VN - Ren'Py - My Dorm [v0.19.1 P2 Ch.7] [Trope95]

I actually really like this game. In fact, there only a couple of things about this game that took my rating from a 5 to a 2 star. I will get to that later, but first, the positives. I really like all the LI and their personalities. I think they're all sexy and really like spending time with them. The English is pretty good, a few mistakes here and there but not enough to distract me from the game or warrant losing a star. I am also interested in the storyline concerning the renovation of the houses and the incoming new students. Now it's on to the negatives, and they are pretty big negatives.
The first, is the MC. He is one of the most annoying characters in the game and one of the worst MCs I have ever played as. He is completely overdone as the "nice guy." He acts like he is respecting the LI feelings but in reality he is a controlling, close-minded, pussy. He claims to be respecting the women but then gives them no agency. When they try to make a move on him or try to progress the relationship he goes "this is not what you want, you want it to be romantic." Not every woman wants this romantic, candlelit dinner scenario as their first time. Sometimes when a woman knows who they want to be with, they just want to take the opportunity to be with that guy, especially if they're sneaking around and don't have enough time. Of course, the dev writes it so all the girls end up just agreeing (sometimes reluctantly), but that's just to make it seem less controlling. Also whenever the MC does get to have sex it's an endless "are you sure?" "We don't have to do this" "We can stop if you want." Even when the girls are basically begging him to shut the fuck up and just fuck them. Also he tells them they have to be honest, sometimes even scolding them when they haven't been, but he lies all the fucking time. There are several times where he can be upfront with someone that there are other girls, without disclosing the names, but he just doesn't. There is another game I have played recently that does the "nice guy" MC way better. He also makes sure the LI are ok and are consenting, but does not overdo it. Most importantly, he lets the women have some fucking choice in what they want. The MC in this game is a piece of shit who thinks he knows what's best for everyone. This is also the MC that turns down the most opportunities to have sex or fool around, not gets interrupted or runs out of time, TURNS DOWN. That is all under the guise of being "nice," but is really just being controlling and not giving the girls any chance to decide what they really want. Now to the dev's credit, the MC does get a little better further in the game and there's even a (half-assed) attempt at a domination route with one of the LI, but it's not enough.
The other negative concerns the storyline. Some of the LI felt dragged out a little bit too long and it started to get annoying. That's actually still a problem with some of them. Those two big problems aside, the rest of this game is actually pretty fun and interesting. I just wish the LIs had a better MC to fall in love with cause they will never have an opportunity to decide anything for themselves. The MC sucks so much that it caused a loss of 2 stars because he is literally the character you spend the most time with and he is unbearable, hypocritical, arrogant, and a bitch pretending to be a "nice guy."

Tropey, Shallow Game with a lot of Words

People like @TheLegend1337, @berny, and @LordOfMurder have already discussed the issues, so I'm not going to simply reiterate what they've mentioned.

I'm sure this game has an audience. There's people who will enjoy it as a kind of mindless frat boy fantasy of just going around, banging a lot of different women, impregnating them without any real consequence. If your goal is just to watch some dude build a huge harem of women and you don't mind reading a bunch of words before you get to that point, this is a decent option.

For anyone else that cares about the story, the characters, the dynamics of a relationship, this game is shallow and uninteresting.

The MC is just a massive, self-insert Gary Stu. He was formerly chubby—done transparently to try to take the edge off his obvious Gary Stu-ness but is completely irrelevant by the time the story starts. He dickishly wants to claim ownership over every girl he meets. Not because their personalities are compelling or they have interesting conversation, but rather just because they're hot.

You have to sit through slide after slide of boring, topical conversation that doesn't illuminate anything, only to discover that it was never even needed, because the girls are already head-over-heels for the MC just because he exists. His magic aura and super penis must produce some kind of mystic forcefield that ensnares any vagina in the area (some of these characters are so shallow it's insulting to call them women).

Almost every girl is either a virgin or has only ever wanted to be with the MC. And as soon as they see the MC and his magic penis, forget whatever they were holding onto their virginities for, it's time to jump aboard the most one-sided harem train. Choo choo!

