VN - Ren'Py - Move the Chains [v0.3.5] [MissFortune]

Awesome. Finally a football VN. The BMS reference was also a nice touch


There is a good amount of content here for a game that is just over a year old. The graphics are good, writing is good (albeit with occasional spelling mistakes), and its a good story. MC is a bit of a punk at first, but it at least fits what the developer is going for

Only complaint is there are too many characters. There are a ton of LI, which always slows down game progress.

Looking forward to seeing this one progress.

So far so good, imo. The chars, writing, and developing plot lines seem interesting. The dev obviously has a good foundation of college football knowledge which adds to the immersion.

Gonna keep an eye on this one for sure and see where it goes/can't wait for more.

I'm torn. The author tries some admirable things (a more ambitious way of storytelling; making use of gradual exposition and coming closer than any other game I've played here to polyphony; chief among them), but lots of it fails to connect with me personally. I can't help thinking that this is the wrong medium for larger-than-life characters (the auto-dealer NIL guy being a good example).

I also never felt like I was Spencer, just the guy behind the screen watching Spencer go about his days. The fact that half the girls you met have a great deal of history with Spencer, which only gradually gets out into the open, doesn't help that case.

But the wigger stuff is the worst of the bunch. You couldn't have picked a less compelling perspective if you racked your brain for all your life. I don't care about some semi-savage primitive chest-bumping about family, when it introduces neither conflict nor motivation. He could want to make it for any other reason, and if the tribalistic familialism doesn't at least come into conflict with one other value or principle, as happened with Marcus Junius Brutus or between Michael Corleone and his brother*, the story is bereft of purpose. The Godfather, Once Upon A Time in America and Goodfellas make for much better blueprints for a crime story than Scarface. Petty criminals and their ilk make for neither compelling characters nor narratives. As it stands, it just makes for very replaceable motivation and atrocious, broken English.

At the best of times, this reminds me of GTA 5, with its biting humor (before it got nuked for the E&E re-re-release), but I don't care for Franklin, but Michael and Trevor. In some ways, it is also more blatantly and unhealthily nihilistic (from the "Be who you are, do what you want" to a nigh paraphrasing of Dostoevsky's warnings in Brothers Karamazov**), but I find it's more than balanced with the references from anything to "Lia" Thomas, Rittenhouse, Musk, Tate, the latest crypto scam and the totally not chronically-online specters haunting Twitter, and any other number of things. It's quite nice.
But some other references to millennial pop culture I find quite bad.

The renders fall within the uncanny valley for me, the mother being the most blatant example of that, but I also don't happen to care for them, outside cases at either extreme (good or bad), which this isn't, so take it with a grain of salt.

There's also a good number of spelling mistakes. All I remember is a missing letter or word somewhere, nothing which renders any piece of dialogue incomprehensible, but it is very much enough to be noticeable and annoying.

Pacing will be off for quite a few people, and some of the tones are quite heavy.

I think you have a talented author who chose the wrong premise, save a re-write or jolt in direction. It's not flawless, I've made as much about my perspective obvious, but the larger point stands. I can't yet say whether I'll follow the game beyond this point. I might give the author's other Ren'py work a shot though, though it doesn't seem to be quite up my alley.

*The prevalence of which is still wide-spread, as I happen to be privy to, through my father.
**"Dost Thou know that the ages will pass, and humanity will proclaim by the lips of their sages that there is no crime, and therefore no sin; there is only hunger? 'Feed men, and then ask of them virtue!' that's what they'll write on the banner, which they will raise against Thee, and with which they will destroy Thy temple.".

Pros:

- Renders


Cons:

- Story
- Main character
- Cringe worthy writing
- Characters


I had high hopes for this VN, I really wanted to like it but it was so God damn cringeworthy.

- Story

Your a white kid from the hood... No, that's not a joke.. You're from Inglewood, California. The MC looks like a goth member of Three Days Grace but throughout his series he has the verbiage of Marshawn Lynch, if I said his name correctly. There's plenty of things about the story that just didn't appeal to me and MC was a huge part of it. Throughout the story he's talking about stereotypes this and that but every other time he opens his mouth was a blatant contradiction. The whole Jakeem scene where he practically glorified assisting in thugs sticking up people. Aside from the cringe slang the story was all of the place tone wise. The dev has woke-liberal talking points as well as conservative-red pill ones. Hell, even Kyle Rittenhouse got a shout out, check that off of my "Things I didn't expect" list. When the MC isn't this poser "hood" cliché he's pretty much a obnoxious arrogant tool. Main characters these days are either tools that are full of themselves or doormats.

