VN - Ren'Py - Intertwined [v0.12.3] [Nyx]

All I can say that this VN has an amazing story with very likeable characters, good character models and great renders. After playing many different visual novels I can comfortably say that Intertwined is in my top 5 favorite Visual novels in terms of sheer enjoyment and I can't wait to see where this story goes

This VN is a real masterpiece and juwel. The short description may be misleading to have the typical story as many others here BUT you realy get a very dense and well written storyline with many twists and choices.....nice characters. For me one of the best VN on RenPy you will get here.

At first glance, Intertwined may seem like a VN with a not-so-original setup full of porn game tropes and familiar archetypes. Yes, this impression is true. But don't let that discourage you. The use of these elements is not the result of poor creativity. On the contrary, the developer seems to know them well, uses them intentionally, somehow masterfully, and manages to add layers to the story and characters that go beyond the scope of most other porn VNs.

Even though I've played dozens of VNs, the story still surprises me at some points, in a good, not facepalm way.

I have only explored some of the options but it seems that player choices really affect where relationships with girls go , there is quite a variety of girls and I guess most players will find some girl they like.

Overall, I'm enjoying the VN and looking forward to more updates.

Some moments in the final parts of 0.9.2 suggest that the story could get quite dark, but I dare not guess where it will lead. I'm almost certain the developer has some interesting surprises up his sleeve.

I Really enjoyed what there is of this so far it has pretty good writing and a good bit of humor throughout. great renders and decent animations.

Writing this review as of the v0.9.1 release and i am mad i started playing not long after episode 9 release cause after that cliff hanger i can't wait for the next update.

Overall great game i followed the Lexi/Cara route i doubt i will replay it in the future i was able to see all of the sex scenes with scrappy mod and i am happy with the character paths i chose but who knows what future updates will bring.

It's such a hard game to review. Reviewed against 0.9.2

It's like Beverley Hills 90210 but in smut form (or the OC if y'all are a bit too young for that) which isn't a bad thing but I do feel at times it suffers from it.

So first and foremost, as mentioned, we're talking beautiful people. In this world ugly people are left to die on mountains after birth it seems. Only the best genes get passed down so everyone's just way, way too beautiful. 18 year olds are actually mid to late 20s, and ripped like they were sculpted from marble, moms look younger than the sons, it's all there. That, again, isn't a bad thing but I feel the variety is somewhat lacking and once or twice I had to try and remember who x was in a particular scene, wait was that x the cheerleader? wait no it's y, the lassie from the thing.

Also much like a soap opera, the whole story is custom made, absolutely MADE for the drama and by goodness this game has all the hits you'd expect; misunderstandings, secrets upon secrets upon secrets, tears... just buckets of tears.... false parents, marriages, fights, infidelity. All that's required to complete the set is someone coming back from the dead. I've not finished it yet so I'll let you know.

The drama is.... good. I'm possibly being a bit mean here for the sake of a few jokes, which I apologise for. I said it's a soap opera and truth be told that could be taken as a compliment. Despite it being such a way, it IS very good... for a soap opera. I've played games that are a fifth as interesting as this.

It is the type of game you want to watch cause you kinda want to know how it ends up.

The problems I have aren't big ones, but that's not to say they aren't there. As a game it lives up to its name, the relationships between the characters are almost on the wrong side of being too complex. There's a lot going on there and although I think the cast is probably the right size, the similar styles of characters sometimes make me think the person I'm talking to is someone else.

It also seems to suffer from that problem that everyone just immediately wants the MC's dick. Now don't get me wrong, it's a porn game so it's kinda expected but it goes beyond that. The characters you meet don't just want to ride you, it feels like almost immediately they're picking out baby names. Even characters you've not spoken to in years immediately revert to wanting a little something something and that's fine and all, but it's sometimes a bit unbelievable.

