RPGM - LonaRPG [v0.9.3.0 Beta] [EccmA417]

It huts me a bit to give this game a low rating given the incredible effort the dev has put into it, but the game is kind of a cumbersome mess and I don't really see that changing. I have tried to play this game multiple times, the most recent being 0.6.4.2 , but I always end up hitting the same wall.

The game is intended to be oppressively hard. I don't have a problem with this, I've been enjoying the souls-like genre since Demon's Souls first dropped. The issue come with how cumbersome the controls are. Combat is mashy, like Legend of Zelda but with character belting out constant low-damaging attacks. The issue arises with character movement, with controlling facing and spacing becoming obnoxious. Enemies constantly shift positions like they're tripping out on Meth, which feels less like intentional dodging and more like the AI can't make up its mind as to what it's doing. Couple this with an oppressive stamina meter and combat ends up feeling annoying rather than fluid or tense. Combat is at the core of the gameplay, so this is a major problem. If this had had a slower or more decisive pace, with each attack feeling like it mattered rather than mindless flailing, I could have seen myself enjoying the system. As it is, it feels like a cartoon slapfight with characters flailing ineffectually at one another until your character runs out of stamina and needs to literally take a nap.

There are other issues with exploration. The game has a random encounter system in the world map, which unfortunately usually results in you getting cornered and either having to run away or losing and getting raped and/or killed. This likely corrects itself at later levels when you can actually put up a fight or make use of other options, but early on it feels like all the options for escaping result in failure and none of your choices matter. With no right answers I felt like I was getting screwed over by RNG rather than my own failings as a player.

There are tons of other little systems I can tell are chugging away in the background, all of which add a level of complexity I don't really need or want. The injury system means any misstep can ruin your playthrough early on. The game has a difficulty mechanic where the entire world slowly becomes more dangerous, which means failing to get a good start makes the game even more punishing and prevents a player from exploring at their own pace. I know some players love this depth and complexity, spending hours grinding away or cheesing the game, but I found it made me increasingly disinterested in playing further.

This is all a shame because, despite some of the content being a little too hardcore for me at times, there is a lot of excellent artwork and worldbuilding to be found. This keeps begging me to give the game another try, but I always walk away hating the cumbersome controls and obtuse systems constantly trying to hinder any sort of progression. Maybe someday I crack through this barrier in which case I'll update my review. For now though I find the game a disappointing waste of potential.

v0.6.3.1
Just, wow
All in the game its incredible, can't wait for updates
I like how it makes you feel the desperation of a child in the middle of the 1700 when a lot of perverts are outside hahaha
Like i said, i like the immersion, i also like the art, there its not much lore but i like it anyways, have much content to be in beta lol

So. After playing for a few hours, I realized that this wonderful game has a HUGE potential! Personally, I expect that the experience of creating this game will lead to another, even more interesting, and with different characters.
And Yes. I REALLY liked the game! I hope I won't be disappointed with the plot ending.

great gameplay, dark theme, they could add pregnancy to make it even better, survival feels real u need to eat anything from bugs to rats, u need to invest at first in survival then when u establish steady source of food u can concentrate on money and missions

dark, cruel and rewarding game with RPG character progression mechanics that keep you engaged. The story and writing is quite good and believable. Beware, some scenes are a bit gory, so If you are prone to that, I wouldn't recommend the game for you. Otherwise, I defintely recommend this game.

A potentially good game filled with design decisions that I could only describe as braindead stupid. As many others have pointed out, difficulty comes in many aspects, and for LonaRPG, few of which actually helps to portray a grim, punishing world. While I could drag myself through the hours of cheesing and AI manipulation, that's far from the gameplay experience I'd enjoy, and while tis but a shame since I actually love the design in general, the specifics leaves too much to be desired.

Hard, unfair, difficult, complex. To understand the problem with Lona, A Masochism Simulator, you need to differentiate between these.

Imagine you're tasked with creating a game derived from chess. What will you do? You can make the AI really good, like Deep Blue good. That's hard. You can make an extra rule stipulating that every time a player makes a move, they roll d6. If they roll one their opponent gains an extra move. But that opponent doesn't have to roll. That's an unfair advantage. You can make an extra rule that in order to take an enemy piece, you have to log into your old World of Warcraft account and slay 1000 boars. That's difficult or grindy. Or you can simply make the physical pieces tiny and very slippery. That's another kind of difficult. Finally, you can make each piece have dozens unique abilities, governed by different resources, level ups, situational rules and the like. That's complex.

