Ren'Py - Lessons in Love [v0.47.0] [Selebus]

Updated for 0.29

TLDR; Game is weird and that's good. Unless you don't like weird, then it's bad. Game isn't just about sex, but relationships. So while there is plenty of sex, there's also a lot of romance. And manipulation. This game will make you feel something. Good, bad, horny, disgusted. I can't promise what it is, but I can promise you'll feel. Read on for more details!

Personally, I think this is the best game on the site. The writing is intelligent and well-done, the lore is complex enough to encourage theory-crafting, the characters are all unique, there's variation in body types, and it accomplishes an incredible feat by making characters both anime-ish and realistic at the same time by making them flawed. There are characters with depression, trauma, ASPD, PTSD, grief, emotional baggage...

If you're looking for a game just to fap to, this is not the one. When I played this game for the first time, I dropped it pretty quickly. I wasn't in the right mind-space to play it. But after revisiting it, I've played it through completely twice (which it has at least 40 hours of gameplay to it right now, btw).

This game is art and you can't convince me otherwise. The subject matter is horrifying, it's aware it's horrifying, and that's largely the point. The game itself asks you to stop playing it on multiple occasions, calling the player out for continuing and making the choices that they do. And those choices matter in this game, btw. They have long-lasting consequences that change the story in both small and large ways.

Still not sold? The game consistently updates every month with hours of new content. And the dev? Constantly active, providing timelines for releases months in advance, and actually sticking to them. This is his job and he very clearly treats it like one.

As much as I'm fanboying in this review, there's negatives to it too. First off, trigger warning for suicide, body dysmorphia, childhood sexual abuse, rape, blood, gore, disturbing images, and psychological horror. Also something that can be frustrating is that while choices have consequences, they can also lock you out of certain paths and content. A choice made in chapter 1 can lock you out of things in chapter 3, 30+ hours of gameplay later. Sometimes being a good person comes at the cost of getting what you want, like sex scenes. And sometimes being a bad person can push someone away, costing you things you may enjoy like a romantic scene. It is possible to play in such a way that you can view all content in a single playthrough, but without following a guide or paying close attention to the wiki, it's unlikely you'll do so on accident.

The game also doesn't offer in-game hints on how to progress, though it does have a link to the wiki. Without the wiki, it would take you forever to figure out how to progress.

This negative may also be a positive, depending on the type of person you are, but in-game puzzles are not skippable and the wiki does not offer solutions to them. The game leaves small hints to puzzle solutions, but you have to really be looking for them to find them. Solutions to puzzles may require you to review past events in the archive. They may be what you thought were throw-away lines or hidden in the backgrounds of scenes. Or in the audio. The game demands your full attention and if you want to continue being a horrible person by playing it, you'll need to put forth the effort. Some people legit keep notes!

Finally, this game requires a bit of grinding. It's really not much, but it exists. You can cheat, but you run the risk of having your save file flagged for doing so. Being flagged as a cheater can change some scenes and dialogue. There's also no telling how it may effect things by the game's end.

And that's everything! Hopefully that answers any and all questions you may have and will help you figure out if you want to play. If you enjoy it, be sure to throw the dev some cash. He's certainly earned it.

This game is pretty thoroughly reviewed, so I just want to voice that I don't find the writing good.

I played this game specifically for how good everyone said the story and writing is. Part one will trick you into thinking that something might happen, but it quickly goes nowhere. I stopped playing about halfway into part 2. It's 'edgelord deep' at best, imo.

If you thought the TV show Lost was well written and you were satisfied by how it ended, this game might be for you.

Pros:
1. The writing.
This is not only the best written H game I've ever played, it's one of the best written things I've seen in general, including books, movies, tv shows, etc. The characters feel incredibly human, they're super witty, and the game overall feels super believable. The depictions of most mental illnesses are incredibly well done. The fact that the writing is so good really makes me wish the rest of the game weren't so fucking dogshit.

