VN - Ren'Py - Jessica O'Neil's Hard News [v0.65 BETA] [stoperArt]

The graphics are nice and the MC is really hot but that's all it has in its favor. Developer is trying to slow play the fact that she's a total slut (which is obvious), the pace of the game is dreadful and the story is generic and painful to read through.

Play version:v0.50

English is not my mother tongue
So to be honest I don't really like to criticize or comment on certain things

Good:
The first thing that caught my eye was definitely the graphics
The rendering quality is very good
Some of the shots made me feel like I was watching a movie
As a corruption-themed game
The characters inside are not deliberately shaped to be ugly and disgusting
The female MC is very hot and definitely hits my sweet spot
The theme of newspaper office is very fresh
It also fits the elements of blackmail and corruption
The core plot looks like it should be good

Bad:
I honestly don't know how to screw up the story of a woman in the media industry who is gradually corrupting herself in order to move up the career ladder.
It's been told a million times and it's still a classic.

Congratulations!
The development team just FUCKED UP.
The beginning of the game is fascinating
But the development team was so reluctant
to let players experience the core plot of the game
The storyline is so slow and boring
It just throws in a lot of lesbian sequences
and having sex with your boring boyfriend in the same scene every day in the same position

You've built up a lot of powerful characters
But you're so reluctant to involve the female MC
In my case
I'm here to play this type of game
I just want to see the blackmail and corruption and cheating(or NTR)
You've created a MC who isn't the kind of woman who can be easily intimidated
This can bring out the essence of the corruption genre

It's like the production team is deliberately delaying the pace of what is obviously a very big story.
This is how you can earn as many subscriptions as possible...

And even if it's based on good graphics
The sex scenes are frankly boring to me
Although the animation frame rate is very smooth
But the plot is boring

This game is really a pity
A good subject matter good graphics
but dragged down by the rhythm of the plot

End:
I would still give 3 stars
Because the MC and the theme is too suitable for me
But the slow plot and boring sex scenes is a major drawback
First of all, it should be an erotic game, then the story

As usual Im going to try to speak my minda bout the game in case I return to it in the future. Will try to make it short:

The good:
Visually is quite appealing, is definetly abov average in the render aspect and in the choice of shots. I totally feel that the dev is aware of the limitations of DAZ and al the angles prevent all this flaws from showing. This wway you will never see a explicit porn shot, everything is kept clsoe to porn, but more erotic. That is a plus.
Sex scenes are definetly above average also, and this together with the quality of the renders make a good combination.

The Bad:
Way too supermodel milfy. Even if the girls we in their 20s, the sophisticated look and the overall aspects is the one of supermodels or milf supermodels.
For lesbian there is 1 girl only (maybe a half cause the other one you barely know her, she is more like a plot device, and).
The third one barely has any content (after 3years...)
The above points raise another issue: too many dicks.
I dont like partners given from the begining cause they are usually plot devices, meaning 1 line of character background and a couple of perks. This feels like the case.
I didn't get the point of the story which seems to be a thread taht you follow to find people to fuck. Those options about "getting documents serve any purpose plotwise?

The good aprt of the game is 4 starts,€verything above average, but the bad part below is 2 or 1. The average of good and bad its 3, the rating.
So if you value the good parts, and don't care about the bad ones as much as I do, go for it, the game should be 4 or 5 stars for you. I didn't feel it that way.

ok ... too bad it can't give more than 5 stars, the developer's talent can't be questioned, the game is just perfect. great renders, great story and personally I have to say that the characteristics of each character are perfectly spot on, seriously guys ... this developer is talented.

Renders are great and the cheating scenes are fucking awesome. I have replayed them multiple times.

The pace of update is very very slow. I hope the dev gets to live a long life so that he can finish this game in time.

The render for every female is incredibly sexy; Shani being my personal highlight. My issue with this one is that the story is incredibly dull and even while controlling Jessica, it felt like just going with the flow with no real choices beyond the binary( faithful or full slut mode). All the male prospects are forgettable and formulaic; naive boring boyfriend, old lecher, powerful fat guy. Even the sex isn't too appealing.
Clearly a lot of work has been put into the renders but the overall product is bland.