- Characters

Not really all that blown away by the love interest in the game. Majority of them all dense or have shallow personalities. Diana, Laura and maybe Kara seem to be the only ones worth the time. Laura isn't romancable but Diana is which is a head scratcher. Yuna wasn't there for you and pushed you away but the MC broke out the cape for her while ignoring Diana that was pretty much in your corner the whole time. Make matters worse is Yuna then lives with you.

Again, I wasn't blown away by the characters. Most of them just throw themselves at the MC which makes this a bit lackluster. No real connections other than sex. There's literally a character named Swallow...

This just doesn't get me invested, I'm sorry.

I hope this game doesn't get abandoned like other games. This game is in my top 10, renders, story, and characters, all good. I really want to support the dev but with last 2 games didn't give me hope.

Overall i like this game. it's a good 4.5 stars so i rounded up.

Renders are beautiful, there's a good variety of LI (seems like it still early on, 0.2)

The story is cookie cutter, a great athelete that comes from small beginnings. It's well told so far and if this trend continues it will be a good story.

I like the dev. went for menu choice rather than qte, it gives it a more novel fell rather than reactionnary game. (so far)

The only minus for me, and it's not a really a minus just a bit confusing (maybe it's just me). Not all flashback, but some where introduced confusingly (imo). Some of these flashback are introduced perfectly either while sleeping or while seeing a trigger. Others seemed like they just happen for some unknown reason.

Keep up the good job.

I am really enjoying this AVN. It is very different than any other game I've played out there and that is refreshing in itself. I agree that it may not be everyone's cup of tea, but those of us with lesser political sensitivities will find this game to be a gem to enjoy. I can't wait for more. This game gives me Rocky Balboa vibes, but in American Football context!

There were a few typos here and there, but that wasn't a deal breaker for me. The dev will do well to iron out these simple errors in later updates. Sometimes it seems like too much text cramped into one frame. Other AVNs do a good job by largely keeping the writing short and to the point for each frame. This AVN can benefit from that example.

I've found the writing in this VN fantastic—one of the very best with regard to style and story. The graphics while to me are second to the story/writing, are themselves extremely top-tier. This is not the standar fuckfare VN, and it is not trying to be something it's not. It's obvious the dev took a story-first approach, lude scenes happen where they make sense. And they are good too!
Love Move The Chains. One of my new favorites.

I abso-fucking-lutely loved the update. Don't know why people complain about MMC being an asshole. The environment in which he was raised, you have to be asshole to survive and it's not like it's out of character that MMC behaves that way. I believe this attitude and personality suits MMC perfectly, especially after he spent a year in jail.

Dev melted my heart in UI department. I just loved the UI and the animations used in UI. Renders and animations as you know are already great, no lagging when animations play.

I really believe think that story will get more and more interesting as we move forward and this episode shows exactly that very clearly. Loved with the ease the story flows, reveals the bits, immersively.

Characters are lovely and I love detailing on characters. You'll see what I'm talking about when you play the game.
Emily gonna lose her other eye too. Bitch emptied her brain when lost first one. I already knew she will jeopardize Diana when MMC saw her with Dwight the twat.

KEEP GROWING!
STAY HEALTHY!

GOLDLUCK! MissFortune

The premise is a good one, not enough games of the sportsball genre here. The story feels a little disjointed in the beginning, that it doesn't flow well. Part of me expects that's intentional... that the game is trying to introduce the player to all of the set pieces before jumping into the meat of the story and that requires going to all the places, for better or worse, and being introduced to all the people. While it's likely the developer feels this is necessary to ensure players don't feel like the story is being cobbled together on the fly, it isn't really necessary. We don't need to introduce the player to all of the people, places, and things to know they were fleshed out and exist, we only need to hear of them. It feels like we ran into 15-20 girls (I'd have to replay it to know for sure) during the first episode's content, and most of those interactions felt forced.

In spite of the early story tripping over itself to introduce us to all of the players, I do actually like the characters being introduced. Most of them seem to have very different personalities with some gentle overlap, even if the characters with personality overlap don't necessarily interact with one another--yet. For instance, Nicole and Swallow come to the story as a sort of package deal, yet have personalities that are as diametrically opposed as the north is from the south. Episode 1 wraps up with tension between characters simply being a part of the MC's life in various capacity, and while I'm sure it will ease up--the MC's sister of all people can't keep up jealousy of other women without causing social problems for the MC in the long-term--It's still a fun hurdle to come across and overcome.

Scene backgrounds are choice and the character designs are amazing, they are very high quality and while they're obviously 3DCG, they have very realistic qualities (I loved seeing the MC and Yuna in the pool at the end of E01; that is high detail). I don't intend to come off as mean to the other game in the sportsball genre--it's a good game and I'm still playing it--but realistic faces really give me a better impression, and the visual quality is on par with some of the very best games on the forum... in any genre.