Cons:
1. The characters are all first year high schoolers. Pretty fucked up.
2. The story is just not enjoyable. You play as an self-proclaimed asshole who goes around hurting and traumatizing all these girls. Half the H scenes have the girls crying.
3. On that note, if you're into the game for H scenes, don't bother. It's hours between each, and they just aren't good.
4. There is so much fucking grinding in this game, it's exhausting as fuck. 90% of it is filler, and it does not give you hints about where to go or what to do so you can either look it up or spend an hour of your life trying fucking everything until something gives you a new event. Idk how braindead the dev has to be to design a game this way.
5. The puzzles are absolutely retarded. It scatters clues in throughout hours of gameplay and it expects you to remember everything and write down a bunch of random details to use later on. The puzzles aren't even good either. If you look up the answers on this site you'll find condescending posts by the dev shaming people for not wanting to participate in his garbage half-rate puzzles.
6. There is potentially NTR in this game. The main character has amnesia, but there is a scene where the main? love interest is raped by a shadowy figure while the MC watches. I say "potentially" because the nature of this scene hasn't been revealed yet. The game implies this is a memory of something that happened in the past. Also, if NTR does not have to include just males, there is a bunch of unavoidable content where love interests get sexual with other girls.
7. It's pretty boring at times, especially at the beginning. Which is a major problem since its so long.
8. While the depiction of most mental disorders is super good, the depiction of bipolar is wildly over the top and the depiction of brain damage/anomia is laughably bad.
9. Nodaka.
10. The art. I mean its as good as Koikatsu can pump out, but that's not a high bar.
11. There are lots of scenes in the game where the dev breaks the fourth wall and starts relaying messages directly to the player. And every single one of these involve him being a narcissistic condescending elitist cunt. Which I guess is to be expected of someone who made a game like this.
12. I just struggle to see the point of this game. The H scenes suck. It's not at all romantic. The story is long and drawn out and boring a lot of the time. What am I playing this for? To grind for hours so I can watch girls get hurt and cry?

In conclusion, I really wanted to like this game. The writing alone kept me playing for a lot longer than I expected it would. But despite it being so well written, it just does literally everything else so incredibly poorly that I cannot keep playing.

This one's hard to judge. It's basically a very polarizing Doki Doki Literature Club with a lot of added grind, written by someone with considerable writing talent; the latter point is something I don't say lightly.

When it's about characters, their problems, the ways they cope, and the fact that the MC is a fairly shitty person, the writing is often good, and sometimes even great. Most of the meta humor is also above average. Especially considering the large number of characters, they feel distinct and most of them qualify as at least interesting. On the other hand, when it's trying for random creepiness with OMG HEXIDECIMAL! FLICKERING! STUFF IS SCRIBBLED OUT!, it comes off as overly pretentious and not anywhere near as clever as it thinks it is.

It also does not hold your hand, at all. You'd best pay attention to the random musings and be willing to experiment if you're not using a guide: this one is LONG, and it has no interest in telling you what to do. If you don't like figuring stuff out for yourself, either grab a guide or steer clear.

I'm still giving it a 5 for what it represents as much as anything else. I did enjoy it, and again, the author actually shows more writing ability than a lot of the other stories and games you'll find here. They're very clearly designing the exact game that they want, and that's absolutely going to put people off. Nonetheless, I think the story shows what these games are capable of, and I think that deserves praise.

If you're not prepared for a very slow burn with a lot of grind and no hand-holding, go far, far away from this one. But if those things don't scare you, there's a lot to like here.

(Disclameir: not a native speaker, sorry for any grammar errors, feel free to point them out and teach me on why they are wrong, if you feel like it)
To start of, the game isn't perfect, far from it, its a flawed game, and even so, it is one of, if not my favorite 18+ game.

i will sort this review in 6 points:''gameplay'', the wold kumoni(lore and stuff), the characters(desing, renders etc), actual porn and sexual content, my final thoughts and TLDR

Gameplay:

It's horrible, it's so bad that this game went from 5/5 to a almost 3,5, if you don't already love the game or have a hell ton of patience, trying to find new events will make you mad beyond any sense of reason, sometimes you have to go to the most random place at the most random time AND have a certain amount of affenction for no fucking reason, some times i even wonder if this game was made with the intention of using a guide, and there is 2 part that you will 99% NEED a guide (end of both chapters if am not wrong) if the game explained even a tiny bit better like some hint or even a confirmation that you can do certain event it would make the game so much better, and besides that, the actual game is really harsh, like, if you make a single mistake you can lose an entire scene or even whole paths without any sort of warning, selebus really should have used the rework to better the actual ''game'' side of the game.

