v1.1.3 Unedited Version (final or build 7 47)
An extremely well written VN of considerable length about social manipulation, impersonation and consent.
If you spend any decent amount of time sampling different games on this site, you'll find that many developers are amateurs in every sense of the word. Particularly when it comes to writing. Many games are tropefests with almost photocopied plots, tropes and what not. Though in all fairness the Japanese professionals don't do a better job at storywriting. Well, that's not true for this VN. The MC is a lesbian biker tomboy who's been lured by her cocky and manipulative twin brother to impersonate him on a cruise ship with his shitty rich classmates. She has to avoid getting caught out by the wrong people if she doesn't want to end in a bind and a strange competition in social manipulation is announced soon. Most of the plot is told by her to her brother, just before the finale.
This structure of the narrative permits a style of first-person narration that's livelier than normal because it remains part of a level of dialogue, and her brother does interrupt her a lot. This gets to another outstanding strength of the VN, the dialogues are crafted with fantastic quality and make the rounded characters really come to life. And from strength to strength, the characters have developed, distinct, solid, coherent core personalities, that limit their behaviour in normal circumstances. Just the interactions between these characters, but also the differences that pop up on different playthroughs, are a joy to read. The MC is also shaped by a core personality that informs the choices she can make in conversations. On any playthrough she's still her pretty confident, bluffing, horny, kinda goofy, street wise and certainly not virginal self. It's a delightful escape from many games' naive virgin MCs who descend into a rapefest.
Those choices are given in a far more dynamic way than in your normal VN. Options are not all presented at the same time, but new options may appear and old ones may fade away if you decide to let the MC bide her time by clicking through while the narration continues. And there are many choices, there are dozens of choices in many of the scenes. Apart from a few mandatory scenes like the introduction or scenes that are triggered by certain conditions, the majority of scenes can be picked in a scene selection screen. This adds another level of "strategy" and even more dynamism to what's already a pretty dynamic VN. It's also like that with the LIs, who're the two characters in whose rooms the MC can spend the night. The sex scenes in the VN, there are ones with LIs at night and with other characters during the day, are really long by the way, they're some of the longest in the game but don't get boring and they are firmly placed in the rest of the story. The MC's score in the game also decides how happy the ending is on the monogamous routes. Beware that spending two nights with both LIs leads to controversial content.
The hidden underlying plot about Mécontents Sans Frontières who seek to overthrow capitalism with escapist fiction is sure weird if anything. The arranged marriage, a consensual arranged marriage of convenience to be sure, is also an unrealistic element and seems directly lifted from old-timey fiction. These are unnecessary and, I suppose, unwelcome elements, but they are marginal enough, or at least backgrounded enough, that it doesn't detract much from the primary plot. There's also some strange shit about a living AI that suddenly comes up in one epilogue.
Another thing that may cause grief is that if the MC spends two nights with each LI and lands on the truple route, she's presented a nasty choice: she either faces rape by the obvious antagonist (the President/the Rival) or she has abusive sex with an obvious drama queen (the Flower/the Boy). These do have reasonable warnings, but they don't really communicate in the original version of the game that one is submissive and the other dominant and that one of them is perhaps more objectionable too. You're however forced to pick one of the two on the route and you're also not warned in advance that sleeping twice with both LIs has this consequence in the build I tried.
Of course, the mere existence of content like that means in this world of sour grapes and nasty online sniping by a small but productive clique of censor-happy progressives, something that's sadly especially bad in LGBT+ circles, that some will drum up outrage campaigns to pressure game devs. That also happened with this game, so the dev released a patch or update to "fix" that terrible offence against online loserdom. I didn't try the patched version so I can't say anything about what's been changed in that, but if the above-mentioned kind of content is a hard no for you, you might want to check out that version and see if it fixes stuff enough.
The above shows that this VN is not short of dark and gutsy stuff. I can also mention that there's also a betrayal arc (avoid content with the Swimmer/the Slut if you hate this), a messed up struggle with drug addictions in the background of some arcs and a clumsy attempt of pressuring someone into a relationship (not the MC). And the "good" endings have the dark side that the MC will permanently assume her brother's identity at work.
The manga art style, though it may not be your thing, is well drawn. This is supplemented with beautiful backgrounds and UI art. Tasteful music rounds it out on the artistic end. Every part of the visuals and audio is outstanding.
There's a good deal of lezdom BDSM in the nightly sex scenes. The scenes with the Beauty/the Princess, where the MC is submissive, are all about it. But also the route of the Hacker/the Stalker has. If you're not averse to a more grounded and psychological treatment of BDSM, this is the game for you because it's some of the best that you can find.
Essential reading for any fan of yuri, BDSM, dynamic VNs, creative plots or fleshed out characters. Mind the controversial but avoidable parts and make your informed decision. 5 stars, not a shade of doubt.