I enjoy most of the music. I look forward to the developer adding more to the jukebox. Ambient sounds work well, all of the music and sounds are generally normalized so nothing comes out of left field suddenly blowing out your eardrum (problematic in one or two games I've played). I will note that I'm not a fan of the music stopping when you go to the menu. It feels like it pulls you out of the element, and I understand the very action of going to the menu technically takes you out of the element, but it feels like some platformer being paused rather than simply going to look at something in the menu... the menu isn't just a pause button, after all; it's where all the extras are at.

For the moment, I'm giving this 5 stars.

Through about 3/4 of the first episode, I was leaning towards 4 stars... and that had pretty much everything to do with how forced some of the scenes felt in the beginning. However, as I've moved into v0.2 content (S01E02), I've come to the conclusion that it was simply the developer trying to plug us into all of the coming content rather than letting it come naturally with the story... it really feels like the story has slowed into a more natural pacing, and I appreciate it.

Looking forward to future content, and hopefully that will include a season worth of good sportsball content. The adult content will come, but remember: Without a good story--chock full of as much detail that a genre-savvy player can stand--all adult games will simply boil down to a lazy porn plot. Don't be that writer.

PS: Love Dean, he sings the song of the MC's people--loud and proud.

I wouldn't know a cornerback from a diamondback, but I still enjoyed this game.

For a start, the game explained a lot of the sports terms as it goes, so that helped.

But the characters were great, and they acted consistently with their personalities.

The highlight though is the rendering. It's amazing, and definitely some of the best work in any AVN.

Outstanding job.

So I love the game. Renders are awesome, beautiful girls. Very interesting story, which has some great potential for some deep moments.

Aside from a few weird grammar things, and a few misspelled words, the dialog makes sense and reads well.

The only real complaint is I want more, and I want it now, lol.

Keep up the terrific work, really excited to see how this game comes together.

Enjoyed the game so far; unique and interesting premise, nice renders and good writing. The HUD looks crazy good with all the animated logos.

I quite liked the choice to keep the MC's face a mystery at the start, it kind of left the visuals up to imagination, so I was a little disappointed when you could see the MC's face in the renders afterwards, but that is not really a big issue.

Well overall a great game,
Great renders,
Good music,
Good Characters,
Story is a bit confusing for me since i dont understand American football and its core of this VN,
The interactions with some of the characters are vague at this point but i can see of them coming together.
Will consider supporting n Looking forward to the next update.

Eh, this is only on 0.2. Shouldn't be much to it, but I'll give it a look--

>Great music
>Fits the atmosphere perfectly
>Great renders
>literal hours of genuinely well-crafted story
>No character falls flat
>Even the damn world feels fleshed out
>MC is an actual character not just a vehicle for the reader

bruh

My expectations were blown out of the water. I couldn't have been more than 20 minutes in before I was hooked. Hell, I don't even care about football, but having the narrative tightly focused around it and through it has gotten me really damn invested in it.

If you took any one thing away from this (the writing, the visuals, the focus, the music) it would merely be above average. Good, don't get me wrong, but not great. Except, with how its all put together, I was instead left feeling like I'd just been watching the sort of polished show/movie/game that blows up and gets a cult following for however many years it runs.

Overall, I'd say this is one of the rare games where every element of a VN manages to come together into something greater than the sum of all its parts.

Oh man, I really want to enjoy this game because the renders are beautiful, but for some reason I can't. (TLDR at the bottom)
It might be because I was expecting a 'normal-ish' harem game based on the tag but it's not really that, at least not for me.
Granted it's not clear what kind of a harem game this will be, it might have the tag out of necessity and it is not aimed for vanilla harem players like me.


I don't really want a harem of slutty girls, while I don't have a problem with LIs who have a past, also they don't have to be virgins, I just don't like them to be part of a harem. It's fine if they are side girls or a ONS.
Hopefully there are some 'normal' girls as well who we yet to meet or get to know better and they act 'less slutty' so there can be some romance in that relationship.
What's missing for me is the romance part to be honest, but not sure if it fits the MC so that could be the reason why it's kinda lacking on that front.

The cast is quite large, which might not be issue now, not sure how long this game supposed to be. It is really ambitious though to have this many LIs even in a harem game. (I'm sliglty concerned since the dev have another game on-hold so not sure what to expect.)

Why make a hot mother figure character if she is not romanceable is a sore point for me (don't want to compare it to a certain 3 letter game, but it's hard not to..), why not just make her an older women in her 50s/60s who is not that attractive or not have her at all. At least she is not sexualized, but since we found out her backstory I just want her to be happy, find love again and have a child, but that's off the table I guess, she'll be a tag along and just exist as a mother figure while for some reason the 'female roommate' is romanceble. So not sure about the reasoning why she is not an LI, hopefully she won't get together with an NPC, I don't want to see/hear that. I see no value having her around in this capacity (same as in that 3 letter game) as her 'arc' is kinda complete, she helped MC and took care of him and his 'female roommate'. Although surely something will happen with her character to add more drama, otherwise there is no point having her around in my opinion.