The wold Kumo-mi:

if you can some how ignore the actual bad game desing, you are greeted with an actual amazing story, sometimes a bit tone deaf but amazing, you must be wondering why did a give this game 4/5 after such a rant about the actual game, and the reason is that the characters, the world, dialogue is just amazing, yeah, it isn't for everyone, the absurd amount of monologues and fourth wall breaking can get a bit annoying and the jokes might fall flat if you just doesn't have that kind o sense of humor, but if you can just ignore the fourth wall or even get used to it, if you have that sense of humor, you will love almost every single event, this is the first porn gam to actually make me laught almost every 10 minutes in every single update, and even being beyond gooffy, it can become serious and even in some rare moment make me feel for certain characters, if you are the type of person to get attached easily, you are going for an amazing ride, trust me.
without much spoilers, all that i can say about the lore is: some stuff is really on your face, other are left for you to find your own answer, and even so, i just can't get enough of it, the mysteries, the goffynes, everything about just clicks for me, and even if don't like stuff like the monologuing, i wouldn't change a single thing about it,besides the ami dream on the start of the game after the rework, remove that scene, its the most tone deaf free spoooooooky scene for no reason, it make no sense to be that early on the game, it seems like it was made for those replaying and not just starting the game

The characters:

This might change over time, since the actual characters desings change along side the chapters, but, i think this game nailed on them, well, most of them, characters like chapter 3 rin, or chapter 2 ami, just look amazing, most character are based on certain tropes, but with a twist, like maya is the tsudere, but she knows more than it seems, and i think that this choice is amazing, you can almost always know what a character is about with no more than 2 to 3 lines of dialogues and how they look, but they aren't stuck to theirs stereotypes, so it easy to get suprised, well,it was, with time you just expect characters to just have sad story, so you can just look at them and say ''cool, another characters, let's see just what sad thing she has to offer''
but some times its just someone is normal, or just depraved, like the mc.
and while im on it, i will just say it, sensei render seems weird... not bad, just inconsistent, like, his body is of an adult, but his face doesn't seem like it, along side that, his personality is the what most ppl hate and love about this game: ''oh im sad, quirky, outright a piece of shit and think that im smarter than any one else'' and like most things, if you just can't stand him, you won't be able to enjoy the game.



The porn:

I did not say it until now but, this game doesn't have that much sex as it has dialogue and cockblocking, like, this game is 2 years old (and counting) and there are characters that have been here since release with no sex scenes what most game have of 18+ in like half a year to a year, lil doesn't have in 2.
and that is not a bad thing! but not for every one, you game is more about dialogue and it's story than sex appeal, the start of the game is the slowest point in terms of sex, you will have to wait up to 1/2/3 hours to even get a single scene (deleted scenes/ami weird shit doesn't count) but with time it gets more frequent, but don't get used to it, sex scenes are the most affected to selebus bad desing choices, since you can lose some of for even to get enough lust in time( with no prior warning lol)

My final thoughts:

This took longer than i thought, so let's wrap it up , the game is flawed, it's not for everyone and that okay! those who don't like it will not like no matter how much they try, and those who like it will also keep on liking them, until selebus bad game desing make them stop. most of the flaws come from the actual gameplay, and i know it may be too much to ask for it when the worst part of a game is the ''gameplay'', but give it a try, you might enjoy it, you might hate it, it fully depends on what make a good game for you, i fucking love it, and some the shity sandbox won't stop me, also, if you are starting now, just use the mod that give you a guide, it will make your experience much better, if you are like me playing updates as soon as they release, i wish us good luck, well praise be or some cringy reference (please let's tone down on them...)
(selebus did nodoka dirty, i actually liked her before the bathroom incident selebus do a redemption arc for her, i won't forget, but i will try to forgive, also, fuck kirin and niki nakayama best girl, and i will die on this hill, fight me)
Tldr:


Amazing lore and characters only held back by shitty game desing

Just a waste of time if you are not eager to read tons of debatably interesting "character development" without plot, only to watch some weird semi-horror porn. And the last part comes only after ~10 hours of reading. Maybe. I wish somebody would give my hours I spent on this back.

And please - don't do favor to this game, mentioning Doki Doki. Dan Salvato with all his respect have made free and short visual novel without porn. While this parody is probably eternal author's masturbation on himself, rather than a proper story "with porn elements". And I say nothing about crappiest "sandbox" game design.

