last part is, at least partially, for the writer:
One further problem, (which is compounded by the difficulty understanding some details of what is actually revealed to the reader), is that the writer doesn't understand the difference between a mystery, and, I'm going to call it, inflicted ignorance. At key junctures, the protagonist is given critical knowledge that is deliberately withheld from the reader. It's not good. Basically, you're given no indication of what the protagonist's plans are beyond what is right in front of you. I know that there's a rule that the more the audience knows about a plan, the worse the plan will go, but that doesn't mean the writer should conceal EVERYTHING. If the plan is, say "build an army of irregulars that can overthrow some bad guys", tell the reader that that's the plan, and it can still proceed with neither the story being predictable nor the plan failing. Key details can be revealed at choice times, but the reader shouldn't feel like they're given the perspective of the protagonist's dog. Not that this protagonist has a dog. There's a scene where the protagonist leaves an area, and people talk cryptically about him behind his back. That is one of the correct ways to do a mystery. It's a shame the rest of the story isn't like that.
It's not hopeless, but I'm not going to hold my breath; I'm very doubtful this game will ever reach a place that is satisfying and rewarding to the players.

I really wanted to like this game but couldnt...

Lets start with the obvious positive... The Models are lovely and unique.

Unfortunately however, having pretty things to look at does not save this game.

The story is lacking, disjointed and poorly written. There are massive gaps where the dev just "fades to black" and you jump forward missing what appear to be critical story plot points.

The MC is also poorly written, he acts like an arse to the LIs for no reason and is just plainly unlikeable.

As i said at the beginning, i really tried to like this game as the LIs all look good. and i like the fantasy world story arcs normally.

But This game apart from nice models, fails everywhere else and is a game i will now avoid.

Beautiful Game with a Taste of "Might & Magic" with plenty of beautiful women, and lots of demons and magic, played this game and it felt like I was really there...The story is being told with suspense and with not knowing what comes around the corner. The characters are very nice, and the main Mc is not bad either. The Costumes are also beautiful also, even with its lack of animation I deeply enjoyed this Game, and is now one of my favorite fantasy Games.
Hoping to see more soon.

Someone in the thread comments said it best: everytime an important conversation is about to happen, the dev skips it, without fail.

This is a narrative device that has to be used sparingly and in the right circumstances. Sometimes, instead of having characters discuss a plan, you will show the plan being carried out. This is fairly common for a reason, instead of telling the reader what will happen, you show them.

This dev, unfortunately, does not execute these "dialogue skips" well. In fact, every time something important to the plot of the game is about to be mentioned, SKIP.

The MC's goal, SKIP. The "inciting incident," SKIP, important information about an LI, SKIP, general plot of the game, vague hints and SKIP whenever something tangible would be mentioned.

It's not that this info is a mystery to the MC, it's only hidden for the reader.

When used correctly, concealing information from the reader can build tension and mystery. Concealing all information just means there is nothing investing me in the game. I don't know shit about what is happening or why it is happening, so I cant sympathize or take an interest in any of it.

What makes this worse is we are allegedly supposed to make choices as this MC (game is kinetic right now). How is that supposed to work when everything we need to know to make decisions has been skipped.

It's not mystery, its not even confusing, its just bad. I lasted til the end of the current game out of the hope that it wasn't a pattern (and the LI's are hot af) but man after like the 3rd or 4th time a convo was cut prematurely I checked out.

Another Kinetic Novel tricking people to believe they have choices.
1* for the nice renders.
The story would be intriguing if not ruined through artificial plot holes created through annoying skip moments.
Overall the dialogues are ok.
The disconnect from the MC because of lack of knowledge is quite annoying and leads to a spectator experience rather than actual immersion.
Sex scenes are forced and choices have no consequences.
All in all very disappointing, but given a proper rework of interaction and choices, somewhat redeemable.

This game has one of the best storyline,loved it , but it needs a work on lewd scence they are way to short and less animation try to acompalish that things i can see that this game will be very popular

This game is heavily emphasized by it's story and writing. But after all, i can tell that the dev has never picked up a decent fantasy novel to read. Everything is just exposition after exposition, then cringy dialogues, then more exposition... the renders are just decent. What a wastefully mediocre game! Average for the effort I guess.

In my opinion, this is an elegant project. 5 Stars
This have good story, good renders, the music is adequate, transitions well implemented, the speed of development and publication is good.

From a player's point of view, I can't expect more or better because everything is excellent in this game.

Pros: -> All.

Cons: -> The thing is, I can't travel to the future to see the finished project.

Very good job Mystic.

