VN - Ren'Py - Completed - Melody [v1.00 Extras] [MrDots Games]

I really enjoyed this one! The story is well written and fun to follow. It's basically about a music teacher that falls in love with one of his much younger students who has star potential. You'll have to work on her career as well as well as on your relationship. The story has a lot of twists and different paths to chose from and the artwork is really well done.

Melody is an adult visual novel that promises a mix of romance, drama, and steamy moments, though it does have a slower pace than some might expect. You play as a guy who’s struggling to find his place in life, but things take an interesting turn when you meet Melody, a charming and mysterious woman with her own complex backstory. The game builds a slow-burn connection between you and her, with the promise of deeper emotional and physical intimacy as the plot unfolds.

While the pacing can feel a bit drawn-out, especially early on, the story does offer a nice level of character development as you get to know Melody and navigate the ups and downs of your relationship with her. It’s a game that takes its time to set the stage, which some players might enjoy, but it could also feel a little too slow for those craving faster action or a quicker payoff.

As for the visuals, Melody has decent, but somewhat average graphics. It is a game for those who appreciate a slow burn with a focus on story and character-building, but it might not be for everyone. If you're looking for something with a quicker pace or cutting-edge visuals, you may want to look elsewhere.

Honestly I tried, I really tried to go through this game, but the pacing and the length was just not for me.

While this is a sweet story the title character is sweet and all, and the story is a lot like disney princess stories, it was just not for me. Script and character development felt weak. Sadly leaving with a poor rating. But maybe it was just not my cup of tea.

TL;DR: An honestly very overrated title, with mediocre writing, strange pacing, bad h-scenes (dialogue & visuals), and a tonne of content. If you like Melody's and the MC's relationship, you're in luck and there's a lot for you here. If the stilted dialogue and weird dynamic between the two doesn't float your boat, be ready for a story that never really improves in terms of quality.

The Review

This game is one that I feel that I should be the audience for—I like slow-paced stories, I like romance, I like slice-of-life, I like humour, and I'm coming here for the story and characters before anything else—but it just really alienated me at the end of the day due to its poor execution. As a result, I ended up dropping the game—this review will talk about my experience with what I played.

First things first, this game doesn't really have good writing, a bit of a sin for such a story-heavy and long game. Dialogues feel very unnatural and stilted, there is a lot of exposition in the way of telling and not really showing, there are a lot of character lines that feel like they were written exclusively to give feedback on whether the player made a +points choice or missed one, it feels impossible to keep track of the passage of time in the story... There are lots of small and big things that add up to make the writing just feel really off.

In part because of this poor quality of writing in dialogues and in part because of the way the characters and story are set up, the budding romance of the protagonist with the titular Melody—the primary LI and the center of mass around which this story gravitates—just feels off? This will be highly subjective, but to me, Melody was never established as a viable or interesting romantic or sexual partner in an organic way—my character simply started behaving as if that was the case, but me as a player, I was never convinced of that, and it feels like the game made little effort to do so, honestly.

As a result of the setup feeling off to me, I actually chose to say no to having a romance with Melody—a choice that I did not expect to have, and even though it came too late to prevent the discomfort of reading through a lot of the cringey and weird previous sections, a choice that I was pleasantly surprised by having. It was also the choice that ended up dooming the game for me.

This is a story of romance between you and Melody, and if you choose to not engage in the story as was intended, you will simply have a narrative that revolves around nonsensical plot points predicated on Melody being jealous, horny or fawning over a character that she is not in a relationship with, but everyone still acts effectively as if she was—including the very same protagonist that said no to her. The game will recognise in writing that you are not in a relationship, but that recognition ends there, everything is still set up to happen as if you were effectively dating Melody. I think the game would have been better off forcing you to be with Melody and making sure that you understood that from the start. That way, you'd at least have a chance of experience a good story eventually, even if you didn't like the setup for it.

It's not like the game is consistent with giving you a choice on relevant matters anyways—you can say no to the main LI in the game and break the narrative for yourself, but you can't say no to your ex-wife imposing herself on your life, for example. There are a lot of moments where your MC behaves a certain way that you'd expect to have input and you don't, or scenarios where all possible choices essentially lead to the same behaviour from the protagonist (e.g. when Melody does stupid things, you often cannot reprimand her for it, all choices are different flavours of comforting her or you're just not given a choice at all and your protagonist just decides he feels like what she did was fine).