On some level, this is a game of almosts. For instance, the justification for why the MC looks "older" is delivered out-of-character. It's a pretty shallow, straightforward explanation that the dev gives, that some people simply look older than their age. That's fine. But why isn't that information delivered in game? It can almost make sense, if you delivered it in game.

Worse, the exact opposite is implied. The first time you take Norah out to the hairdresser, the hairdresser comments on how she's dating someone half her age. Huh? Norah's model looks about 25. The MC looks about 40. If the rationale is that Norah wants to date an older looking man, why doesn't anyone in game assume he's older than he is? It's such a handwave-y explanation delivered after the fact, to justify why the author took a middle-aged DAZ model and put him on a college-aged character.

Scenes just drag on because nothing really happens. The developer doesn't know how to edit. (And to be fair to them, a lot of developers are guilty of this.) You don't need to depict everything in essentially real time. You don't need to capture every line of dialogue, every interaction, and every piss or shower the MC takes. A lot of these scenes have characters sit around and shoot the shit, and either no action takes place or the plot doesn't move forward in any meaningful way. You can cut those scenes. Believe me, developer, no one will find your characters sitting around and making small talk as interesting as you do.

For a game called "My Dorm," the first thousand or so slides of the game are a run-of-the-mill slice-of-life incest game. You're seducing your mom, aunt, sister, and cousins for long before you even catch glimpse of the first roommate. The main issue with these interactions are they're shallow and porn tropey. A girl walks in on the MC while he's showering and becomes dickmatized. Someone slips and falls on top of the MC. It's bad and cheap. There's no seduction or tension. They're just immediately transfixed and can't think of anything else, because apparently there's no one in this universe besides the MC that has a decent dick.

It's another one of those weird, incel fantasies where the MC is praised for being an amazing guy just for breathing. He essentially does nothing of value. He's bland, uninteresting, doesn't possess a sense of humor, is selfish and thinks of himself, but he's this amazing guy by virtue of how every other male character in the game is a cartoonishly horrible mouthbreather.

And worse, it's not even self-deferential in its tropey power fantasy. The game might be better if it takes itself less seriously, plays into the silly tropes and just has silly and light-hearted, porn-logic driven interactions. Instead, it tries to take itself seriously and falls flat on its face. It really wants us to believe the MC is a nice dude but all of their efforts just backfire on the simple account that he's not a nice guy. Like how the MC repeatedly mentions how he wants a relationship but it's only open one way, and apparently the audience is supposed to buy that he's being a good guy because... he mentions it?

"I'm going to go around banging anyone I want but you have to be loyal only to me" is not exactly the grounds for a kind or likable protagonist, no matter how the game tries to dress it up. It would almost be better if the game completely cut out any attempts to have this conversation and just had the girls magically propose this kind of relationship on their own. Maybe he by some miracle ended up in a dormitory of all cuckqueans. But the more he brings up this inherently unfair relationship, the more unlikable and selfish he appears, which is exactly the opposite effect you want when you're trying to create the MC as being a uniquely awesome guy who's just so lovable because he's nice and treats people well.

Even when you finally, inevitably, hook up with the girl, none of it feels interesting or special. They're just another statistic in the black book. The renders are nothing special, the animations are short and loopy, and there's almost never any foreplay or comedown. It's just hey, this time you get to bang the redhead rather than the brunette.

This is also one of the few games where the presence of sound really detracts rather than adds to the experience. The developer needs to understand that his game is wordy. In fact, he should probably cut out half the dialogue slides, but barring that, he needs to understand the wordiness of his own work. Having a looping, 30 second background noise, that's poorly balanced with a loud laugh or clap at one part of the track, is just terrible sound design. You end up wanting to mute the game.

What I can say about this game is that its not irredeemable, and the developer has some potential if they can curtail a lot of these beginner mistakes. However, the game in its current state is nothing to write home about.

I don't know how this flew under my radar but damn this is good! Sure it follows all the tropes we have come to expect from this type of game but the character designs and writing are all really endearing. I like every girl in this. And I do not care that the sexual content is slow in coming. I'm enjoying the ride.

Some people may not be fans of simple and tender stories like this one, mostly lacking of conflict, but I love playing them to get away from everything. Love the warm characters, the variety of body shapes (and those bushes!), the big family goals, and the overall happy vibe from it.