If you're looking for a quick fap, dont bother.

If you're looking for a compelling and interesting narrative, surprisingly good humor and lots of mystery, backed up by a varied and interesting cast of characters, this is it.

This game could easy be a 3 or 4 star game. The music is nice and the characters are cute.
The fact that all characters have different personalities does not weight up the horrible grind at all.
Packing such a grind into a game which basicially has only 5 locations doesn't make ANY sense.
Also the nice music gets boring once you have to endure it over hours, because you don't make much progress rather than going through all scenes over and over again, just to either raise stats or to try to find the next trigger.

If you are into senseless clicking, i recommend to play cookie-clicker, as that will be much more satisfying and rewarding rather than this so-called "game".

V0-26
First ever review, I've played good games and bad games, yet this is the first game that I've stopped playing because it flat out made me uncomfortable. This is a game where you either love to death and rate is 10/10, or instantly uninstall within the first 15 minutes to 1 hour of playing.... and both reactions are 100% understandable.

The writing is good and the characters all seem to be realistic. There's tons of mystery shrouded in the game and it's characters that entice the player to want more.

That's pretty much the main driving point. Personally for me, it goes downhill from here.

Ignoring the mild static jumpscare at the intro, the first sign that the game is going to be unsettling is the MC's eyes. This sounds minor, and while I have to heavily admire the creator for a memorable design.... it just felt uncomfortable to look at.

I've played for about 3 hours, and the first "sex" scene (10 minutes in) Furthermore, the "second" sex scene
Then, there's the jump scares. I get this is a game that tries to imitate Doki Doki Literature Club, but combining porn games with jump scares is a horrendous take. Now, some of the fanbase might really like the idea of the unsettling atmosphere the game sets, and claim that this "isn't a porn game, but a story game with minor porn elements". If that's the case, just NIX the porn and create a strong/uncomfortable story. Don't have the player try to bust a nut, then suddenly have a black & white smiley face stare them down. It's possible to write a strong game with dark/unsettling themes without the porn.

The only reason I won't rate this a 1/5 is because I was genuinely curious about the story and characters. I probably would have played this game without the porn or jumpscares, just to get to help out/learn about the characters and the setting.

I understand my playtime (roughly 4 hours) is extremely short compared to other reviews, yet as I scroll through the other reviews, I find myself understanding the 5/5's, yet resonating with the 2/5's or 1/5's MUCH more. This isn't a sandbox, and you instead click through multiple "hangout" options to meet with girls at level increments of 5. In short... a way to artificially extend playtime. Apparently there are also locked paths/forced progression/stalemates the more you go along, but I haven't reached that stage 4 hours in....so be warned if you choose to keep playing.

To sum it all up: I genuinely liked the personalities (a bit 1 note as they are) of the different girls, and wanted to know much more about them all. The delinquent, the studious chick, the girl who hates you/seems to know much more than she lets on, etc. However, I can't get past the jumpscares and the uncomfortable setting that the game forces upon the player...which is a shame. Truly.

If you want to keep playing regardless, go off. However, if the first "sex" scene makes you uncomfortable upon the first frame... I HEAVILY recommend you stop playing, as the majority of the game will attempt to follow that atmosphere.

This game is one that you will likely either be completely enamored with, or pretty quickly repulsed by. You will probably either find it insightful and captivating, or obnoxiously pretentious and grindy. That said, it is best to go in to it with an understanding of what the game is. It is not a porn game. It is a denpa game with porn elements. Despite the protagonist being an incorrigible lust demon, the actual h-scenes take a backseat to the numerous story threads, character arcs, mysterious worldbuilding, and completely unhinged and often 4th wall breaking ramblings that make this game what it is: an uncomfortably beautiful car crash of hope and suffering that is hard to look away from.

If you stick with it, the game will stick with you throughout the day as you theorize about what the fuck is actually going on within it, and you will probably experience very genuine feelings of disgust, guilt, remorse, and deep sympathy about the events that take place and the characters that those events affect. This is not a game to play if you're not in the best mental state, unless of course watching someone else's world fall apart somehow makes you feel better about the cracking state of your own. If you allow yourself to become immersed in it, this game will affect you deeply.

