Im using the whole review scale so for example rating a game 3/5 doesn’t mean the game is dogwater like in the gaming media when the games metacritic is under 90 = game shit
Now to the review. Its a 5/10 game. Not bad, not great, just avarage. I chose to give it 3 stars because i cant give 2.5 and its more of a 3/5 game than 2/5 game. Also its your first game and i like that you decided to do something different. Hopefully im not gonna be yapping for too long... surely right?
The game started great, the first hours was legit a 8/10 game, even halfway thru it was a good 7/10 game. The game had depth, nice worldbuilding, it was refreshing, unique looking LIs, characters had identity, was fun exploring different LI personalities and getting to know them. I enjoyed pretty much everything about the game. But the more game went on, the more shallow and brainrot it got.
The turning point where the game started to progressively get worse was after the scene with Nina where she was crying about you cheating on her and then the chapter ended.
Then from the next chapters cringefest started. Every LI including Nina who cried about you cheating on her suddenly didnt care about who you are dating, who you are in a relationship with and who you are fucking. Just like that, their personalities changed. They were not jealous anymore, they didnt care if you manwhore around, they just didnt give a fuck... at all.
I dont know what happend, did the dev just give up? Lazy writing? Just a change of direction to fit LI personalities to accept the harem and not be jealous about each other? dunno but doing that mid game broke the game.
There was no indication before that they would be ok or happy to share you, actually it was completely opposite. Some of them were extremely jealous.
I know the dev has said that harem was always planned and sure fair enough i cannot dispute that, its your game, you know yourself what you wanted to do but surely im not the only one to notice that at one point the whole vibe of the game changed and characters were written to bend their personalities to fit the harem and to share you. I dont necessarily have a problem with harem but more about the way it was implemented and WHEN it was implemented.
You cant convince me that it was always supposed to be harem. At most i see a couple of duos, maybe a trio. Or maybe if it was always supposed to be harem but then it was really REALLY poorly executed, like mid game there was just a switch in LIs head where they decided that they dont care who you are with, what you are doing with them, they were all happy. Noone protested or even show alittle bit of discomfort/jealousy of you spreading your love juice between all the LIs.... yea surebro, let me go find a puke bucket, its fake as fuck and not believeable at all.
Its also not a good idea to run polls in the middle of game development and asking what do you like most? Its like asking do you want GTA6? Ok you know what, you got me there, i want GTA6, fuck everything else. Lets go with..... its like asking what your favourite genre is and ofcourse the most popular genre is always going to win (in this case harem) but does that mean every game should have harem then? Ofcourse not just like not every game should have solo, poly or whatever.
Making polls about smaller things like outfits, character names, next LIs hair colour, maybe which side quest you like to be added to the game etc all those small things but to change the whole game direction.... oof.
If you are trying to cater to everyone then at the end of the day the game will be for noone. ESPECIALLY when the game direction changes mid game like a light switch.
Harem players, solo players, poly players, whoever the fuck, they will all suffer and noone will be happy because you try to cater to everyone. It becomes a disjointed mess with big inconsistencies in characters especially.
Ofcourse it IS possible to cater to almost everyone and have a good game but its a rarity and requires lots of resources, time and creativity to flesh out characters and proper pathings.
If you want to write just some porn slop (which i really dont think you wanted to do in the beginning, the characters and overall everything was decently written. You clearly have talent) then sure whatever, who cares if characters have inconsistencies and bend their personality however you want but if you want to write semi-realistic characters that are also believeable then the LIs need to have agency, their own motivations, needs, identy not just MC's magic dick to the point that they are willing to suddenly become bi and like girls now??? Happy to share you and join your harem just to have a taste of that magic dick. You just cant take these characters seriously.
And because of that every route and character is a spaghetti inconsistent mess.
I can give you another example : Dragomira.
I was very suprised and then instantly facepalmed where i had the option to go "sub" or "dom" route with Dragomira. Theres absolutely no shot bucko, not in a million years is she a bottom and has sub tendencies, like OK maybe at most 50/50 where MC and her are equal when she actually loves him, respects him and trusts him as her equal but a total sub who lets MC to facefuck her and dominate her? Thats so character breaking like wtf is this shit.
Yeayea its "optional" but not everything needs to be optional, by doing this you completely destroyed Dragomira's character and her identity. Shes now just another MC's concubine. She has no agency, is she a dom? is she a sub? is she a bi? is she a lesbian? is she a hetero? who knows, she has no identity, she is whatever MC wants her to be. Lets add her to the harem too, why not. Surely she doesnt care and is happy to share you with every other LI, shes just MCs concubine and all he wants is that absolute CHAD MC magic dick. Hooooooooooooooooooooly.