There's also the issue that at times it feels it's too easy to end up on a particular girls "path" and then you're left worrying that because this game is built for the drama, is there going to be a big fight later on? I don't want that, I just kinda want to pick a girl and do that play through. I suspect it's left intentionally open so you do fool about with other women and as such feed into the drama this game thrives on.

It's a good game, as a writing exercise the level of effort put in to ensure it stays interesting without becoming a mess must be huge, the dev should get plaudits for that. the MC suffers from that "sex god" trope found in many games and I sometimes find he's got the emotional depth of a spoon. Some scenes simply shouldn't be that complicated and wouldn't be if anyone took like 3 seconds to just explain it. But then when has sense played a part in a soap opera?

Excellent game in my opinion and probably one of the best games on here.

The story itself is interesting and well built, the characters are interesting and the way they are intertwined really creates unforeseen moments with some difficult decisions. The branching in the story creates different exclusive storylines, locking you out of certain encounters completely. The different choices seem meaningful and thankfully don't offer some of the creepy/weird options some other games/devs seem to love.

The renders and models are nicely detailed and designed. There aren't a lot of animations, but I hope that will change in the future.

Since I started with v0.9.2 I can't comment on the update frequency and contents, but up until now, there is a lot of branching content in the game.

IF all you care about are amazingly rendered hot babes and sex scenes this is easily a 5/5.

That being said this game suffers from the common "girls fuck fall in love with the MC at first sight" syndrome that plagues many other Ren'Py titles. The writing in general is subpar and the plot is your bog standard transfer student fucks all the hot babes. But the babes are hot and the renders great so 3 out of stars: not great but quite fappable.

This is a review of version 0.8

Pros:
+ very good and engaging story with lots of drama
+ there are plenty of interesting and very varied girls both in characters and their appearance
+ I have few favourite girls and I would be hard pressed to choose the best one, its a really good sign - Yen vs Triss alll over again
+ no pointless 'free roam' sections, the story is linear and driven by choices
+ the length so far is on point, story threads are not too long and not too short with good amount of teasing but not to the point that it gets annoying
+ Monty Python and Witcher 3 references - this dev has some good taste
+ good graphics ...

Cons:
- ... but in some scenes particularly with Lexi I saw some weird skin textures or lightning issues, its not a big deal though
- we don't get to know what happened to brave sir Robin's penis

Sum up:
First a friendly hint - I suggest that you play with a walkthrough mod. Some ralationship ending options are not obvious and you might find yourself frustrated like some commenters here that you accidentally ended some path.
I would score this 9/10 so far. Its not a perfect game, but the overall story and my fav girls are so good that for me it reaches this high level. Plus it gets additional point for Witcher 3 references. If this is the first game of this dev I'm extremely impressed.

it would be VERY don't bad to add NTR to this story with the ability to avoid NTR. the game would immediately sparkle with other colors and give a sharpness of sensations and, of course, attracted fans of the NTR genre))) it wouldn't be so critical for those who hate NTR as it could be avoided, but it would exist for those who like this kind of genre))

the fact is that there is quite a lot of teasing in the direction of corruption in the game, for example when Alexis came on stage and the fans shouted that she would undress, and then the soloist offered to have sex with him, despite the MC being a few meters away from them , I won't even say anything about Alexis' direct hint of a blowjob to Ethan, I get a heavy feeling that I'm missing the content that should follow after these hints and it kills.

the game seems to be walking along a narrow path without the possibility of freedom, and no matter what you do and no matter what allusions to this or that content are, you will not see it, but only one boring route...

then why even make such hints to disappoint the fans of this game?!

the game is really very beautiful, the script, the sex scenes, the incredible beauty of the actors...

the game needs these branches and other types of routes and then it will show itself with brighter colors)))

For Update 0.9.1

I just finished Alexis route, plus some random skip runs just to check what else is there, and I added the game to my watch list but I guess that's Erynn, lying dead in the last picture, when the MC calls her and we have the buzzing sound coming from the dumpster... if that's the case then I guess one more game for the ignore pile for me