Now, the problem. LonaRPG is maybe 10% hard, 30% unfair, 5% complex and the rest is just a mix of difficulty and grindiness. Its combat system is made intentionally sluggish and punishing at every opportunity, same with trade system, sex system... Every system. I understand that the intention was to sell the players the feeling of grittiness and unfairness of the world of LonaRPG, but in my opinion the authors failed, because they relied more on crippling UX than on the intra-world elements, and often at the expense of them. For instance the game's currency system is broken. But if you think whether the game universe can function like depicted, you realize it can't, it doesn't make sense for an establishment to rob its customers of any and all change. This system is designed this way because screw you, dear player, in particular. And so we have a major worldbuilding flaw invented just to cheat you out of petty change. Likewise, some devs take RPGM and make an effort to make it better—not all of them succeed but that's not the point. This dev clearly went ahead and made it worse, sluggish, and they did it on purpose. A good game should be easy to play, hard to master. LonaRPG is hard to play.

And for all that trouble... the rewards are kinda shit. Unskipable and monotonous sex scenes, with little variety, and low resolution art. An extra pet peeve of mine is that sex scenes decrease Lona's tidiness pretty drastically, so basically all sex you're about to see is sex while wallowing in filth. If that's your thing, okay, but personally, it got old pretty fast. My feeling was that LonaRPG has porn more for the edginess factor, and not for the love of porn itself. Since I'm reviewing this as a porn game, it's a clear downside. This makes it not worth to master.

Hard to play, not worth to master. Two stars, Poor. Add another star if you think edginess by itself deserves it, I won't judge you. Lies, I so much will!

Although the game is super hard, filled with a shit load of rng bullshit that make me want to die (literally), the time I spent to load save file is probably more than the time I spent playing, sometime a bug fuck an hour of my progress, I have to say the amount of work the dev put in is amazing, it's dark, it's hard, it's cruel (to my mental health), simply wonderful. Would have give it a 5 stars if it didn't lag every god damn 5 seconds in the overworld, can't wait for v1

This game is unique. None of the complaints can change that.
The true flaw of the game is that it sets the bar too high to enjoy another h-rpg as you used to. It leaves you with a big empty after the version completion. Well, I recommend it

I really like this game.

Although its still in early access and development, I can understand what the developer meant that the game is pretty much done. The structure and main skeleton of the game are done. Now is just fleshing everything out by fixing bugs and adding for storylines, small features, and characters.

The game is not easy. Even on the easiest difficulty would a player have difficulty in playing the game. However, I love how there are a variety of possibilities in the game even if they are not easy. And they are not always obvious.

For instance, in the beginning of the game, you are told by the quest and Lona that defeating the goblins is nearly impossible. However, after playing through this area multiple times, I now know it is possible to bait and kill the three guarding goblins. Heck, I was able to save three captured girls in the goblin den on the first day. Of course, save scumming is almost a necessity at this point. There are some other interesting possibilities you could come up with depending on your playstyle and what you want to accomplish in the game. In contrast to other games where there is a set outcome decided in many cases, you have very real agency in affecting the world and outcome.

I really like how much freedom the player has in controlling how Lona turns out. Is she a brave heroic warrior that saves captured maidens? A prostitute? A morally corrupt person? You ultimately determine how you want to play in the game.

I also like the hand drawn art style of the game for all of the characters, along side the well picked sounds and music in the game. All original assets.

Its a brutal, but quite fun game. I love how it feels like I have agency in the game, instead of clicking aimlessly in what other games might introduce. It definitely is a challenge, but a very fun game in general.

Some good reviews already went into great detail about why this game sucks. Yes there is some solid potential here but everything is tossed to the wayside with how stupid as fuck the game can be, is or can get. Tedium and convoluted nonsense count nothing at all for difficulty. All positives I can say are tossed aside with off color semen and having something like falling down getting raped in a tavern, then everyone kills each other and it becomes a stupid unskippable shitshow

Granted I will say the vision and the intent of the creator is very respectable. Would be nice to see more tread creativly as the dev behind this game does

I personally reccomend this game it's superb RPG without the porn also extremely hard and unfair. Za world is built of references upon the JOJO references - amazing work of art truly combining everything together and it's really fun to explore- play into if you can endure literally "fricked" up things that are main narration there but not the only one.