The build-up on the relationships might feel a bit rushed sometimes, but that's a common issue with harem games. The bigger the cast, the lesser time you have to delve into each character psyche and development. In any case, the game doesn't intend to be too complex, so it's not as if I was expecting something too different.

Pretty good vanilla game where the developer doesn't mix corruption and other nasty tags together to make an abomination. While the starting is rocky and some parts doesn't make sense and Mc looked very old and ugly (only in the beginning). It get very good in the latest updates. Not gonna hold a Dev accountable for those things as it his first game probably. Writing seems to be drastically improved as well. There are not many branches (never been fan of those anyway, too much time consuming) and kinks but probably they will be added on the next phase. Honestly not fan of clones, spy and other c*cks annoying MC and his family sometimes. Most fun parts are starting when everything is being slowly unraveling with grandma and new dorm arrival. Hoping for more harem funny wars between girls and more virgins deflowering lmfao. It also pretty cool to see that most girls are not some cheap sluts like some other games who later become extremely loyal just because of MC cock or some shits.

0.10b.3

Pros:
There's a wide range of fetishes and they're optional.

The girls design is quite hot and sexy.

Story seems pretty interesting.

Cons:
protagonist acting like a lovestruck fool without the player having an option for him to act differently.

Render quality is grainy, blurry and just overall terrible.

Protagonist's personality is blander than water and has no interesting or unique qualities whatso ever, just your typical good guy gary stu.

The dialogue is awkward as fuck and written in a way that feel like it doesn't have a flow

Edit: I bumped my rating up from 2 star to 3 star because the dev decided to be a good sport and like my review despite my negative as fuck comments, lol.

I agree with with pretty much everything @LordOfMurder wrote in their review before me, although my opinion of the game seems to be a lot more negative in the end.

My thoughts on the game:

- abysmal porn logic from start to finish
- one of the worst Gary Stu protagonists I encountered so far
- boring and artificial dialogue (the writing in general is pretty poor)
- uninteresting and shallow girls
- too many girls
- (some?) of the choices don't seem to make any difference, even big ones like avoiding someone sexually
I honestly don't have much positive to say about the game. The reasons I'm giving this 2 stars are the diverse women (their models, not their personalities) and the decent technical aspects of the game.

If you are looking for an uninspired harem game where lots of boring women have lots of sex with a boring and irritating MC this game is for you.
That wasn't sarcasm by the way. I know there's a market for these games and if you are into that, the game is probably worth a look. But in my opinion the game leaves a lot to be desired.

Not that great. This game has several problems some of which come down to taste and some which come down to execution.

It's your standard mega-harem where the MC has a magical penis or something so every loves him and thinks the sun shines out of his ass for no apparent reason, which is fine but it'd be nice if there was more onscreen justification for it.

The one nice thing we seem him do is warn his cousin her boyfriends cheating on her, but this is immediately undercut by this being a harem game and the MC basically cheating on everyone at the beginning.

I guess to the games credit after a while the MC starts opening his hookups with by telling the girl of the day that he has another girlfriend and the relationship will have to be an open one. Only open one way though because again this is a porn game. The reasons for the girls to accept this are a little weak and depend a lot on how far you're willing to stretch suspension of disbelief. There probably should have been a better explanation like, pheremones or mind control or an explicitly magical penis to better convince us that 20+ girls are all willing to share this pretty average guy.

I'd be fine if the game leaned into and the MC admitted he was just being a horny bastard but I'm supposed to believe the MC is a saint for letting all these girls bang him at the same time. At one point the cousin even catches you cheating on her with mum and she talks to your mum about it. We get the absolutely absurd explanation that banging other people immediately after talking about entering a relationship is totally fine as long as you didn't explicitly say it wasn't allowed. And this is coming from the MC's mother who starts the game being furious about her husband cheating on her without saying anything?!

The next issue is that there are just too many girls in this game. The game starts off with just 6 family members but the number quickly balloons out of control until theres something like 16 girls just staying at your dorm/house + another couple of handfulls living elsewhere in the area.