The art style is aesthetically pleasing, the actual h-scenes are decent enough, the writing is mostly fantastic if not a little too verbose, and the characters are all well developed and feel real even despite a strong adherence to many common anime/manga tropes. The world is interesting and disturbing, and the mystery behind everything is a joy to slowly uncover.

I would suggest that if you give this game a chance, you download a pre-rework version of Chapter 1, play that all the way through, and then transfer over to the updated versions. The original release of Chapter 1 has far better pacing regarding the horror elements of the story and maintains a creeping rise in tension as you, the reader, realize that something is not quite right with the world. The rework, though being a nice graphical upgrade, loses that element of suspense and instead just hits you over the head with the more disturbing elements of the game. It is best to experience the game in its original form.

That being said, you should definitely utilize the guide mod that is available for the game. It is the creator's intention to make the game a bit unforgiving with its' puzzles and its refusal to hold your hand, but that does put a lot of people off of it. Without the mod, you will likely have to consult the wiki many times to figure out what to do next, and you will definitely spend many in game days grinding affection and lust points. All of that is fine to an extent, but it can become a bit much and ruin the pacing of the story. My advice: use the guide mod, edit in the affection points, grind the lust points, and look up the answers for the puzzles that show up later in the game because they are definitely pretty annoying.

Probably one of the best original games out here, if not the best. But it is absolutely not H game. Skip it if you are just here for a quick fap. I mean cute girls is here, sure. And sex is there, alright. But at some point you realize it is not the point of the game at all. You realize you care about characters. Maybe even horror aspect or the mysteries. But the real highlight is characters, and the captivating writing style, author really has a way with words (and ideas). Outside of some top tier japanese novels, this one is probably most well written novel out here (definetely at least in top 3). Real gem, but not for everyone. You'll either start to hate game quite early and drop it, or will fall in love with it and stay for a long ride. And what a journey this is, oh boy!

These are my impressions based on 0.18.0 i played like a year ago, which i haven't finished even. Downloaded current version and started all over (and loving it yet again). Decided to rate a thread for as thanks for the wonderful experience, as this is the least i could do since i'm too poor to support with actual money. But if any game on this site deserves it - its this one.

Incredibly off-putting Doki Doki Literature Club wannabe game in which the dev spends infinitely more time pretentiously jerking himself off than you will. A lot of work clearly went into this whole thing, but it won't take more than fifteen minutes to find out whether or not you're part of the incredibly specific niche audience that will enjoy this kind of experience - and the odds are not in your favor.

This game is a gigantic grind; grind so that you can experience a lack-luster story and an occasional brutalistic kafkaesque dream sequence that will make you uncomfortable.

Sure, some people really love these esoteric horror elements , but within the context & gameplay of this game; it really feels out of place. Combine that with the constant grind it really feels like a slog.

A shame too, because clearly the writer of this game can write, it just feels like they decided they'd have infinite dialog without much actually happening.

While this game might seem very lackluster or boring gameplay wise, it makes up for it big time story-wise. It has very distinct characters with intricate backstories. each time you feel like you start knowing one of the characters, you get blindsided by another bit of their past, as you keep getting more and more surprised by their deep backstories and many personal problems. The start of the game lures you into a false sense of security, much like the show Bojack Horseman does, by making everything feel very surface level and generic, however, the story in this game goes very very deep. Be prepared.

I'm a coomer, I thought I only played coom games to coom.

This actually endeared me, I care about the characters, I care about Sensei, I want to read more of it, I'm engrossed, I don't even coom at the H-scenes, and there's quite some of it.

Give it a chance, give it a read.

I highly recommend using the guide mod, it streamlines the experience as a big QoL.

Not my cup of tea, the story goes from being pretty good and emotional to terrible, I understand that some people might enjoy this game but I have many problems with it, first one is:

"RPG system" this game isn't RPG, but it allows you to move around by clicking points of interest, while this might sound fun it isn't at all, you will spend most of your game searching where should you go, if this game wants to be an interesting story, they should choose the"all-out VN gameplay" with maybe some choices sparkled in.

The story is trying to play on emotions, imitating other depressing eroges or even non-eroge games like previously mentioned Doki doki literature club. The reason why I think it might not be a cup of my tea is that I didn't enjoy Doki doki literature club that much either, I would still give it 3 stars tho. This game is just even worse.