This goes exclusively for the way how dev is behaving and his working habit.
Art is 5, story 4, dev's attitude, pace, respect toward consumers... is 0. Latest update (0.5b) after 6 month, except been ridiculosly short, even lacks of any meaningful story development that would make you say: "it was kind of short, but wow..." Such updates should be done monthly.
Way how he "works" is simply killing everything good in this game, which had chances to become one of the best games here.
Dev simply lost his artistic integrity over own commercial benefits. Not to use harsh words on what really this game turned to be about.
EDIT (v.0.55): it is getting worse... endless waiting for several new (i must admit fascinating) renders that you can scroll in few seconds. if you want to read story development created in 9 months of waiting, it can take you 10 more minutes. but why should you read that? there is nothing worth reading.
all in all, for paying users: content is not worth monthly support.
for porn-lovers: almost no sex, just gigantic teaser (blueballer) not worth downloading.
for story lovers, if you can't remember what was in previos update long time ago best way to play it is to wait for 2049 (hopefully) and play complete. game

Great story, high quality renders and great scenes. Well done! I will be waiting for the new releases and new games from the developer.

There is lots of different options and track for different tastes.

v0.5 beta reviewed

This is really a cool title, and when girls express curiosity about VNs I play, I usually start them off with this one.

The art is simply top notch, in my opinion. Easily within the top ten games that use DAZ as the art engine, and the dev does a fantastic job of worldbuilding.

While all of the supporting characters aren't quite as impressive as the titular Jessica, they are universally well-crafted and feel like organic parts of the environments they are rendered in.

The lewd scenes are erotic and mostly feel earned or at least naughty enough to trigger my personal kink threshold, and other than a minor niggle that so much of the available sex is with the one person I try to avoid, what I do find is that the dev integrates the written word, art, and story to deliver impactful and hot sex that doesn't feel bolted on to a well-crafted story that isn't a threadbare skeleton to hang lewd scenes on.

I won't comment on the time between updates as I'll admit that most of the games I enjoy most have long development periods, and this one is no different.

The highest praise I can give Jessica O'Neil's Hard News is that it was the first female protag game I could enjoy (well mostly...Fuck you Conner!)

Above all, I admire the artistry of this production. The fact that I can appreciate the pretty pictures and still find it occasionally fapworthy makes it something special. The production values are pretty top-notch across the board with sound and music integrated as well as seamless animations and a really unique feature that allows the player to choose male, female or 3rd person PoV for certain shots in the preferences.

I feel like Jessica's descent into perversion is moving at a believable pace, and I can't wait to see what she gets up to next!

This game is an amazing example of how to start well and end badly, losing referral, recognition and respect. Just like Game of Thrones.
The first updates were massive, the game has a good storyline, beautiful renderings and an interesting line of corruption. There aren't many good games with a female protagonist about corruption. In the last couple of years, we have received short updates less than a day long, with a break between them of six months.
I understand that developers have problems, they do not know how to continue the project - this is called production hell or burnout. The best solution in this case is to freeze the project until better times, but this toffee with updates for a couple of clicks is a scam and a waste of money.
The funny thing about this situation is that the developer turned off the comments in the topic after the criticism. Lol. I wouldn't be surprised if my review gets banned.

It is one of the greatest female protagonist game since there are only a few. The quality (both renders and animation) is top notch. The buildup is progressive and it has nice set of new environments. The updates doesn't contain bugs mostly which doesn't interrupt our gameplay. The writing of the game is also good. The main drawback of the game is delayed releases. I wish the developer(stoper) a success and hoping for future releases and games.

The game surely has some good renders with decent storyline. In comparison to other games of the similar stories and genre , this surely has more content even though its just teasing till now but the low point of the game is the time gap between updates which keeps on getting bigger just like it's is increasing as of now.

This game is a pain. More than 3 years only for 11/12 days of incomplete plots
There are a lot of nonsense events. She is an investigative reporter who can only look as nice as possible just to get some scoop but in 12 days she couldn't solve anything.
The game is just a story of slow-burning teasing.