El mejor Eroge e.e
Ojala cuando llegue al parche 1 ( salga de beta ) el creador siga Metiendo contenido
he disfrutado pocos eroges tanto como este
y me muero ademas por ver mas contenido de este
Sigo esperando a que suban la 0.6.2.0
la verdad me encantaria comprar el juego directo pero no me acpeta el paypal

Disgusting balance, a ton of grind, a dull, crooked combat system, stupid pumping, a minimum of interesting quests. Silly Realism - Enemy with a rusty scythe deals 9,000,000,000,000,000,000 damage when you are a super cool hardened heavy military halberd 0.1 damage

Hiya! this is my first review and I will use my first ever comment on this site on this very game as my piece.

"I love this game! The management and survival aspect. Every action can mean the difference between life and death. losing doesn't always mean an instant loss as you can be enslaved or become a breeding sack of meat as you try to claw your way out to freedom.

I hope there is an aging mechanic so our little survivor can truly become badass as struggle and near-death scenarios can make anyone into a badass if they survive long enough especially starting from such a young age.

Please translate more as I would love to hang out with Elise even more... My Lona has a huge crush on that femboy >w<"


By now I have played this game as much as I can in my own style and pace and I cannot wait to see it complete, truly a zero to hero experience, and it's a good thing I am a masochist that likes a challenge as only with determination will you thrive and survive in the grimdark of the 42nd Millenium!

This game is actually a really good rpg. I wish we had a custom character but Lona is a great protagonist. Hopefully it gets fully translated soon. Most of it is done already. I want to find more games exactly like this one.

This game will lock you in to boring tasks quite fast. There is no progression. It punishes one who do not know what to do. It is truly unforgiving.
It will not take to long to reach a loop of chores, where you are just doing one quest after another with no goal and no progress since you are not able to accumulate wealth to to the increase of cost while your income remains the same. The world will get harder while you are not really getting any stronger.
Combat is really bad. It is very easy to get surrounded by dozens of enemies and get just beat up. Movement is sluggish, combined with the speed of enemies, it makes it very frustrating to actually play.
This game does not want to let you play how you want. That is why I hate people who advocate for this game. You have to play a certain way to even survive. There is not fun, just chores.

LonaRPG
For the first hour or so you will struggle with every aspect of the game. Not only can you die in the tutorial in this, but you can die within the first minute of playing. You can reach a game-over scene before even leaving the tutorial with no way to escape. That right there is a good thing though. The game does not pull its punches at all. The game has sex in it, sure but I genuinely find that secondary to the actual gameplay itself. Honestly, it's not even second, its third. Even though the controls are frustrating at first, a rebind to them is easy and if you have a mouse with macros on it everything is easier. I rate the gameplay/combat a 7/10 the worldbuilding a 8/10 and the brutal, unforgiving game overs a 10/10.

The biggest takeaway I have with this game, with about 40 hours of playing it is this: This game is not for you if you like an easy win. The combat never is easy. Even doing a full mana weapon build with water mage, it never is easy. I had to turn the health up on every companion by about 100-200 just to actually survive early game because of the learning curve. The biggest thing you have to do early game is grind for the potions. Never leave without at least 7 of both. But this right here is why I love this game, the fact that combat gets easier, but is never easy. You are never out of danger, a single enemy can disarm you if you are not quick and its game over from there. The re-birth mechanic is great and makes it so that you can always replay the game if you made good progress and don't want to start over.


I thank the dev for working so hard on a game that there really is no comparison too.

A lot of people whinge about the difficulty but that's mostly a failure on their part. Everything to do with combat is explained in the tutorial dungeon.
Stamina management can be evil at times but again, PEBCAK.
Sometimes it can be frustrating, yes, I won't deny that.
This game has been described as VH meets Dark Souls, and like Dark Souls it requires patience and practise. Lots of both.

If you're up for a challenge that you'll have to stick with to progress, give it a try.

tried giving this another go and out of 500 + games that i have this one was by far the worst, the character can't even kill a rat and gets tired and falls asleep in the middle of a dangerous battle and the graphics are awful, it can't even get the resolution to 800x600, i don't recommend this game to anyone its getting way more credit than it deserves