4/5 Story - Pretty nice story for now, nothing really new I guess, but it was pretty entertaining and kept me playing so I guess that's a plus. Something I don't like, personally, is when I see what other characters are thinking. It's fine for the MC, but seeing what other characters think, idk, just feels weird. I would've loved to see some face expressions that would hint at what they are thinking (there are one or two in the late game but not enough). Also seeing what other characters are doing when the MC isn't present it's another let down for me, it feels like watching a movie and not playing a game. Dialog was more than fine, nothing awkward or nonsensical, pretty funny at times. English is my 2nd language so the grammar was ok for me, didn't notice any mistakes. I liked the flashbacks but some were pretty long, at some point I've forgotten that I was actually watching a memory...

5/5 Renders - Awesome characters, that feel actually alive and not just placed there for the MC. Some of the characters where a big problem for me. I've checked a lot of games on this site and what I can say is that some of the characters are not unique, I've seen them in other 3D games an that was another big let down for me.

2/5 Animations - I don't even want to mention animations, from start to finish they are weird, sometimes spooky, low fps. Idk, i think I saw 2 animations that were actually decent?! Anyway, there is a lot of room for improvement in the animation area because sometimes it just breaks the immersion for me.

Anyway, with a few fixes this could be one of the top games for me. Depending on what happens, with the thing in the spoiler, this game could go to 1 star pretty fast, at least for me.

Let me start by saying that this is a good game, it has great characters, the writing is good and the renders of the girls are amazing.
And if you look for a game where you have dozens of possible options, but can only end up with one girl, breaking hearts left and right, this is THE GAME for you.

If not, then there are a few points I need to mention.
The game hints at incest and offers none, the game plays with the idea of the MC being a player having several relationships at once, but that will lead to a lot of girls becoming heart-broken and/or angry.
It would kind of leave a too negative taste, for the review as is, because this is still a good game, so I will further explain why I have a problem with that, but will put it behind spoilers.

In the end, this is a game with beautiful girls, good writing and a lot of choices, which will inevitably lead to a single love interest and for that kind of game it is really good. If I would go solely for my personal tastes, this would rate lower, but I can't in all fairness let this influence the rating much, as I should have known what I was going into. The game is a good game for what it is, just don't expect incest or the possibility of several love interests ending up with the MC.

For a review going into much more details and actually explaining my own problems with the game far better than I managed, go down a few reviews for that by Kata.
I might not completely agree with the rating for reasons I explain above, but the reasoning behind their problems with the game, is exactly the same as mine, only put into words way better.

For that the Dev claims that this is her first game its better than most of other games. Very interesting and engaging characters, beautiful renderings and animations. And a really engaging storyline with different paths and surprises.

A very good game overall with a pretty good story. Lydia and Valeria are the best girls in my opinion. MC is kinda a pussy and gets beaten up quite a bit without even trying to fight back most of the time. Can't wait to play more.

Version Played: v0.9

Time to Complete: 8 hours

TL;DR: A game with intense and unpredictable twists and turns, and with more drama than discussions on NTR. If you can put up with it you may find this game to be an enjoyable experience, but if you don't like bullshit, this is not where to go.

[3/5] Story: This game loves its drama. True to the name, every character is intertwined in the story with every other, making it a minefield to traverse. Seemingly arbitrary choices will continue or entirely close a character's path and playing this game is almost impossible without a walkthrough as any progress will likely be made entirely by blind luck.

[4/5] Renders: This game has renders that are overall good but not much better than anything you'll find elsewhere. It's a standard affair for Daz renders, just with contrast cranked up an immense amount. It is not uncommon to wish the assets in the scene had higher resolution textures, but the characters themselves don't have such issues.