Actually, a lot of gameplay systems don't feel properly implemented, it's not just for relevant choices. There is an overwhelming amount of poorly implemented fake choices—it feels like the game is just fishing for player engagement, and it starts to take you out of the story at times. There are so many scenarios where you can choose the order of dialogue but that order changes nothing; or with choice modals showing up in the screen but you only having one choice to pick; or with the pop quizzes, which are more impacted by previous choices on their difficulty than on whether or not you actually pick the quiz answers correctly.

There are also a lot of choices that feel completely random in how they impact character scores and seem to just be there to encourage you to savescum (this game doesn't allow rollback past choices, and a few choices only have their outcomes become clear past the autosaves window) for absolutely no discernible reason—the prime and repeating example is choosing what food to order, for some surreal reason Melody will instantly like you more if you have the prescience of picking whatever food will be the best one when it is served a few dialogue lines later.

Some of the systems that are poorly implemented have a nice intention, but still feel off. You can lock or unlock romantic relationships manually in this game, regardless of what choices you previously made in dialogue—conceptually, it's a nice feature to have, but the game doesn't adapt at all to that choice in terms of narrative (I do understand how hellishly laborious it would be to implement that in a satisfying way), which makes it so that if you use this feature, your experience of the story will be made worse than if you just went back to the relevant choice and flipped the flag value organically in the first place.

This is not even everything that nagged me in this game... Melody and Sophia look and behave like young adolescents, not college students; there are random 4th wall breaks in the dialogue that refer to protagonist as "MC"; there are event continuity errors; the sex scenes are way too simple, way too quick, and have disengaged dialogue from the characters; and so much more. A lot of these are nitpicks and I'd completely overlook them in other games, but my immersion was so often broken while playing through this game that I couldn't overlook them, they felt impactful.

The game also has positive aspects to comment on, it has some nice portrayals of some non-sexual relationship dynamics that aren't that common to see being explored, it has a lot of content to play through, it tries to do a lot of nice things—I just can't really praise any of those good intentions when they're buried under so much rubble. I think if the game at least made me want to pursue Melody's romance—or didn't give me the choice to remove myself from that primary narrative—my review might be talking more about positives, but as is, there is really just too much frustration to wade through and too little payoff.

Art style: 3/5

The art style is kind of ugly cg creation. The character models are average quality, with less detail. Because i dont have alot of art skills though, im able to look past it. If a great game dev needs to use AI art or ugly cg to get their story across, im ok with it. Its better than ugly hand drawn images. So its not exceptional, but its not the worst ive seen

H scene creativity: 2/5

This took a hit because the sex (in connection with the story) is very vanilla. Most of the stuff is accidental peeping, slow petting and kissing, and some RAW sexual events. My first play through i was trying to be a gentleman and not take on more than one relationship, so this might change as i unlock new stuff and story. The scene gallery in the menu already has all stuff unlocked, so some of it does look interesting, but i want to come across that in the story rather than just watching it outright. Again, artwork isnt the best, but its not the worst ive seen.

Story: 3/5

The story is very vanilla. A good MC who isnt some perv just started a new life with: a attractive older lady, a young talented lady, the young womnan's classmate, a fiesty air steward, a young hard multi working woman, and a shy woman next door. Lots of juggling relationships, and depending on who you are pursuing, you are no longer free to do that thing with another woman.

Negatives of the story: First, there is alot of apologizing. Like someone did something wrong, and even after paying for the meal and enjoying the days events, they are still saying sorry. Thats not how real dialog unfolds in real life. You move on.

They rehash things too much. At the end of each day, you are reminded that you are dating her and this happened, and you are also dating her and this happened. Its kind of a grind to read through it all again.

Even though its entertaining, nothing much is happening. You go out to breakfast, you go out to lunch, you go out to dinner. Other events happen, but there is almost no drama. Yes there are things that happen, but alot of this is just "friends hanging out but they suddenly are horny for you because you are nice and experienced". I am enjoying the story, but nothing too crazy has happened.

The theme is based around music and musicians. Even for those that like that kind of job, its not a lasting impression. All the names of the artists are changed or parodied, so when they talk about music stuff, its very boring. Other than the "life on the road" kind of relatablility, it really seems superficial about what someone thinks the rockstar life is about.