The upside of this is theres a fairly wide range of body types on offer. The downside is the dialogue. There is way too much dialogue. If it was all different it wouldn't be so bad, but it's the same stuff over and over. Introductions, hobbies, lifestyle choices up till now, the mc replies with the same stuff, then a variety of sob stories presumably to flesh them out. It's not all bad but because it has to be done 20+ times all the good gets buried under the mediocre.

Even if you try and limit the size of the harem to just the girls you happen to be interested in which is at least offered as an option, it turns out not to matter since you still have to sit through most of the dialogue with them, you're just skipping the sex scenes.

As for the scenes themselves, the models can be a bit hit or miss but there's a wide enough range that at least some of them will be attractive to everyone but by the same token some of them are going to turn people off.

The animations are also often jerky and the positions obscure a lot of the action most of the time. They're reasonably frequent but again because there's so many girls you'll be waiting a while to see your favorites.

By the time the students arrive at the dorm which is like 6+ hours in I just couldn't put up with the dialogue anymore for such a small payoff and gave up.

Excellent AVN. You can probably tell from the screenshots that the artwork is top-notch, the girls are beautiful, and there's some diversity of shape, ethnicity, hair color, etc., etc. But what sets My Dorm apart is the story line. It's not a slow burn with all tease and little action, and it does feel like the relationships are going exactly the MC's way pretty fast and without any setbacks, but the characters feel real enough that it's still enjoyable. Tropecita also breaks the fourth wall every now and then, referencing the MC's favorite AVN site, a game just like My Dorm (only different), the characters wondering if they're in a porn game, etc. Really looking forward to the next update. My Dorm deserves a place on your shortlist.

There aren't many redeeming qualities for this game. Every character, and I do mean every one of them, is shallow and banal. No one acts or talks like they do. The writing gives off the same vibe as writing assignments in high school. The girls are so artificial and it really ruins the whole experience.

Tropes tropes and more tropes. Silly situations that's not even charming with scenes that you've seen a thousand times before.

Pretty nice models though.

I was pleasantly surprised by this game. A good harem incest fantasy with some twists.

Pros

• Good story
• Good writing
• Good sound effects
• Good characters
• Good character development
• Good character models overall
• Good to excellent sex scenes
• Good to excellent animations
• Unique path choices with the girls

Cons

• Environments are mostly stock, generic, and mundane
• The character models have good facial and hair detail but the rest of their bodies lack detail overall (skin mostly; some of the nipples and areola are detailed). Some of the girls have bushes with hair that is too long and straight (and also too thick). Pussies don't have the same hair density as the top of the head. I prefer girls to be clean shaven but that isn't even a complaint really
• A bit of a slow burn but I've seen much worse
• English problems throughout the game - misused words, missing words, and awkwardly worded sentences are fairly common (the dev even mentioned that he has proofreaders which was shocking for the English to be in this state)
• The MC has some core logic problems and a possessive personality which I don't care for (more on that below)

Overall, it's a solid visual novel. "My Dorm" is a misleading title for this game as it is largely an incest focused game currently.

I was very happy to see an author do real animations in Ren'Py! It shouldn't be rare but it kind of is.

The MC has a possessive personality and double standards that I don't like. He basically tells all the girls that he can be with as many girls as he wants but they can only be with him. Take it or leave it. If you want to be with me, those are my rules that you must follow. My way or the highway. It is a hypocritical and selfish attitude which I am not fond of.

He then tells the girls that he doesn't want to get STDs spread around so that is one of the main reasons why they can only be with him. More failed logic here. So the MC can sleep with lots of girls and have no chance of catching an STD but if the girls sleep around they likely will. I'm still scratching my head over that one!

The dev then says that it's NTR if the girls can be with other guys even if it's never shown or never happens. I'm scratching my head yet again. I would have been happier with the story if the dev just said he is OK with possessive personalities and that is how he scripted the MC instead of trying to make excuses for it.

The game is very close to 5 stars for me but due to the cons I listed I had to remove one star.

Overall, a solid visual novel that doesn't disappoint! It will be interesting to see how the two girls doing surveillance on the MC plays out. That is still very much a mystery.

I recommend this game and encourage others to give it a try!