[0/5] Animations: The animations in this game manage to sit in the middleground between a viewable 30 fps and an also viewable 2fps (a few images on repeat). Unfortunately, this sits somewhere around 10fps and is often unviewable as any significant movement becomes painful to view. There are some animations which turned out acceptable, but unfortunately the overall experience actually detracts from the game.

[~] Soft Drop: This game has too much drama for me. Every single character has some connection to another, and as a result you have to deal with everyone's drama. This was not an issue in earlier chapters (or maybe I just put up with it), however I feel it cranked up immensely with the ending of this latest chapter. For now I've decided to simply drop the game until the final update. I do not wish to be strung along by intense cliffhangers and would like to replay from the start and enjoy the game in full whenever that comes.

Сan't escape the feeling that plot planning or the game design choices turned the wrong way at some point. It was kinda interesting and engaging at first, but with the game progression the spark is gone, just like my interest to the game. Combined with some weird branching sometimes plus a lot of filler content (that damn flashbacks), can't say that the game is above average in some aspect. So playing 0.9 made me feel even more disappointed.

I´m not handing out 5 stars to every games. There is really a lot of great games theses days! It´s a pity really. If this is really Nyx first game, it´s top shelf! Finding a flaw in this game is stupid, mostly because it´s irrelevant. All that matters in a VN is done expertly here.
Every girl looks different, feals different and has a distinct personality. The MC is a great guy, very funny and has believable relationships with every girl. The story is great and VERY branched out. If you think episode 9 was short, start over and flirt with a different girl and you´ll get a different scene with your girl.
I dont know why you´re still reading this. Stop wasting your time and go play one of the best VNs in existence.

A Good Game Marred by Extremely Questionable Design Choices
A v0.9 review. Spoilers ahead.

Intertwined is interesting. It's entertaining. The characters are all reasonably compelling and if not quite lifelike, at least lifelike-adjacent. Renders are good, even if the animations feel more like stop motion photography than anything resembling smooth and seamless. It has all the hallmarks of a good game. You want to like it.

But the problems start to surface the more you play. They're small and harmless at first, letting you overlook them, but it becomes bigger and harder to ignore as the game goes on.

The game is fundamentally built around a series of branching paths. But even in a game with so many girls and so many branching paths, choices feel restrictive. Choices in this game boils down to which character(s) you wish to pursue. But even the choices to pursue them are far from obvious. Certain choices that seem innocuous, like not having a conversation this very second somehow lead to totally terminating the route for a certain character. Because not dropping everything in your life to immediately follow up on a character's whims means that character is no longer in your romantic future, apparently. Worst of all, it may not even be clear that it terminates the route for them until far into the future.

Playing this game without a walkthrough or mod tool like Universal Ren'py Mod is a lesson in frustration. Any given choice can straight up harpoon your future with another character, to the point where if you want a good ending with one character you often have to deliberately ignore all the porn logic characters the game deliberately throws at you every other scene.

The argument about realism doesn't even apply, because the situations are neither realistic nor consistent. Why would two best friends who know each other's feelings about the MC deliberately choose to ignore them so they can both blindly pursue the MC? Why would Elena, knowing Layla's feelings for the MC, choose to add additional temptation to the pile? Why would hooking up with Juliet end the Nikki or Cara route when the MC was in a relationship with none of the girls at the time of the hookup? "Realism" in this game seems to boil down to choosing the girl of your choice as soon as they appear and neglecting everyone else, hovering around them waiting for the first opportunity to white knight for them. I would call that stalking or simping, but evidently you're rewarded for that.

Unfortunately, even this isn't consistent. If you want to pursue Elena, much of her interaction is gated behind pursuing Layla. But romance Layla too much and you presumably won't get anything with Elena. It's a clusterfuck of storytelling that can be handwaved any which way because none of it makes sense.

The developer clearly does this intentionally. "It's not a harem game" is probably one of their chief excuses, practically sticky-noted to the game's splash screen. But in order for this excuse to hold water, the game has to be fundamentally and appreciably different with each playthrough.