One few things saving it from 1 star (trash rating) are some well-done scenes. While horror visual novels are quite common, some jumpscares were well done and made me even squeeze my private part. I don't like the 3D art style in eroges, but this one wasn't so bad, and some sex scenes were surprisingly well done.

If you loved Doki doki literature club, you will love this eroge as well, but I did not enjoy it.

I'd like to begin by saying words don't do this game justice, so whatever I say from here on out is my attempt at describing this game. When I first started the game, similar to most other games, I came for a quick rub n dunk but sheesh. Let's start with the characters, in no other game have I ever met such unique and well written characters, deep and complex. Plot is amazing, one can theorize many things, with the creative setting of the game and events. The choices we make actually matter, for better or worse. Some decisions are guilty pleasures but end of the day, the consequences of your actions hurt lol. The philosophical points made in the game, the inner monologue, it's all so- My only regret is not starting this game earlier, and playing before it finished. Recent update recommended us to restart the game, no problem, I've been looking for an excuse to do so anyways lol. Much love Selebus.

"Let me show you this review so you can see how much I hate you"

I tried this game recently but dropped it after the first scene in the game is a forced "niece breeding minigame" where her head rolls off, and her vagina swallows you whole this is of done while her vaginal blood floods (games words not mine) the room with blood.

After having multiple people tell me that it does get better I can confirm that for me it did not. I should have looked at more of the reviews because every one of them that does not give the game a perfect rating and claim its literally the best game ever all mention the same thing: Grindy, Underwhelming, and pretentious/faux deep. That quote that starts the review? Its the same line the game gives you before showing you the forced sex scene. That alone should act as a litmus test for the majority of players.

If you have to lie about your age when starting a game the chances that you will like this go way up.

Update as of v0.35.0

This is one game with depth in the writing that is really good. The only bad thing is trying to remember everything that has happened and making sense of the entire story. I consider myself smart, but I still have to pay close attention to every dialogue that is said and still don't get the full picture like some players.

Each character has layers of depths to them and change as the game progresses. Everyone gets time for development and you can easily see how they all change over time with very few exceptions. The lone really being Sensei who hasn't changed much ever since the beginning which is weird since he is the MC.

The only two things that I really don't like are the annoying puzzles that truly serve no purpose and how involved the Gods/Higher Beings get later on. You could take the puzzles out and nothing would change about the story. As for the Gods, that's my personal preference as I don't believe they're needed to tell an amazing story. Dev seems to use them as antagonists in the game from my understanding.

Then again, maybe I'm not smart enough to grasp everything that the game is trying to convey. None the less, the story, characters, graphics, music, sex, and visuals are all top tier. Just go in preparing to hate some characters, love some characters, get disturbed, or even getting lost and confused about a lot of things. Still an amazing visual novel game and likely one of the best on this site that isn't a parody.

I'd like to say something like "Praise be 5/5" in this review, but that would defeat the purpose of writing one in the first place, so I'll refrain. To begin with, I find the quality of the game, the events, the characters, the art, etc. brutal. and it's ironic because despite the fact that the game already has a lot of content, I still have the same doubts as when it started, I feel stuck and for some strange reason I don't dislike it, only the sensations that this game provokes in me makes me feel satisfied. The characters mostly base their personality on classic anime stereotypes, which however are put in interesting situations that make you want to know more about them, as for the mc he is something special, frankly at first I hated him, really, that man I should visit a psychologist, his constant monologues about any random stupidity and his way of seeing life are disconcerting at first, I literally couldn't feel further from the character, of course, with time I got used to it and today I could say that it's He is the most interesting character. Now, as much as I would like to say that everything is perfect, what a pity it gives me, no, it is not, and on that we go with the next point and it is the gameplay, if it is a sandbox, one of the annoying ones I have to say , I had to load my game many times because certain events that I had to do at the indicated times or with certain statistics escaped me, otherwise I could not see them again at that save point, It is also worth mentioning that every time you reach a certain amount of events with a character, these are blocked since you have to do all the events of the other characters to be able to advance, I had to have the guide in hand many times, but leaving Apart from these disadvantages, I consider that its history , art and characters are enough for 5 stars: Since the end of the game is not even close, I recommend using cheats to increase stats and/or change certain events at your convenience, this doesn't mess up your save file at the moment.