An extremely well written VN of considerable length about social manipulation, impersonation and consent.
If you spend any decent amount of time sampling different games on this site, you'll find that many developers are amateurs in every sense of the word. Particularly when it comes to writing. Many games are tropefests with almost photocopied plots, tropes and what not. Though in all fairness the Japanese professionals don't do a better job at storywriting. Well, that's not true for this VN. The MC is a lesbian biker tomboy who's been lured by her cocky and manipulative twin brother to impersonate him on a cruise ship with his shitty rich classmates. She has to avoid getting caught out by the wrong people if she doesn't want to end in a bind and a strange competition in social manipulation is announced soon. Most of the plot is told by her to her brother, just before the finale.
This structure of the narrative permits a style of first-person narration that's livelier than normal because it remains part of a level of dialogue, and her brother does interrupt her a lot. This gets to another outstanding strength of the VN, the dialogues are crafted with fantastic quality and make the rounded characters really come to life. And from strength to strength, the characters have developed, distinct, solid, coherent core personalities, that limit their behaviour in normal circumstances. Just the interactions between these characters, but also the differences that pop up on different playthroughs, are a joy to read. The MC is also shaped by a core personality that informs the choices she can make in conversations. On any playthrough she's still her pretty confident, bluffing, horny, kinda goofy, street wise and certainly not virginal self. It's a delightful escape from many games' naive virgin MCs who descend into a rapefest.
Those choices are given in a far more dynamic way than in your normal VN. Options are not all presented at the same time, but new options may appear and old ones may fade away if you decide to let the MC bide her time by clicking through while the narration continues. And there are many choices, there are dozens of choices in many of the scenes. Apart from a few mandatory scenes like the introduction or scenes that are triggered by certain conditions, the majority of scenes can be picked in a scene selection screen. This adds another level of "strategy" and even more dynamism to what's already a pretty dynamic VN. It's also like that with the LIs, who're the two characters in whose rooms the MC can spend the night. The sex scenes in the VN, there are ones with LIs at night and with other characters during the day, are really long by the way, they're some of the longest in the game but don't get boring and they are firmly placed in the rest of the story. The MC's score in the game also decides how happy the ending is on the monogamous routes. Beware that spending two nights with both LIs leads to controversial content.
The hidden underlying plot about Mécontents Sans Frontières who seek to overthrow capitalism with escapist fiction is sure weird if anything. The arranged marriage, a consensual arranged marriage of convenience to be sure, is also an unrealistic element and seems directly lifted from old-timey fiction. These are unnecessary and, I suppose, unwelcome elements, but they are marginal enough, or at least backgrounded enough, that it doesn't detract much from the primary plot. There's also some strange shit about a living AI that suddenly comes up in one epilogue.
Another thing that may cause grief is that if the MC spends two nights with each LI and lands on the truple route, she's presented a nasty choice: she either faces rape by the obvious antagonist (the President/the Rival) or she has abusive sex with an obvious drama queen (the Flower/the Boy). These do have reasonable warnings, but they don't really communicate in the original version of the game that one is submissive and the other dominant and that one of them is perhaps more objectionable too. You're however forced to pick one of the two on the route and you're also not warned in advance that sleeping twice with both LIs has this consequence in the build I tried.
Of course, the mere existence of content like that means in this world of sour grapes and nasty online sniping by a small but productive clique of censor-happy progressives, something that's sadly especially bad in LGBT+ circles, that some will drum up outrage campaigns to pressure game devs. That also happened with this game, so the dev released a patch or update to "fix" that terrible offence against online loserdom. I didn't try the patched version so I can't say anything about what's been changed in that, but if the above-mentioned kind of content is a hard no for you, you might want to check out that version and see if it fixes stuff enough.
The above shows that this VN is not short of dark and gutsy stuff. I can also mention that there's also a betrayal arc (avoid content with the Swimmer/the Slut if you hate this), a messed up struggle with drug addictions in the background of some arcs and a clumsy attempt of pressuring someone into a relationship (not the MC). And the "good" endings have the dark side that the MC will permanently assume her brother's identity at work.
The manga art style, though it may not be your thing, is well drawn. This is supplemented with beautiful backgrounds and UI art. Tasteful music rounds it out on the artistic end. Every part of the visuals and audio is outstanding.
There's a good deal of lezdom BDSM in the nightly sex scenes. The scenes with the Beauty/the Princess, where the MC is submissive, are all about it. But also the route of the Hacker/the Stalker has. If you're not averse to a more grounded and psychological treatment of BDSM, this is the game for you because it's some of the best that you can find.
Essential reading for any fan of yuri, BDSM, dynamic VNs, creative plots or fleshed out characters. Mind the controversial but avoidable parts and make your informed decision. 5 stars, not a shade of doubt.