They skip ahead alot. One moment you had a great dinner and night, then you wake up and its a week later on the next time you see each other. I dont want to read about him getting groceries, but there has to be something else happening other than "you meet up with another lady". Its weird how you care about this person, but you didnt text them for a week and instead wait till you see them again. Even if they were busy for the past week, you could call, text, or visit them.

It would be nice to know how my answers are taken. There is alot of internal thoughts after choices, but no way to know what that option did, if anything.

Gameplay: 5/5

I like how there are lot of options in this game.

Music:4/5

As a game about music and musicians (not magicians) i like the music. First there is the mid instrumentals throughout the gameplay, which is nice to hear in EVERY game. You know which ones they recyle over and over. Then there is these unique songs that play when someone you know is singing or playing. Nothing too outstanding, but definitely different with how much different music.

Suggestions: I know the game is completed, but i still feel like these things would make it better

A wallet. I want to know how much money i gathered. Supposedly each lesson i got paid for. There is alot of buying breakfast/lunch/dinner happening and i want to know that if i ran out of money, the story would change because i cannot pay.

Why is the main girl the focus, but there are other op[tions. Is the game suppposed to be me dating a young star and juggling other? Or am i supposed to just pick 1, even if its not the main starlet?

Is there a way to have a schedule of the month pop up? Like when i click the button a postit with the current events for that day as it is planned in the story? Every time you set a "date", it would be nice to figure out what i have to expect next. Some times the story skips big portions of a day or week, making it hard to follow if the next thing i was doing was a hour later, or a day later. Some stuff happened on monday, the the next event was also on monday, then the next event was on a friday. The reader really gets confused if you dont put the date and time of what the event they are viewing is on.

Why do they have cell phones? Someone had to tell someone something, but instead of a text, they leave that message till "after i see them again in person", which can take up to a few days. The story should put important messages as urgent, and you just didnt get the text, but why cant they communicate urgent news more urgently.

This is a great game. Very solid story, clear ability to diverge based on your particular love interest, and if you're a music aficionado, I assume the references will all be interesting and fun for you. Admittedly, I didn't get a lot of them, but it's clear the creator had some passion for music that infuses the game from start to finish.

After playing DMD and seeing Melody at the end, I tried this game for the story and played the canon Superstar ending first, and it was a pleasant ride. I really liked Melody and the side characters, and the story felt great to the end.

But then I tried to play the other paths; the pregnant and so-called good ending with the foursome really felt bad for me, like letting Melody down and ruining her career. The next run I tried was a Melody friendship run with Isabella as the main goal, and I disliked it the moment you have to reject Melody. It just felt so wrong after seeing how good the end could be for her.

I suggest playing the friendship paths first for the side characters and then going the Melody romance routes with the Good and Pregnant ending and finishing with the Superstar end; it's by far the best one if you feel any connection to Melody and are not here for only the sex scenes.

My rating is purely for the superstar route; the good/pregnant ending would lower it to a 4 and the friendship ones to a 2.5, but I don't want to even remember the routes exist.

I don't wanna talk about it. Do I have to talk about it?

Fine. 200 chars.

It's more novel than visual. Waaay more novel than visual.

The models are good, the renders are poor. (I may be using that terminology wrong). What I mean to say is the ladies never look genuine. There is no real facial reaction/emotion.

As for the novel; I skipped thru most of it. neurotic 'adult' MC, complaining teens, both annoying.

Sex scenes were lifeless. And repetitive.

Gotta be honest here. The dialogue in this game is absolute trash. None of the characters have an actual personality, because they all speak the exact same way. It's overly formal, and doesn't follow any sort of realistic speech patterns. On top of that the writer constantly throwing in everyone's overly descriptive thoughts rather than showing them through their actual dialogue or actions.

Add to that, the idea that the mc was going on tour and playing with rock bands but acts and speaks like a 55 year old tax accountant? Not even the slightest bit believable. There's also specific statements made by the MC which date them as being significantly older than the story would suggest, such as stating that when grew up with vinyl records and cassettes. Considering CDs were already being used in the 80's this would put the MC somewhere between 40 and sixty, which, combined with the MC constantly expressing that their musical tastes veer towards music roughly between the 50's and the 80's, I suspect is the minimum age of the author and why the dialogue sounds extremely dated and unnatural.

