RPGM - Ethereal Sunder [v0.15] [EtherealSunderDev]

While I do have gripes against the character art looking like it's straight up taken out of very cliché anime not to mention the lack of eyebrows, the intro being a massive, overly long just block of text, the battle system and battle art being just free assets that are massively overly used, and most of the "gameplay" just being the very boring fights that have very little engagement, my main gripe is this game is damn near unplayable.

Constantly you'll have to save scum and revert saves because a flag didn't get triggered correctly causing you to be completely locked out of doing anything. As soon as I finally got free range to actually move and play the game (took quite literally 20 minutes), I almost immediately found myself unable to go into the first dungeon as well as unable to talk to any side-mission givers.


I will mention as well, this game is one of those that seems to forget both that it's porn and a game. The game takes most of its time setting up the world and setting while yet still leaving it incredibly boring and un-unique filled with incredibly badly written dialogue.

Usually with these games, I can at least find something to enjoy about it but... this game from the re-used free assets, to the weird looking MC, to the re-used free assets combat, and to the major lack of sexual events... This was just absolutely painfully boring.

really bad game if you run out of potions you are fucked if you run out of mana you are also fucked and you can't escape the blond bandits most of the time i got softlocked trying to clear a dungeon and the only way i could get out of this predicament was to start over again and i didn't want to do all of that again therefore this game is terrible if only there was a teleporter at least so you can get out of the dungeon and heal with magic at least it could have been more playable

Pretty good so far, the art is fantastic and I can see some half decent start at a corruption system as well. I just think more choices in the harassment based events like where you get groped giving apples you can just stand there and let it happen for a few seconds as a choice (that also helps show how weak she is to pleasure and secretly wants pleasure) and they maybe they get slighty bolder like for the breast grab it could be they pinch nipples and such. Options like these help show corruption and pleasure wanting instincts of the protagonist.

The problems I have are the combat being tedius and way to annoying as well as enemy tracking you even through walls, pretty much most combat related things imo. There are also bugs such as if you sleep at the in on the first day regardless if you rescued the people or not the quest advances and the custcene of them at the bar plays out. Another bug is being able to give apples before you are supposed too.

Overall I would rate this a 4 stars as I believe the combat is the only really bad things so far and the bugs will obviously be patched so I wont count that against the dev. This willy easily be a 5 star game once the combat is fixed and the corruption is more fleshed out with more and more options.

I would definitely recommend everyone trying this.

This review is for v0.3.5.

Short review: So far overall 4/5. Not a lot to do after ~40 minutes to an hour. Has a few promising systems. Has a lot of potential in story and art. Hope it does not end up as a short <3 hr game. Will look forward to final release.

• The rock-paper-scissors battle system is a fresh take, considering the quality of most RPGM battle mechanics on this website.
• You "level" up your stats and unlock spells by spending mana as a currency, but you have to be careful because you need mana to clear dungeons. And if you run out of mana, you lose. I thought this is a very unique and fun feature. On a side note, this system of currency is so underrated, I wish it was available in more games (the most recent one I remember is Metro 2033's ammo system).
• Doing "favors" for mana or benefits reminds me a lot of Ambrosia. Love it.

Critiques/Feedback:

• There should be an option to skip to end of the day or the next cycle of the day, instead of being forced to fulfill an activity every morning/afternoon/evening/night. Also would like a warning to know if an activity will move to next cycle of day, as it's not entirely clear.
• Would love to have more side quests and H quests. The game is in early development, so I expect there to be more in the near future.
• Being able to miss your spells is REALLY frustrating, especially when you're already limited by not being able to heal in-combat and needing to manage your mana. It's just not fun RNG.
• I think having two types of healing potions as "G" and "H" is redundant.
  • Would like to have mana potions as "H" instead. For difficulty balance purposes, you can have it be unlimited for casual difficulty, up to 3 for normal, and up to 1 for hard.
• When you escape combat, you can potentially hard-lock yourself to fighting when trying to run away from enemies, because they still move around the map during the transitions. Feel like you should be given a 2-second invincible grace period when escaping.
• Consider adding a quest log, or have NPCs give hints on where to go after dialogue ends. I have goldfish memory so I can't remember everything that's being said in cutscenes... especially when I'm horny.
• Losing mana = game over feels a bit harsh. Would've loved losing mana = defeat H-scene & teleport back to entrance of dungeon instead.
• Why are the predators/stalkers around the prison district faster than Usain Bolt? Slow their speed just a little lol.

Very promising first release, but there is really not much to do yet.
(Also: the game does not tell you when you reach the end of the current build (0.3.5))

I will be watching this with great interest and hope it will not get removed

The art is a solid 10/10.
Writing is quite well done too.