FYI i dont mind if Dragomira is a sub character or dom character. What my problem is that she has split personality, she is whatever MC wants her to be. Again, if you want to make that slop shit where every character personality is bendable and dont have their own identity then go for it but i dont think you do, you just got lost somewhere with the game direction but i dont know why and how. (ok maybe i do)
About pathings - Sometimes i like to do the harem path to see how the dialogue flows or if theres any unique dialogue/scene depending on what path you do. NOPE, theres nothing. Even my harem bros can agree that the harem route was spaghetti and messy as fuck. It was implemented to just have "harem" in the game while in reality it was just duct-taped solo scenes together. Only exclusive scene that the harem bros got was the ending scene with all 6 LIs together having an orgy.
Even on solo route after committing to Emily and saying "you are the only one", the game still lets you fuck everyone with MC showing no remorse and no consequences, no dialogue change, its as if MC forgot who he was in a relationship with. Emily WHO?? Bro you just committed to a solo exclusive relationship with her.
If you want you can just romance single LI and reject everyone else but its meaningless. The game wont recognize it, theres no extra scenes or unique dialogue when you just pursue 1 LI and reject everyone else. The world and characters dont react or awknowledge that you are on a solo path. You never felt that you are on a solo path. You can literally manwhore the whole game until the end where a menu pops up and asks which LI you want to end with, theres no point to even reject anyone, just pursue everyone and then at the end when the menu pops up just pick the 1 LI.
That btw goes for every combination of LI's, solo, duo, trio, quad, penta, hexa, TRILLIONS OF TRILLIONS OF LI's, harem whatever combination. The game will not recognize it, there are no unique scenes or dialogues.
The game had other male characters which was refreshing but ofcourse they all had a flaw which is classic. One is a fuccboi, other one is ugly af, another one is 0iq who all he does is say "oooo dragomira", one of them is just a slime.. you get it, they are all like that so theres no "competition" or "threat" to the chad MC. Im suprised there wasnt a gay best friend.
Ofcourse im not saying that i want the MC to get cucked, NTRed and all that other fun stuff, i dislike those types of heavy NTR games and by heavy NTR games im talking about where the whole game is built around you getting cucked, embarrased, cheated on etc, those for me are HARD no.
When another male is inside the 100km radius, touches LIs hand, stands next to LI or *GASPS* kisses LI that you are not yet in a relationship with then im not screaming WAAAA BABYRAGE NTR WTF DEV, CUCK DEV. I like something in between where its semi-realistic.
Im talking about there being AT LEAST bare minimum an illusion that there are other good looking male characters competing for LIs or just in general more male characters in the game who are not flawed. It gives you more of a sense of achievement when you get the LI you are pursuing and in general adds more immersion and realism to the game. Right now you are the only good looking gigachad on the planet, every LI wants you, theres no challenge whatsoever which is just so immersion breaking and cringe as fuck.
I will say that i dont think its necessarily THIS DEVs issue, its more of a overall problem in the AVN world where some are just so sensitive and fragile snowflakes that if theres even another male inside 100000km radius its NTR and start giving death threats and scream at the dev and thats the reason most of the devs avoid adding other male characters. Sooooooooo yeaah. It is what it is.
MC is a horndog. Its the classic MC writing where in game everyone thinks he has 100 charisma but in reality hes a immature dumbfuck.
He picks girls up like he has +1000 speech but in reality hes just the uuga buuga MC.
Bro is constantly yapping and thinking of boobies, oh wow look at that ass, oh yeah i would love to fuck her and her... and her...and her...holy fuck it gets tiring.
He goes to one LI, confesses his love then goes to fuck every other LI with zero conflictions or remorse or thoughts.... at least give some thoughts like "im in a relationship with "X" LI, i shouldnt be doing that"- ESPECIALLY when you are in an exclusive relationship with Emily, Olga or Grace but theres literally nothing. Its "cosmetic" relationships, its only a relationship in "name" but not in action or dialogue or world reaction/awknowledgement.
The sex scenes also have no emotion or attachment. Its like a casual everyday event. Like a 9-5 job.. yeap... job done, onto the next one.
POSITIVES LETS GOOO
Big props for the dev for creating visually very nice looking "monster" LIs. Its a rarity to see these types of LIs, super fresh.
Personality wise the more the game went on the more it started to feel like they are just humans with monster "skin". They all speak like humans, thats a slight negative but overall i still liked it and were distinctive enough.