Overall, the premise of the game is interesting, but the author should have stuck with creating the overall narrative and found someone else to write the script, because as is it feels completely forced and artificial.

After fully played and explored the endings, this is my review on Melody.

Story:

The story was well made. I really enjoyed the growth development and bonding between the MC and Melody (the girl) regardless of their relationship (either just friends or lover). It was simply heartwarming and wholesome relationship between them as the MC tutoring Melody and them hanging out together.

Couple things I noticed throughout the story is that there's little to no drama, no complexity or tension to MC's relationship with women (except with his ex). There are all caring and understanding to one another, even when breaking up. Not that I'm complaining, it's just a little too straightforward for a relationship, no bumps or obstacle, and it's easy not to screw up your relationship as the only choice in the end to be with her in the end or break up with her for someone else. How I wish relationships are this simple IRL lol.

Another thing I noticed regarding Melody's development of sex is that when after taking Melody's virginity, she became too horny with you and started to have sex almost everyday. It felt a bit rushed of a development. I wish they tone it down a little or at least give us the option to.

Characters:

The MC was a really genuine and caring man, I have to say I like the way he was written. He really sets his priority straight helping Melody becoming a singing artist. He teaches with caring and understanding and not once he had a bad intention. Even when having an affair another woman (if he chose to), he still never left or hinder with Melody's study. Although one issue I have with him is that everytime he meets with his date, he likes to grope too much even in outdoor and it is forced as you don't have the option not to.

The main girl, Melody, was really done well. Good personality and humor, good backstory, and great maturity development (aside from certain aspect I just stated above).

The supporting characters are not bad as well. But 2 characters in particular kind of unsettling for me, Sophia and Xianne. They both supposed to be 19 years of age college students but their faces and bodies doesn't justify it. They look much younger than they should've. Xianne kinda looks passable, but Sophia, she has a face and a body of 12 year old or maybe 15 at most. It makes me feel uneasy to have her sex with the MC.

Music and soundtrack:
(I'm not going to include background music on this one)

The songs and the instrumentals from the game really fits. Melody's singing voice, the instruments played, all are chosen nicely to suit the vibes.

Visuals and animation:

Considering for how old this AVN is now, it's good. I do think it's still holds up to today's standard.

Conclusion:

Melody is a story-focused AVN I've really enjoyed. The character development, the chemistry building between them, it was such a heartwarming relationship and if you play it right, you may get a super wholesome ending with Melody. It might not be for everyone taste as it is slow-burn and it can be boring with so many dialogues, but if you don't mind all this, I would highly recommend this.

Final score: 9/10

Never thought I'd get this invested in a game like this, but Melody is a really interesting character. A really well made game, with good renders and animations. Melody (the girl) somehow made herself a special place inside me. The character is hot (let's be real, main thing), but she's also funny and dumb. Her character development through the game is interesting, and she's getting more and more kinky as the game progress and she learns to trust more in you.

MrDots needs to figure out how to replicate this game, it is his magnum opus, DMD and Sunshine Love don't touch this game in terms of likable characters choices, and overall vibes.

This a pillar of a game in the adult vn category, and this game gives you a LOT more choices than his other games. DMD has a flawed concept that I dislike, and I used to like Sunshine Love a lot, but we did not have as much freedom to pursue certain characters or avoid certain characters in that one.

Melody is the "main" love interest, but you can totally just be her friend the whole game and it doesn't limit you, you still get content with other girls and I prefer it to the "canon" ending of you ending up with her. The game is great, play this one.

Solid visual novel focusing on romance. Would recommend if one doesn't have some insight into what to look for. Nevertheless of what is written later still recommend a go-through to at least make own opinion withing the first 2-3 hours (if you actually read the shit).

Graphic and vibe of the game are great and definitely worth going through if what you are after is the visual stimuly. Visually great experience, even tho the animations ain't the greatest as the game has it's years. Other-vise the game usually set up scenes well and the characters ain't generic or repetitive.

Story is more generic and doesn't offer anything significant as a reason to play the game. Setting of the story is plain as you are a experienced person in new situation in life. You bump into new people unexpectedly and became to start building relationship with them...

A game that has it all. Laughter, desire, cute bits and a really tough choice in the end. This game got me into the genre and I loved every second of this piece. I most of the games from this developer, but this one will forever be in my heart.