But it isn't.

This game isn't a free roam game. This game isn't a free play. It's a linear VN. Even if you elect to play this game ten times, focusing solely and completely on a different girl each time, you'll still see a supermajority of the same scenes over and over. You'll read the same filler sequences over and over. And even if you do happen to choose an entirely different girl, many times you'll get the same scene with a different skin (looking at you Nikki/Cara).

Also remember that we're playing these games as they are released. We don't know the final outcome. We don't even know which characters have meaningful potential relationships. The game throws well over a dozen "love interests" at you, and presumably only 5 or 6 of them are actually major enough to warrant endings, but you don't know that for sure. Is it worth pursuing a minor character? Would doing so destroy your chances at a good ending? Who the fuck knows...

It's a classic example of a developer overestimating how interesting and varied their content is. You go through all this effort and uncertainty to see the content in the game, and the payoff is not worth the work you put into it just to see the story.

And to make it perfectly clear, the story is decent, if a bit formulaic. You play as a young man who moves in with his divorced (and very attractive) mother. You reconnect with old love interests and meet new ones. Your father is your typical Asshole Dad™️ who eventually becomes something resembling an antagonist in this game. Just like how almost every other male character in the game is eventually positioned either as an antagonist or rival, which is odd considering it's "not a harem game."

Why does Ethan still insist on getting in your way if—in your playthrough—you don't give a shit about Erynn? Why does Lucas get in your way if you don't pursue Layla? Why does A Manual care if you don't go after Cara? Why does your goofy old "friend" still undermine you if you don't pursue his crush, Valeria? Who knows... It's almost like the game presumes you're going to pursue those characters, but really it's just tries to bait you into doing it so they can pull the rug out from under you in a bullshit "gotcha! you shouldn't be trying to romance multiple women" lecture later.

Like most VNs, you're supposedly incredibly charming, attractive, and good in bed no matter how you play your character. You meet a bunch of women, each of whom are obviously super attracted to the MC, like all of the most boring, boilerplate games of this genre. Instead of writing romance and build up, where the characters charm each other and grow closer, they just submit to a juvenile fantasy of instant attraction so they can avoid the heavy lifting. However, for the most part all the women have interests and ambitions beyond just the main character. You want to get to know them.

Dialogue is decent, at times quirky and other times snappy and quick. The flow of dialogue to renders is very nice. You never feel like you're settled on the same screen for overly long just reading slide after slide of bad dialogue, which is a huge improvement over many other games in this genre.

But every time, you eventually run into that wall, where you're either bottlenecked by a choice made 400 slides ago, or you didn't hug or ogle the character enough and thus miss a scene (or you ogled them too much even though there's no way to know whether or not ogling would reward or detract points). It just leaves you with that salty taste in your mouth that you missed content for minimal reasoning, leaving you unsatisfied and feeling punished because you didn't interact with the characters in exactly the way the developer envisioned.

In other words, all the choice in this game boils down to a correct way to interact with each girl (plus points vs negative points), and then rigidly adhering to elevating the girl of your choice, spurning all other opportunities. Apparently the developer feels the "correct" way to play this game is to play the same game a dozen times, each time focusing on a different girl (many times seeing the same scene with a different model render), and utterly yielding to said girl's every whim and desire in just the right way to get maximum points with them. It's not even realistic, it just means you get to choose which girl you choose to become a total simp for.

This game ultimately has an objectively right and wrong way to play it, and the right way is incredibly frustrating and restrictive.

The game obviously takes a lot of inspiration from Witcher 3, both tongue in cheek and literally—it pokes fun about how you can't romance both Triss and Yennefer in that game, and shows the MC playing Witcher 3 in multiple scenes. But what the developer seems to have forgotten is that both the VN format and the genre of game Intertwined is precludes it from being like Witcher 3.