Really good game so far. It has room for improvement, it has a few rough edges, but it's very relaxing, comfy game.
My 2 favorite things about this that stands out from other games are:

1. The choices actually tell you the possible outcome of them as opposed to some games where you have to chose between some arbitrary options and hope for the best before reloading a save.
2. You get to know what everyone is thinking. It's so refreshing and ads so much to the story to know how everyone is feeling all the time and it's exactly what I needed.

Quite enjoyable and it's nice to see a developer passionate about his game and having discussions with people on the forums. I'm interested to see where this is going and how it will eventually end. Just hopefully not for a few more years worth of content.

Zero depth to the lighting, horribly uninteresting story written as if by someone who has no idea how people communicate with each other, weird obsession with strange details (reggaeton, really?) - This isn't abysmal, but it's close.

On a positive note, there is variety in character skins (I say skins because the models are largely similar aside from skin/hair colors) and it seems to want to focus on one of my favorite kinks. It just feels like it's all in the service of nothing.

My Dorm [v0.9B.2] 2*

Pros:
Sound

Neutral:
translation
Renders are average at best
pacing is inconsistent

Cons:
Character Models
The Girls are dull and uninteresting
Story is uninteresting and has a corny porn logic
Boring Sex Scenes

Conclusion:

I think this game lacks in every department.
I can ignore the silly incest/harem story, but everything in this game feels so boring. The Character Models are the ones you see in every other "smaller" game and their look and personality are just not interesting, which is something that can make or break this game. The Story is not intriguing and has this weird porn logic where even your relatives jump on your dick in no time. I can´t give this game more than 2* because there is nothing for me that is mildly interesting.

An ambitious first project with updates every month has a great sense of "good" humor, The story (yet to be discovered but I hate giving spoilers)

The graphic quality is very good, the setting also, at the beginning the game has animations of 2/5 I am very critical until the last update there have been no major changes in this aspect but Tropecita has also improved and in this latest update the animations are some from 3.5/5 and some from 4/5. In short, it is a nice game where many memes have been created and the community 5/5

The game is decent, but I want to give 4 stars just for how great the dev is, listens to feedback, posts consistent updates and has demonstrated their talent.

Now coming back to the game, this is the type of game a lot of people will like, good diversity of characters and even looks. Somewhat of a slow burn but with good pacing. Nice renders and decent animations. The scene writing is also very good, and has just the right length to engage you. It seems to have almost everything.

My issue is that there really is no hook apart from the girls and their looks. There is no stakes anywhere. I am generally not a big fan of slice of life, but I can appreciate it if I have something to look forward to. Here I have nothing to hook me on the game except for the fact that I might get to bang some of the girls in the future. And the girls are not so amazing for that to be enough.

Good game for those that look for something lighthearted with good visuals and scenes and a harem, but not for me.

I would rate that 3 1/2 if I could. It is not bad, and I believe many people would like it, but it doesn't work very well for me. There are a lot of pretty women and there's the not-so-rare issue of everyone wanting the MC for a long time and all. The quality of the images and animations is good and there's enough spicy content coming regularly.

So, why it doesn't work that well for me? In short, the game tries to do too much and often fails.
- Too many characters = too much going on and I struggle to remember who is who. There are half a dozen women interested about the MC in the prologue. I find myself skipping parts of the dialogue of less interesting girls often because the cast is big.
- The changelong at some point rights: More words than Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Yeah, that's another problem. The game is too wordy. In HP the plot and characters move much faster.

And yet, the art is good, the developer updates often and I like many of the girls. So 4/5 from me.

I've been enjoying this game. The story line though not the most captivating has given the player enough choices to keep things lively and entertaining. The ladies and graphics look good and the discipline of the MC is on par for a character that most guys wish they could be. Looking forward to future updates.

It's a generally good game. Dialogs drag out sometimes, gotta beat that dead horse into the ground, eh. But what killed this for me was the stiff, unnatural animations. Pivoting on ridiculous pivot points, parts of the body waving around that make NO sense, either aesthetically OR from a standpoint of physics. Bodies don't move that way. Combine that with the fact I find foreskins revolting, and this thing focuses on it All the Fucking Time, skipping forward to miss it just means I'm missing most of the game anyway, so I'm out. Though is was the disjointed and stiff animations that put me off more, thatt was just the skin-icing on the cake. Most will like this, I suspect. Even moreso if he can deal with the jankass animations.