I'll start off by sayingI I played this game Melody out of order, after completing dating my daughter.
I had come across DMD by pure accident and mostly loved that game which brought me to this game only to find out this game is somewhat slightly a prequel, like I should have played this game before dmd.

This game has pretty decent sex scenes and the graphics and animations are really pretty decent.
For the most part, the storyline does a good job at drawing in the player with interesting dialogue, but about 30 or 40% of it was just Overkill and unnecessary. Just like DMD, it's just chock-full of breakfast lunch and dinner dates that drag the game out slowly and unnecessary.

I guess the main reason that I only gave only two stars instead of the four stars that I gave DMD is because
1: some of the side girls barely had any sex scenes compared to others.
2: just as DMD did, you had a choice between a perfect ending where you're exclusive with the main character, or ended with a supposedly"good ending"with melody plus her two best friends.
The only problem with this supposedly good ending, was that it wasn't a good ending at all, and felt like a punishment just like the bad ending would have.
Let's face it, we play these games for the sex scenes, and we want to see as many of them as possible during gameplay.
I paid attention to the walk-through as I played, and broke off with all the other side chicks other than melodies two best friends, well before the ending of the game. At the end of the game I only had paths of Melody Sophia and xianne, hoping for that good ending that was promised.
The problem is is that good ending was a terrible ending, and the only way to get a good ending whatsoever is if you're only on an open path with Melody and nobody else. Don't let the walk through fool you that the good ending is good.

Mr dots is getting a bad habit and penalizing players that come play the games for the sex scenes, with bad endings, which pretty much defeats the purpose of playing a sex game to begin with.
I'm not so sure I'll continue playing anymore of their games because they're probably all going to penalize you, as I've already read about sunshine love and it looks like it's the same scenario

Version 1.00 Extras

A nicely rendered dating romance story that’s realistic enough though it runs out of steam after a while.

Story
MC broke up with his fiance and was subsequently offered work to tutor Melody (main LI) in music at another town. The story traces the romance between MC and Melody though you do get to fool around with three other LIs and some minor characters.

This is not a harem game and even if you try to keep all the LI paths open, there will come a time when you have to pick one. However only Melody’s story is properly developed, the rest are skeletal BTW sort of paths that don’t really stand on their own.

Game Mechanics
AVN with choices that affect romance score with Melody and availability of scenes. However many of these choices don’t make much sense given their effects are random. For e.g. whether you hug or kiss, the food you choose, whether to ask something etc. can affect a scene and love points 1 week later which is really weird.

Background / Character Renders
The renders are well done - it’s a romance story set in a small town so there are no fanciful backgrounds needed, but the developer harmonizes the backgrounds well and you don’t get the sense they are clobbered up from different sources.

Character models are well designed and all the LIs have slightly petite and sweet facial features even for Izzy who is supposed to be the wildest. The style isn’t cartoonish like HS but neither is it rough like Daz3D which is a breath of fresh air.

Character Development
As this is not a harem game and focuses mainly on your relationship with Melody, half of the screen time centers on MC and Melody with all the remaining LIs and minor characters taking up the other half.

The characters here act realistically so there aren’t any particular storyline or scenes where things are dramatic for the sake of it, but conversely this also means they can be rather flat after a while. None of the characters really play into typical troupe stereotypes nor are they particularly sophisticated.

It’s a laid back game that explores the romance MC has so don’t expect intense conflict, dilemma or attachment within the story.

Sex Scenes
These are mostly well done with nice animations supported by good dialogue and BGM. They are around the B grade i.e. serve the story well but not spectacularly erotic or intense to stand out.

BGM and Sound Effects
As the material centers around music, we get quite a number of light hearted instrumental pieces that complements the story well. There are no sound effects as far as I can recall though.

Conclusion
Melody is an easy dating simulator cum visual novel game that is relaxing to play with - there are no bombastic plot developments, no intense emotional moments or complex game mechanics. It’s well rendered and most of the characters are pleasant if not a little flat. An overall above average gameplay.

POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD

This is my first game review on this platform and I will be using a template from the rules so please bear with me.

Review is based on v.1.00 Extras

Preface
First of all, I have never played any of MrDots' games, but kudos to the Dev team for the great game. At first, I wasn't fond of "old games" as Melody was completed back in 2019. But recently I was looking to try games with different themes and Melody popped up in some of the fansigns I've seen on the platform. Coming from a non-creative background, I liked the overview and the theme so I bit the bullet and tried this game. And oh boy how I regretted not finding this game any sooner.