BADs:

1) Jessica doesn't need money so she lives in an unreal world like in a Disney fairytale
2) The story is stuck in a constant teasing that stops when things get interesting.
3) The Dev is unable to communicate correctly when the new update is ready
4) in this story all the men and women drool for her as schoolchildren .. at the moment there are no real men in this game only some softcore lesbian sex that is not my cup of tea!
5) the game is still in a starting phase from 4 years (started in 2018)
6) Version 0.35 is better but was made about 2 years ago.

Goods

1) The renders are very very good but that's not a good reason to justify more than one star
----
There are many games with good renders, but in this game the constant delay in updates makes it one of the worst on this website.

Maybe it could be very interesting to play it for new players that have found the game today .. but I'm sure those players will be disappointed with each update

The game is a disappointment and the most delusional I have encountered on this site.
I prefer to play version 0.35 as a short novel even it is incomplete! (at least there is some good tearing action with Parker and his friend

Jessica O'Neil's Hard News is an incredible game, it has one of the most beautiful arts I have ever seen. The plot is also very interesting, I normally don't like to play female protagonist type of game but it worths a shot because of how good it is. The pace is little bit slow but I like it because the narrative is well made, the author definietely has many experiences in story telling.

v0.45

Pros:
- Gorgeous art
- Super detailed and sexy clothing
- Gorgeous MC
- Kinky
Cons:
- None ?

One of my very favorite. Jessica is absolutely fantastic, a lot of effort is put into the visual aspect of this game. We can see the MC in a lot of different clothes. Do not hesitate to try this one out.

This game is easily one of my favourites on the site. I love female protag games where you get to use your sexuality to try and get what you want. This game sets this up really well with the story of working at a law firm.

Only negative is that it's basically a VN and choices don't matter much; but I feel this allows the story to be more concise.

If you play this game, make sure to actually read it and don't skip. 5 stars, can't wait for more.

Excellent sexy story with superb artwork and extremely well written. As others have said I won't play blackmail or similar games but like where the MC makes the decisions. Also I do like the female MC games with a hot MC. The only reason I've given it 4 instead of 5 stars are the delays with updates, however, don't let that put you off what is a fun and sexy game to play.

Reviewed as of v0.45: If you like smart writing, hot female characters, and a compelling storyline, then "Jessica O'Neil Hard News" (JOHN) should appeal to you. I am a fan of AVNs with female protaganists, especially those who have real agency--that is, they're not simply thrown into lewd situations by blackmail or other crap done by douchy male characters. In other words, I'm not a fan of AVNs where women get "corrupted." Just as plenty of men enjoy sex, plenty of women do, too, and it's fun to play a female character who does.

The dialogue and storylines in JOHN are smart and feel real. I've never worked for a newspaper, but I have been a professional TV and radio reporter, and I got the impression that stoperART has genuine journalism or media experience. The sexy situations also strike me as realistic. Not realistic in the sense that these kinds of things happen all the time, but realistic in the sense that nothing I've seen so far is preposterous or even terribly out of the ordinary, at least for a hot character like Jessica O'Neil. Pulled together, the scenarios and characters--fleshed out with great art, animations, and writing--make JOHN one of the most erotic AVNs I've ever played.

The story also provides lots of replay value, as choices put Jessica on different paths with different outcomes.

This game escalates sexual encounters gradually, but is not exactly a slow burn, as there are hot lewd scenes from the very start. At the same time, it's clear that future versions will only get hotter. I, for one, can't wait to see the next update!

Superb game that caters to a wide array of fetishes. The writing is very solid and there is a good balance between story and sexy scenes. Great models, great clothing and a steady pacing that is well rewarded.

Excellent game! The setting has the potential for a lot of exciting scenes - a reporter who needs to get to the bottom of a story and the best way to do that is flattery and seduction. The renders are superb, the story is interesting, and choices are fairly straightforward.
At version 0.45, it feels like the story is only about 30% complete, so I really hope to see more from this game and will be keeping an eye on it.