Good job nr 2 to the dev - Emily, Grace, Olga. Those 3 kinda.. maybe..not really..but still kinda(i will get to the kinda part below). I was suprised they didnt also want to become MCs concubine and share MC with all the other LIs waiting in a queue system ooooh boooy who gets to have sex with MC this month. So props to dev for at least somewhat sticking to these 3 characters identities and not have split personalities.
Why its "kinda"? Even though u can commit to them, the pathing was still fucked. After commiting you can still go manwhore around with 0 remorse and 0 consequence and still get their ending. So in theory yeah, its "exlusive solo" relationship but then again.... not really. Nothing changes, the world doesnt react like you are in a solo relationship but it was still nice to see Emily for example saying that she is selfish and wants you all for herself and not share you. Same with Olga and to some extent Grace.
Good job nr 3 - Dragomira visually is 10/10 and if you somehow delete from the brain that she has split personality depending on how MC feels like it, she is hot af and has that dommy mommy im the sexiest here aura, dont you dare fuck with me. Dev did a massive job with her. I really really REALLY hope that you will do justice to her in your next game and dont ruin her. Imagine a dominant figure and a big character like Dragomira happy sharing you with all the other LIs, in a harem where she is also suddenly now a bi who likes girls, waiting patiently in a queue system to get that MCs huge dong like a submissive dog....oof. Hopefully not.
Good job nr 4 - Olga - Throughout the game the most consistent and probably the most fleshed out character. The scene at the end sitting together was done well and actually made me feel something not just an empty everyday fuck. I bet it was not easy for the dev to write that scene but you did well padawan. Probably my favourite character in the game and the most satisfying "path" so good job dev.
Good job nr 5 - SPOILER ALERT DONT LOOK IF YOU HAVENT PLAYED -
Good job nr 6 - SPOILER ALERT -
Good job nr 7 - Lenny and Oliver were both very funny. Good writing on them, stayed consistent the whole game. The first scene with Lenny where you are sitting at the reception is perfection and Oliver throughout the game was fun to be around.
Some things you can improve on for the next game :
-Stick to your vision, core principles and pillars that are unchangeable. Dont make patreon polls that changes the whole game. You can do polls BEFORE you start developing the game to get an idea where you want to go with it but not mid-development.
-Whether its harem game, solo game, poly game, pick a lane or if you want to do them all then do it properly and from the beginning.
-The paths would need to actually have unique scenes, dialogues IF you go for multiple routes and not full harem. If its full harem then this point is moot.
-The world needs to have reactivity and awknowledge the pathing you are on, not this isolated bubble that only you, the player know what path you are on but even for the player its confusing. The MC himself also doesnt know whose path he is on, bro is just going from 1 LI to another acting like hes not in a relationship with anyone.
-Characters need to have their core identity and principles and stick to them, dont give the player the option to bend their personalities, the character becomes fake who doesnt have their own beliefs, world views and identity. If you want to make a character from the beginning that is very open-minded in relationships, doesnt mind having poly relationships or harems or is a sub character or a dom character or shy or outgoing or whatever else then sure go for it but bending characters mid game is a nono and giving player the option to bend her character is a nonono.
-If you want to do a harem game but also want to have something for the solo players while keeping the game scope in somewhat of a control where you dont have million paths then i would highly suggest you having at least 2 LIs in the game who have no desire to share you and are only solo options - like you did with Emily, Olga, Grace - BUT have a MEANINGFUL, UNIQUE scenes and dialogue where the world also awknowledges and reacts that you are in a relationship not this spaghetti mess where the MC doesnt even know whose path he is on. And the rest of the LIs would be harem option only because if you start giving them solo paths too then it gets too complicated, messy and a big headache. That way you keep it simple but also maintaining quality that every path gets proper love.
Overall its an OK game, the first half was very good probably a 4/5, the 2nd half was 2/5.
You have good potential dev, this was your first game and im sure you already learned alot. The first half of the game showed you have talent, there were very good parts there but clearly something happend after that. Im sure you realise it yourself aswell that you kinda pushed yourself into the corner doing that mid-development change, then it all started getting messy, you somehow had to juggle and make harem work, solos work, probably even scrapped the idea of duo/trio combos, then there started creeping in inconsistencies, just tunnel visioning the main story and not really giving anyone satisfying paths/romances/conclusions. It is what it is, you learn from your mistakes.
Thank you for actually completing the game and not milking it for years.
The game making thingy is not easy work, its ruthless, it takes alot of effort, passion, time and a need to have a thick skin so respect to you and everyone else who gives us these games.