Story
You play as a late 20s to 30-ish (age not specified, I may have missed it but I'm gonna assume the age range) "fill-in" musician, going on tours for a living. You argued with your fiancee and called off the engagement. She then decided to kick you out, leaving you with a guitar and one of the 2 cars you both own with you taking the "better" one with a trailer for your stuff. You crash at your friend Tim's place for a short while, trying to find a way to start anew while putting up the guitar on sale for cash.

A woman named Amy then bought the guitar from you for her niece Melody, whose guitar is currently in her ex's possession. After a few conversations, Amy then offered you a job as Melody's music tutor during her summer break.

Along with Melody and Amy, you will meet Rebecca who is your redhead neighbor, Isabella who is your childhood crush, Sophia who is Melody's best friend, and Xianne who is a college student working multiple jobs to fund her education. This is the start of your new life in a new town.

Renders and Animations
The renders were decent. But keeping in mind that the game is 5 years old, I would say it's pretty good for its time. Even shaming some ongoing AVNs of recent years. All the girls are pretty, but out of all of the girls, Melody, Rebecca, Sophia, and Xianne are the ones I find prettiest (sorry Amy and Isabella). However, the thing I would like to point out is the lack of facial expressions, with characters only having a couple of them, with the characters pursing their lips being the most prominent one. The animations were only short loops with no variations which is kind of a bummer. But once again, the game is 5 years old so no complaints.

Gameplay
Like your regular AVN, the gameplay is pretty straightforward. You make choices and it impacts the game. some are negligible and have no point, but if you're going for Melody's run, a lot of them are gonna matter as you need to essentially drop everything with other girls just to pursue Melody.

The 2 annoying points from this category are one being the sheer number of single choices that don't matter that are presented to you, something like "answer the phone" and the like. It disrupts the flow of the game IMO, but it can be overlooked.

The other one is you being unable to make optimal choices without the walkthrough as some choices are a bit out of place and are purely a guessing game. An example would be Melody wanting to pick an outfit, and you are presented with "outfit #1" "outfit #2" and "outfit #3" choices, with each of the choices netting you different Melody points. You have no prior information or conversations as to which "better" choice to pick so it gets a little frustrating without the walkthrough. That is only one of the several similar choices you are presented throughout.

Amount of Content
As you may have read from other reviews before me, yes the game is a slow-paced one. It took me 3 days on and off the game but I usually sit and play for hours in one session so it might be different for us. I would say around 20-30 hours of content, give or take according to your reading speed. You can judge the amount of content from the 66-page PDF walkthrough provided.

Love Interests and Paths
The main LIs you meet are Melody herself, Amy (Melody's Aunt), Rebecca (Cute redhead that lives next door), and Isabella (Childhood crush as well as Tim's sister). You can have an ending with either one of them, and no, no harem route. As the main LI, Melody has the most content, with Rebecca coming in second, Amy third, and lastly Isabella with the least content.

The side girls you meet are Sophia (Melody's Best friend) and Xianne (Masseuse attending the same college as Melody and Sophia). You can be on their path, but they cannot be pursued solo.

One of the 2 things that bug me is while you are dating Melody out of love, you can fool around with Sophia and Xianne. While I like harem content, this is not a harem game so it is a bit out of place. You can also be in a relationship with multiple main LIs, but you will be given hints saying that you are treading on thin ice and shouldn't be with multiple LIs at a time. You will be given several chances to end things with the main LIs. The Rebecca, Isabelle, and Amy endings were lackluster compared to Melody's and they will also no longer play a role after a certain point in the game which is a bummer as Rebecca is pretty cute and her ending wasn't so bad IMHO. I certainly would love to have Rebecca around as a side chick.

Another one is Melody's development in regards to sex. Sure she is a virgin when she meets you but she masturbates and plays with Sophia at times, while being reserved towards you. But after taking her virginity, she shifts into a sex maniac, becoming more daring and essentially being constantly horny and wanting to jump your bones anytime, anywhere. While I don't mind it, it seems like the dev wants to cram in as many sex scenes as possible for Melody, seeing that she is the main heroine so to speak. Her development is too sudden and too quick. You don't change from a prude to a nympho in a day just because your boyfriend popped your cherry. I would prefer it if the development was a bit slower to build the intimacy between MC and Melody. But I appreciate the number of scenes between them.