I'm not really a fan of this 'hood' talk and environment, but that's probably my personal preference, not an issue really.
This game is too heavy on the drama side, it's brewing everywhere and it might just be too much for me.


TLDR:
+ beautiful renders and girls all around
+ love the detailed sport aspect of the game
+ good story and writing besides a few type or missing words (although my next point kinda contradicts this point..)
- too much drama all around and it feels like it will keep coming
- questionable LIs for a harem game (this might be just my preference, could be a non-issue for others)
- the existence of the non-romanceable mother figure character left a bad taste in my mouth
- too much 'hood' talk (this might be just my preference, could be a non-issue for others)

Overall it's not a bad game, I'd recommend playing it or at least trying it out.
Others might find it 5/5 and maybe I'm too nitpicky or I have a unique taste in harem games.

Good luck to the dev!

Review: "Move the Chains V0.2"

Move the Chains is essentially an American football enthusiast's wet dream come to life. From start to finish, the narrative is dominated by the intricacies of the game, leaving little room for genuine romantic development.

The core narrative of "Move the Chains" struggles to break free from the shackles of mediocrity, much like a third-string player hoping for a shot at the big leagues. Our protagonist, is supposed to hail from the gritty streets of Inglewood, but his portrayal feels about as authentic as a Hollywood set piece. Instead of embodying the raw energy of his supposed upbringing, the MC comes across as an edgy pretty boy straight out of Echo Park, complete with a wardrobe more suited to a fashion runway than a football field. As for the characters, they're introduced with all the subtlety of a linebacker blitzing the quarterback – expect to be left scratching your head as you try to decipher who's who in this gridiron soap opera. And let's not forget the barrage of American football terminologies and mind-numbing banter that permeate every dialogue exchange; it's enough to make you wonder if the developers mistook this for a playbook instead of a visual novel that's enough to make even the most dedicated sports fan yearn for a timeout.

In the midst of the touchdown dances and intercepted romances, "Move the Chains" does offer a few silver linings. The renders shine brightly, displaying a level of craftsmanship that could rival even the most polished helmets on game day. Likewise, the writing, though often lost in a sea of football terminology, showcases glimpses of genuine talent. It's clear that the developer possesses the necessary skills to craft compelling visual novels; however, "Moving Chains" falls short of reaching its full potential. With a more nuanced approach and a willingness to tackle themes beyond the gridiron, future projects could see this developer emerging as a true MVP in the realm of interactive storytelling

Promising storyline great characters, loved the interactions with diana so far she is my favourite character/Li, i loved the back story of diana and the MC and the scenes with conflicts between them were Top-notch, All the best with your VN will be looking forward to more updates and hope they will be frequent

V0.2

i am over half a century old, a brit and spent nearly two decades in the hospitality trade, 4 years of which was both working and managing a bar and cellar, and as a brit have never tried, served nor ever known anyone to drink warm beer.....except guiness in ireland where it is served in half pints traditionally from the barrel.
from an american writer, i find the lack of knowledge understandable as i have been to the states and tried the fizzy chemical piss they serve so the thought of real beer can seem scary and create false horror stories in imaginations
(at least i made no jibe about the sport)

making a VN one would think that the N is just as important as the V right?
it would seem not. the writing errors throughout are abundant and immersion breaking for me. developers do not check before release what they are releasing, which i translate as 'could care less'.
it's a sloppy practice

there are hints of good characterization for some but not all, but early days i guess. it does go on a bit and at one point the developer loses enough focus that one woman gets two names during one conversation.
the humour fell as flat as the many other game plugs and mentions in the writing and art. curious after the opening warning at game start.

the first thing it does to me, as a reader, is make me then stop reading and start thinking about those other games. hey presto, immersion broken.

the art is good/great (not my forte so hard to tell) as nothing i see looked weird or drew the eye for the wrong reason. no extra fingers or legs bent at strange angles. no odd lighting etc.
the V got all the good attention.

no renpy exceptions and good design choice. if the writing was error free then full immersion would be possible. the choice to go the VN without the clutter of stat screens and the breaks for sandbox/P-A-C styles is a great choice for this middling plot.

with better care this could be an easy 4 out of 5
but with too much outside influence and shoddy quality control i remain swimming the lake looking for the hook

after playing version 0.1
- Excellent story showing what we see in many American films and series, about poor young people who seek, through sport, to get a scholarship to pay for college and be able to help their family.
- Excellent images, with well-designed poses and lighting as well.
- Characters well introduced into the story.