Witcher 3 can get away with the one-romance-only ending because it's fundamentally not a romance game. You're plunged into a massive, open world fantasy epic with a war, civil unrest, monsters, and the literal end of the world happening in the background of a game with strong open world exploration and character-building RPG elements, all of which are completely playable and engaging even if you don't choose to romance anybody. If you strip all that away and leave it with just a voiceless linear visual novel of the Triss and Yennefer storylines with bad animations, the game would absolutely suck, just like this game does.

(Also, it should be mentioned that the bad ending only happens if you explicitly tell Triss and Yennefer you love them both, attempting to pledge Geralt to both of them, not because you waved at Triss as you passed her in the Novigrad streets, like Intertwined.)

Many characters are slow-burned and breadcrumbed into oblivion. It falls into the lewd game trap of having sex be some kind of endgame payoff rather than organically weaving it into the story (you gotta rub their arms the right way first before you can proceed to a scene three days later, where you kiss them exactly how they want, before anything sexual is even on the table, obviously). If you're pursuing Elena, Erynn, or even Layla, be prepared to hang on to the barest tethers, because you still, 9 chapters into it, haven't come close to sleeping with any of them.

And other characters like Gabi, Valeria, ShaCarri, Emily, Melissa, Tori, Brooke, Iris? They have points but they're such minor characters that you wonder if they will even have romantic scenes, much less endings. Would pursuing them completely bork your ending with a more prominently featured girl? Is it worth bothering with them? Who the fuck knows! You're left in total limbo not knowing who to romance because it might be years before you get anything resembling a payoff, and making one random wrong choice might completely seal off an ending with the girl you want in the most convoluted of manners.

This game almost makes more sense if you read it as a reverse female fantasy MC. You take all the attributes of an attractive male love interest, put them in the MC, throw a bunch of temptation at him and expect him to spurn them all in order to mind-read and anticipate the desires of his one chosen pedestal girl. Unfortunately, you have to play as this idealized female fantasy without any of the psychic powers or futuresight evidently required.

Story - 5/5 The overall story is better than most others, although parts of it are static and unchangeable. It is interesting although parts of it can be confusing. Such as points system, which doesn't have that much of an effect on many parts that you would think would be changeable considering the amount of possible relationships. An example would be Zach, even if have full friend points and you avoid the girls he likes, he is still going to become your enemy. So much of the points system needs improvement. Should be clear indicators as to the status of the relationships. Even then many choices do not change what happens overall. You cannot completely avoid interaction with most characters.

Originality - 4/5 The story itself is not original there are hundreds of the same. The way it is done and some parts of the overall is different though. So it is still pretty original.

Renders - 4/5 They are well done, some are grainy in the lower chapters. Still higher quality than the usual.

Playability - 5/5 There is nothing confusing or difficult when playing, no grinding stuff out to get through the story and such. Which is a great thing considering there is not a lot of these story/games that don't make you grind in some way to get through it.

Animations - 1/5 One would think that considering the render quality is very good, that the animation quality would be as well. Unfortunately this is not the case. The usual 2 second and two motion sex in this one. Very amateur on that part. Since Story, renders and animations are pretty much the big three when it comes to adult games. As well as animation quality and amount of, being so important. This one misses the mark, could be so much better.

Grammar - 4/5 The story is easy reading, although some of the wording in parts needs fixing.

Amount of content - 5/5 The updates have not taken vast amounts of time. As well as most updates having a lot in them. Definitely better than so many others who take many months only to put out micro updates that have next to nothing in content.


Overall interesting story/game. Definitely needs improvement in some areas. Still interesting to play through at least once.

Story was just unintresting
choices makes no difference
There is no stat that increase of decrease if you decide pick a rude choice
I was about to skip class and went i went to class i was rude and i was expecting some stat decrease But seems choices just don't matter
Almost every girl you meet jumps on mc his dick
No bugs
Only good thing is renders