Conclusion
Melody is a slow-paced but wholesome and heartwarming AVN for me. As someone who has no prior dating experience, I dig the sweet, lovey-dovey experience this game gave me, and I surely can feel the love between MC and Melody as if I'm the one falling in love with Melody. While I agree that Melody is not groundbreaking so to speak, it sets the bar high enough for me. I believe it will be hard for me to enjoy other AVNs after Melody. Melody will remain in my game folder for some time along with other AVNs I cannot bring myself to part with, and I wouldn't mind going through it again from time to time just for the sake of the warmth. If you are looking for a more fast-paced AVN, or just not a fan of slowburns, Melody may not be for you. But I would push you to give Melody a chance. 11/10 would recommend.

Story 2/5
If you deside to play this one be ready for a bit of an extrem slowburn, i normaly like the slower ones but this one is pushing that limit a bit to much.
Also some routes seems a bit weird like they shouldent be in the game, mostly thinking about when you go after Melody solo but let her play with Sophia in a lesbian act before MC and Melody gets together, she will do more lesbian scenes even after shes in a relationship with MC, so in other words cheating on him and we are talking all the way to the very late game.

Melody even says she knows its worng so it dosent really get more clear then that, it is NTR sure it is easy to avoid since you do controle if Melody is bi-sexual or stright, but it dosent change the fact that it is in the game and should have the tag no matter if its optional, it happens even if your on a 100% solo Melody route and has Sophias route locked meaning not on her route and when MC finaly walks in on the two having fun he simply just accepts it? so you dont even get the chance to dump her after that which really fucks up that hole story and thats just to shitty considering it is the main girl and has a route broken when playing a 100% faithfull route as the MC.

You got to remember MC is a faithfull type guy, no matter how many times he had the chance to be with someone else when he was with hes old ex he never cheated, not once so theres no way in hell he would ever accept Melody cheating on him and lieing to him, it really just broke the hole story and backstory, all MC says is "look Melody no harm done here" i mean fuck me thats awfull, shes lieing and cheating on him and he says no harm done, are you fucking kidding me......then he just invites her to hes room to have sex and forget everything about her cheating.....

To make it even more idiotic, when Melody talks to Sophia later Sophia thinks this "It seems like she has no idea that MC and me have slept together" which never happened since i turned Sophia down every single time.

And funny enough MCs ex ask Melody is she truely loves MC and she says yes and that hes the best thing that ever happened to her, but apprently thats not enough to stop cheating on him behind hes back or come clean about it to him.....

Also i felt like 90% of the game is about Melody so iif you dont like her, you should proberly skip this one, most other LIs has very little screen time.

Game also feels extremly kinetic even though its not due to having diffrent relationship routes, but it pops up with soooooo many single choices which really has no point in being there, like "open the door" or "take off shirt" "take off panties" and you do that first for your self then for the girl and in sex scenes its clicking "kiss her" then "kiss tits" then "lick pussy" all single choices and its even more weird when you start being in a relationship with Melody and whenever you meet her it goes "kiss her" then "touch brests" then "touch ass" then "expose brests" and this is even in the middle of the streets? it just feels way off point.

You really need to use a walkthrough if you want to get everything right since alot of it just makes 0 sense, one girl you first shake hands then hug then kiss, but other girls you just go stright for kissing when meeing her for the very first time. theres also mini-games well quizes is more correct but you will proberly need a walkthrough for those questions as well since its all music related and not the most easy questions.

Also some LIs arent LIs since they dont have solo endings which is a bit weird but oh well.

Pregnancy is a big fail as well, only a single girl can get pregnant and only if you fuck up her life long dream.

Girls 3/5
I wasent really a big fan of the girls, they look ok but none of them really did much for me due to their personalties, you got Melody which is the main girl and found her a bit bland and boring, then you got Isabella tims sister which was my favorit really, then you got the standard shy girl which wasent even a virgin and you get told all about her ex-boyfriend and how she lost her virginity to him, its way to much information that no player wants to hear about, then the the girl working everywhere but shes apprently also a whore and which im not into and also bi-sexual, Sophia wasent bad but she already has a boyfrind and is also bi-sexual, then theres Amy which was just meh.
There is a bit diversity in builds.

