I made many conditional statements as counterpoints for some of the criticisms laid out. You are repeating some of those points in your explanation, which seems redundant. I'll try to clarify some things that didn't belong in a review though.desmosome
Thank you for taking your time to write a lenghty review.
Couple of things I would like to adress.
You want hard science - the idea of it,at least,as maybe 40% of what we call science,can actually be tested,observed, repeated(Something that Sydney loosely references at one point) - in a lighthearted AVN,where we deal with portals to other worlds operating on sexual energy?
To be fair to myslef,I do stick to physics - examples would be elevator conversation in Book One and a scene when Sydney folds the tent in Book Two.
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I actually am basing interactions with female characters on my real-life interactions with my female friends ... but I will make sure to let them know they don't behave like real people
Pointing out some of the plot holes you noticed could be very helpful,even though I am confident I stick to the rules of the world I established and confirm it with my small team,we are only humans and can miss some things.
As for the sexual tension thing,there's a horrible misconception,I believe implemented by the template used in way too many adult games,where sex becomes end all be all of a romantic relationship.Where once it finally happens it feels like the goal has been achieved and the game could very well end,often it actually does
No,that's not how it works.Relationship can very well start with physical and move from there.
My intention from the very beggining was to put the focus on getting to know the character,developing the relationship,NOT being solely focused on getting in her panties.
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No,it's not a kinetic novel.Kinetic novel does not give you any choices.It is linear,the story has a clear path,the choices in Triangle serve different purpose,than what you have been used to, but they're are there.
Some authors across all the media,often decide to make the MC a blank slate,it's ofcourse acceptable and when done well it works,but when it doesn't MC comes across as a wet noodle.
That's not Ghost, he has personality and history and a role he played in the past of the world of Triangle,while still being neutral enough to make immersion possible.
Originally there was no Game Over screen,I added it to response to some complaints from some players feeling uncomfortable about the scene.When I did I told my team someone will still complain about it and here we are
I don't like to repeat that but I work on limited hardware,with limited resourcess,I simply can't provide enough renders,in reasonable amount of time to cover multiple paths.I written a story with my limitations in mind.
Some scenes need to happen to move the plot forward and continue to make sens,both plot wise and relationship wise.That's why sometimes,some scenes are mandatory, but I will continue to give the player the choice to avoid some scenes when it's possible.
And to those limitations - we see many promising titles,that die out way too soon.Why is that?Well lack of support.
What many players seem not to understand is this is work,it requiers a lot of resources, time and money.In the meantime we have to pay our bills,we have to eat.We start crowdfunding campaigns in hopes of improving the project over time, but requieres support.
You are confusing falling in love with attraction.Nobody's in love with anybody yet.
No,he's not a "white knight",chivlary is not the same as being a "white knight".I was born in a time and place where treating women,like they're women was and is percived as normal behaviour.There is an in-game examplewhen the line is being crossed.You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.
There's barely any talking when you have sex,just moaning.I don't intend to add any more dialogues,than there are already, during sex scenes.
Thanks again.
I already stated there are many sci-fi that doesn't explain anything in scientific terms. Star Wars, for example. I said that's fine, but when combined with the unnatural ways in which the entire operation is being run, it took me out of the story.
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About the actual science, I don't mind magical devices like the sex portals or force fields generated from "vibrations and frequencies." You can handwaive things away by making up stuff or just not explaining things. This is very common when it's not a hard sci-fi story. That said, if you do offer an explanation, I would prefer if it wasn't directly contradictory to basic principles like electromagnetism. The specific example is the shrinking device and the explanation that they "removed the empty space" between molecules. That is not possible. That space exists because of the electromagnetic forces. Plus, if you shrink things small enough, you are also contending with the Strong Nuclear Force. You are making a bomb. To shrink things, you would need to remove atoms (changes the make up of the object) or shrink the atoms themselves (not possible). To your credit, this "remove empty space" explanation is precisely the one used in "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids." Ant-Man, on the other hand, uses the made up Pym Particles which is an easier pill to swallow.
You say these characters are based on real life friends. Maybe their base personality types are based on people you know. That's cool. But the actual actions and thought process of these characters certainly do not come across as believable when taken as a whole. That is partly due to the farfetched set up given to them. They are the only members of this team trying to save the world for some reason. They are expected to open the portals themselves as the first option, rather than doing it out of necessity. The boss even tells you that he has some whores ready to bang, so in reality the characters being sexual is not a requirement. Of course, if there is a need (like when the portal closed on them), they would get it done as part of the mission. It seems odd that all of them are very eager to bang the MC immediately, not for the mission, but just because they want to. If it was just casual sex, all 4 of them being fine with it is odd, but individually, it's not so crazy. However, they are all quite smitten by the MC right from the start for no discernible reason.
As for the plot holes created by harem convention... I already explained some issues with the whole set up trying to isolate the MC and these girls into being the only ones on this mission (and therefore banging). The boss Hauer is de-dicked to reassure people that he never banged the girls. He says that he can't abuse his position. Ok, that's fine. But he is fine with letting Claire who is the team leader bang her subordinates. You also had to add the line about having whores to open portals to tell players again that Hauer is a safe character. Again, that begs the question. Why can't they have a bunch of whores having sex and then just make a bunch of teams of 5 experts to study the portals much faster? Eclipse is shown to be a super powered megacorp that controls most of the city. I'm not saying that you should add non-MC sex because this game was clearly aimed at the people who don't like that stuff. But the situation created to make this a safe harem has too many illogical aspects to it. It might even have been more effective to just leave it without an explanation rather than being so on the nose about it.
Maybe sexual tension in porn games is not important to you, but I consider it to be 1 facet of a good porn plot. There needs to be a balance. Too much teasing or too little build up both suck. In this game there is none to speak of because all the girls are immediately down to fuck AND falling for the MC. Just as an example of one hypothetical scenario that immediately came to mind, I thought it would have been effective if a character was forced to have sex when the portal closed unexpectedly. A character who was originally reluctant to partake in sex and maybe even antagonistic towards the MC. The sex could be the beginning of their relationship arc.
And FINALLY, the main critique. It's a fact that all the choices don't affect the greater plot at all since none of them are tracked. You could pick ALL the wrong choices and you will still get the same exact scene and relationship progression with all the girls. The MC will basically love them regardless. Thus, it makes no real sense to pick choices that might not fit into this mold, even for just the sake of role playing. I am NOT making a complaint that sex scenes are forced or whatever. I couldn't care less. I do care about the consistency of the script though and prefer choices that have meaning. I am using the term meaningful choices very broadly here. Even with no variables, you could impart meaning to choices by making each answer be consistent with the character portrayed thus far. I did not get this impression. However, it's still very early and it remains to be seen if you can actually do a non-harem playthrough or something like that by never picking a certain girl for kissing or sexing. Let's say you always remain professional with the army girl (forgot her name) and don't pick her for sex until the end of the game. Would you, as the dev, be able to maintain this percieved relationship dynamic until the end with no variables or flags? If not, there might be a disconnect at some point when the MC is suddenly very in love with this girl.
I mean, I tried to offer counterpoints whenever I felt like it was leaning towards subjective. I didn't base the overall rating too much on any one perceived issue. Many of the points I made culminated in the overall experience though. I really did like the broad concept for the core plot where various ships getting lost in the Bermuda Triangle ended up in different worlds through the portal. I thought that was really interesting and original.