So i just played the game and i loved it
all i can i say is the game is masterpiece ... i have played dozens VN and very few can compare to it in my opinion. (easily one of my favorites from now on)
The story is fantastic , the Visuals are beautiful, and charachters are interesting with different personalities. The Li are very lovable and beautiful
i found myself attached with one Li from chapter 1 , seriously thats some very good writing.
Furthermore it shows the quality of work and planning the dev did for the VN.
I wish dev continue with such quaility work and this gonna be of the few VN im planning to support someday.

As of v0.3 Ch.1.PartII


PROS

• Good looking models
• Interesting setting & premise .

CONS

• Forced into scenes.
• Walls of text about nothing in particular.
• Meaningless choices
• It's an unlabelled kinetic novel.

CONCLUSION

Started off hopeful but soon went downhill. Seems like another dev that can't get their head around a player NOT wanting to forced into sex scenes.

It's a Kinetic Novel in disguise so if you're looking for routes and choice don't bother.

The game seems promising -- good renders, decent dialogue, possibly interesting characters; but the lag between lines in dialogue is... sooo... infuriatingly. . . looong...., that I gave up. I hope the dev fixes this.

Edit : I have added back one star since one problem I found had been fixed.

So what to say about this game ?

I like the fact that he do try to have a proper story for change,

But here the thing that let me lose two star, first even if this game have very good render, some can be repetitive (aka talk during transport) when i do understand that showing they are on the road is important i can become quite annoying to always have the same move that come often.

On the story, i found it refreshing, even if some of the writing can be enhanced (like the major vow make in 2 sec because why not), i do find sad to have a kind of (self sacrifice personality) to not push his loved one on the "bad" road, it's already seen and frankly i don't like this kind of way to think, so i hope the hero can change his mind later.

Some girl are seen for 5 minutes with nearly no interaction before moving to another part of the plot, franckly even if (again) i understand why it was done like that, i found it anoying since i have the impression of "oh no i cannot use that it miss somone so i will put this person here to fix the mess".

but overall it's a good game that i will follow, in hope the dev see my message and enhance the said point to win back some star.

So the dev want's to write a serious, plot-driven VN. This means I will hold the writing to a higher standard than I would if I this was just a silly fuckfest porno VN.

The dialogue can be very clunky. Apparently the MC has known this elf girl for 6 years, yet they speak like they barely know eachother. The dev uses their conversations for exposition purposes and it comes across very unnatural and forced.

However, it's obvious that this is probably a translation or ESL dev, so I don't want to be too hard on this aspect of the game. I don't expect perfect english out of my porno VN's lmao.

Where the main reason for the bad review comes from is the dev's bizarre insistence on skipping extremely important conversations. There is an incident where our character seems to die but is saved by a goddess. This goddess essentially wants to recruit us to achieve some goal. Great. Just as she is about to tell us what this goal is, we fade-to-black.

Next thing we know, the MC says "yes, I agree, I want to do the right thing." and starts talking about choosing between "evil and lesser evil."

Like what the fuck are we talking about? All I know is that there are other gods that might be causing a conflict, and we are going to choose to do [REDACTED] because the MC thinks its the right thing, so that we can achieve [REDACTED].

So now, the character who's thoughts we can read and who we make choices for, has a goal. Unfortunately, we don't have a single clue what that goal is beyond it being "the right thing." How am I supposed to get invested in the story and the protagonist if I have no idea what I am doing or why I am doing it? Every scene that comes after just falls flat, because why tf would I care? I don't know the stakes, how important our actions are, why I am taking any of the actions I am taking. IDK if the dev thinks this is some cool mystery, but it's just bad writing.

A couple scenes later, we are trying to recruit this sorcerer girl to our [REDACTED] cause so we can accomplish [REDACTED], and she says she has some very important conditions. Guess what, fade-to-black, MC agrees. Apparently, these [REDACTED] conditions are so important that we need to make a magical vow to uphold them.

I genuinely don't know if the dev thinks this is somehow some kind of intriguing mystery, but it isn't. Frankly, it comes across as lazy. Like it would be too difficult to write a compelling scene, so just handwave it and hope the player doesn't care.

Very good game, needs a "skip transitions" feature, waiting for each speech to load is bothersome. The MC is kinda pompous, but bearable. The ladies are 10/10, too bad the MC has a huge stick up his ass so the interactions are a bit limited. Still, the game is way above average, definitely following on Itch and recommended a play and support!

This is a five-star game, while I admit there is very little sexual content, I think the world-building and established characters are a strong foundation for a very solid game. I do think it jumped too quickly at parts and you get a bit of whiplash, but I really do enjoy that vibe, plus I think the goddess's are inspired by Selune and Shar and I like that as well, all in all this is a game I will probably continue to play every time there is an update.