Animations 3/5
The first animations are pretty bad, not only dont you see anything but a side view which does nothing, but it also flashes with a black screen constantly even though its for less then a second it was a bit annoying, later animations get a little better.

Music 2/5
Its mostly just standard background stuff nothing really special other then a few short times where there is something with lyrics buts it way to rare and way to short, so its a little disapointing considering the term of the game being about music.

Choices 2/5
Just cant rate this higher due to the 5 million single choices that was constantly annoyinig me, but you can pick turn down any girl you want including the main girl so thats really nice atleast, also having broken routes with the main girl is just not good enough.

In short its really not above average due to the story is just to long and to much of a slowburn with so many pointless dialogs and single click choices plus all the other stuff i already rated above and having broken routes with NTR or no tag also hurts overall value, stuff like that just shouldent happen.

[SPOILER ALERT]

So, I don't make a lot of reviews lately because... well I got writer's block or something, I guess? but anyway I pushed myself out of my comfort zone and decided to review this game.

First, I just wanna say that I regretted myself for not playing this game sooner. I wasn't interested with Melody because the game was released in 2018 and completed in 2019, so the game is fairly old. I've played Mr. Dots' first game (Dating My Daughter) a long time ago and I didn't manage to complete it for some reason and it became one of the reasons why I've been avoided Melody. But then boredom struck me, I didn't know what to play. So I've browsed multiple completed games and this one was on top because it has good ratings. I'd say "fuck it" and downloaded it despite knowing the dev behind this game.

Anyway, in Melody you start as a 30-ish year old guy whose job was a touring musician. He just had a fight with your soon-to-be ex-fiance and decided to left his old life to find a new purpose. To survive, he sold his guitar to a woman named Amy, she bought it for her nephew named Melody. After a few chats with her, she offered him a job that he couldn't refuse, tutoring Melody during summer break. What could go wrong? is it going to be the best choice you've made or could it be a disaster?

Talking about choices, Melody has plenty of choices you can choose. Few of them are useless but many of them aren't (if you decide to pursue a relationship with Melody, more than 95% of the choices matter a lot).

Now let's talk about the Love Interests. There are four main LIs, first is Melody herself, second is Amy (Melody's aunt), third is Rebecca (a redhead beauty who lives next door), and last is Isabella (your childhood crush). Melody, Rebecca, and Amy are the only ones that's worth to be pursued, while Isabella is... no. I'm not saying she's bad, ugly, or something, it's just that she has very little content. I wish Mr. Dots made her appeared more often. There are also two side girls, Sophia (Melody's best friend) and Xianne (a masseuse who's also attending the same college with Melody and Sophia). Too bad you can't pursue them solo, but if you're a horny bastard who can't be satisfied with one woman, those women are for you.

Now here comes the main appetizer, the sex scenes. I was thinking since Melody is an old game, its sex scenes probably kinda choppy or maybe even worse, but I was wrong, like really wrong. For an old game that was released before 2020, Melody's sex scenes are top notch, hell even much better than many underrated AVNs out there that are still in development (*cough* I'm looking at you, Intertwined *cough*).

The only hiccups so far about this game is when you get confronted by Steve and Bethany in the alleway. If you're not on Melody's path, the choices feel so weird and I feel really bad with Melody's future, all because of her guitar that was a gift from her deceased mother. One more thing, if you're not a fan of slowburn AVNs, I think you might dislike Melody. Well, at least the good outweight the bad in this game so I'm just going to let it slide.

Also, did you noticed that Melody is Mr. Dots' most approved game? It's sad to see that he has made four games so far and most of them scored below 4 stars, but at least I'm glad this one exists to cheer me up. By the way, Melody's and MC's daughter is so cute, I want to pinch her lol.

A truly affectionate, beautifully portrayed novel about an inseparable love in the music business. With lots of details about music, instruments and studio work.

If you go the pure melody route you really experience a feeling of true love.

However, I have to say that without a walkthrough mod I would never have gotten to the 400 points for the perfect ending.
It's a shame that developers never include a walkthrough mode, especially for the first playthrough.

I'm really going to miss Melody. But there are still some LI to discover that I left behind, this time without a mod.
But first I have to let my feelings sink in again. It's been a really intense few days with the game