Great game, captivating story. Very cool and mysterious MC.
Stunning renders, beautiful LI's. Music is very good.
Universe is rich and interesting.

I cannot wait for more! Overall 5/5, rare gem. Keep up good work.

For Version 0.2

<--- Graphics --->

More than enough to tell the story. Somewhat simple, but, still good quality and good lighting. The posing and the planes for the stills are decent, but, not brilliant. While they don't have to be astounding to fully illustrate the story, there's a simplicity about them. Not that that simplicity is in any way undesirable, it creates a feeling of some monotony.

An example of this is the camera at the back of the carriage. I can completely understand that it is extremely pragmatic to use the same the same camera for all the shots, it is however a bit monotonous. If you pardon me, I would suggest 2 or 3 more cameras, one from the front and one from each side. Some alternation of them to reduce the sense of monotony.

The angles are all frontal and static (I don't mean to make them animations, I mean the posing) as in the poses are not dynamic or expressive. I read your objections to unneeded rendering, agree with it, but a standing pose doesn't mean stay there with arms along the body in a rigid position. I would suggest you to try some observation of people in relaxed poses both solo or in group. This isn't a MAJOR problem, but it is something that would improve your rendering and visual story telling.

The usage of Depth of Field was nice, but, I'm sorry, it was a bit over used. This is a personal preference, but, maybe use it more sparsely.

<--- GUI and Gameplay --->

I found the GUI excellent. The choice of fonts and colors was quite good. During the game the selection boxes were quite legible.

There is however an issue with the choices in dialogue. Sometimes the choices are indistinguishable one from the other in terms of results. To the point that the choice is irrelevant, or, at the very least, seems to be. They simply say the same but with different words but the same tone. If this is a relevant choice that leads to different results, it MUST be made to give that impression. Let me tell you right now, if any of those choices leads to content being blocked, I will instantly block this game and most certainly all others from you. Choices should only be made to relevant content and must be made clear. If the point is to promote save scumming, forget it. Zero relevancy "choices" and hiding content under choices that look exactly alike, are extremely bad form. Remember, a large majority of the people playing these games, even if somewhat proficient in English, are not Native English speakers, as so, a difference that seems obvious to a native speaker, feels and looks the same for a non-native. Needs serious work on this.

<--- Writing --->

I mean the writing technique, not the story.

There's too many errors. Both grammatical and typos. Some sentences are simply overly complicated, or completely indecisive, or unneeded.

I recommend the usage of a writing tool like (but not exclusively) Grammarly.

Apparently someone already is doing the corrections, I'll leave it to them.

<--- Story --->

I find the story absolutely interesting. All characters so far are well developed and interesting.

It is still early to have a full comprehension of the plot, from what it seems to lead, it is quite interesting. If you change it or twist it, we'll have to adjust I guess.

So far, it looks like a bit of a romantic triangle for the personal drama, and the specter of war for the world drama. Both are quite a bit "abused" but, they are so, because they are effective. So, for now, the story is quite interesting and I do want to know more of it.

<--- Conclusion --->

A very interesting project with much room to grow. Not a graphics oriented project, but decently illustrated.

A story that leaves us wanting more, without the use of cliffhangers, I hope this practice is kept.

There's a terrible amount of grammar errors and typos that break the flow of the reading, making us focus on finding them instead of enjoying the story. Needs correction.

The choices are many but several are either for flavor or look so. Not easy to decipher for non-native speakers.

<--- Rating --->

So far a solid 4. Only thing detracting from a 5 is the choices and the grammar.

I really like the game so far, off to a great start. I enjoy the writing, the story seems interesting and I like the characters and renders as well. Animations could be better but I don't really mind them in a game that's more story-focused. Looking forward to how this one progresses.

Well, the first of all the highlight of this game is the writing. It is very polished and cohesive. I often try to find AVNs produced as mature visual novels with mature writing and not just as fapping material. I want some stories to engage in deep philosophical questions for some refreshments and variety. This is one that I have found which scratches that itch.

The writing on a lighter background is a little hard to read.

I won't question the characters' personalities because I liked the MC, and their dynamic was also enjoyable.

Also, the theme is medieval times and fantasy, which is used so much yet we can't seem to get more of it. So another kudos to you for producing another enjoyable fantasy and medieval-themed AVN.

But the only thing, not a complaint, is the intro is quite short, and before I could realize, I have finished the VN. Though it is short, I gave it 5 stars because I see it developing quite well in the future. So best of luck, dev!