One playthrough completed. Planning making a few different decisions in the late-game to see how other heroines turn out if picked as the main lover. Also, another playthrough to witness certain unlocked H-scenes.
Summary: Now and Then is one of the more grounded AVN experiences out there. While there are other titles featuring dystopian or apocalyptic scenarios, they tend to be more bombastic about the way they handle things. In Now and Then however, we find ourselves following the cast, a pair and then gradually a group of average “commoners”, who aren’t at the forefront of dealing with some major plot in relation to the downfall of society. Instead, we are just along for the ride, as the characters try to hunker down and survive, day by day. There isn’t really any major narrative going on, with focus instead being on the way relationships and characters themselves change/adapt over time, to the situation at hand. Now and Then also tries for a more realistic approach on how to make a harem without resorting to non-logic, magic or other shenanigans to justify said harem. N&T is a little unique in the sense that the endings are set up in a ranked harem system, with one heroine becoming the main lover.
As for the actual story that we do get, N&T is split up into 25 chapters and the epilogue. Each chapter having been whatever was added with the individual updates. Additionally, the 25 chapters can be sorted into 3 acts, based on whatever location the characters live in at the time. I would say that there are 2 chapters (16 + 17) that are mostly transitional between act 2 and 3 and doesn’t fit into either. Other things to note is that the first few chapters feel, or simply are, shorter than the rest, which also makes act 1 the shortest. Act 1 is also my personal favorite. More time is spent detailing the actual survival part of the post-apocalyptic existence, undoubtedly helped by the cast being small at that point. I came to grow attached to the apartment they lived in, and it hurt inside when they left it behind, wise as the decisions to do so might have been. Act 1 was however a bit weaker on some technical aspects and h scenes were maybe a little too scarce, even if it made sense in the context of a relationship developing realistically. The later acts had their own weaknesses. Act 2 felt very samey and boring outside one specific event. The transitional chapters felt a bit wasted in some ways and had several factors that challenged the my suspension of disbelief. Act 3 suffered from suddenly having a larger cast, with each character seemingly being mandated to have at least 1 h-scene each in each chapter, at least from chapter 21 onwards. Kinda broke the pacing of the main plot, that was otherwise experiencing a resurgence in tension and excitement following the relative boredom of act 2.
Also: Sydney >Carol=Hana>Naomi=Alice=Julie.
Pros:
- Pretty good variety in H scene music. Well, ok, not that much variety, but the 3-4 music pieces used are well suited for the job.
- H-scenes frequently had separate animations for climaxes and especially PIV entry. A nice little touch that you don’t always see.
- A simple plot that focuses on the depiction of the atmosphere and the mundane day to day events of a small group of normie survivors.
- I personally felt that all the girls brought something unique to the table and made for interesting characters.
- Some really great character development, especially Carol and Naomi change a lot and very naturally over the months that we follow them. The epilogue expands a bit further on this.
- Good grammar, decent vocabulary, no awkward or faulty English phrases that i noticed.
- The flashback “Then” moments are a nice feature and used to great effect when needed or just to flesh out the story a bit.
- In terms of animation and art assets, N&T arguably manages to make the actual penetretion part (clipping in general, distortion of the female parts, etc.) of H-scenes look as good as is possible within the constraints of the HS engine.
Mehs and hit/miss:
- Fairly spicy but natural sounding dialogue for H scenes early on. Nothing being rushed, the tension gets to really build up and each scene so far feels novel. There are a few exceptions. Carols and Naomis first time each, both having longer build-ups, and higher excitement levels and a realistic depiction of pain and blood associated with virginity. As the story progresses, this Pro becomes less significant. The H-scene dialogue gets more repetitive, the constant references to MC’s wang size becomes tedious. Same with the seemingly never failing comments about the volume of the loads he shoots. This becomes especially noticeable in the end game with the too-frequent h-scenes. So i dumb it down to MEH.
- Despite the length of N&T, number of H scenes and number of heroines, there is only really 1 threesome H-event with Naomi and 3 options for who the second girl will be.
- Sound effects during H scenes? Guess I made this note referring to the same 2 moaning/whining sound being used for the female climaxes. Fortunately you can lower the volume of these separately from the background music. Maybe it was the moans being stock Japanese voice effects that annoyed me?
- Climax animations were decent in terms of twitching, but also a bit….glitchy/stuttering. At least the transition into the following still frame was a little janky, but nothing too bad really.
- For the most part, Good, but simple animations, even early on. Boobs however are quite a bit on the floppy/liquid side, not nearly firm enough in the way the move around. Sometimes it's comical, other times straight up off-putting.
- *Sigh*, another AVN where MC is once again in the upper end of the wang size category, just like in 95% of the medium/genre. And i will never refrain from complaining about it.
- Speaking of MC being really good looking (which I put in Cons), how is he this big and muscular looking? Didn’t he have a job in marketing where he sat down in a chair most of the time? Often working from home. Never noticed any mention of him having a gym membership pre-apocalypse or doing other types of exercise, except during the school arc, and even then, only for a week or so before they moved on.
- You sometimes get the impression that sex scenes are added due to the requirement that each chapter must have pretty much one for each character, except for the first 5 chapters.
- MC rides a bicycle for 1+ hour into town, to have a conversation that is only a few sentences long, then calls it a day and heads straight back? Nah fam, you actually want to acquire some info while you are there.
- Now and Then kinda has the unofficial condition that you need to be okay with Carol and to a lesser extend Naomi, being involved romantically with them throughout the story. While I didn’t experience it myself, I have heard that the story just falls apart and the dialogue stops making any sense if you reject her (Carol) or both. Romancing them more discreetly and focusing on the girls that joins later is fortunately possible.
Cons:
- Lacking quality of lighting. Especially in early chapters, but persistent throughout. Other than some scenes where everything looks as if lit from all angles, you have hair and eye colors that can be very inconsistent. Sydney’s hair looks almost looks bioluminescently orange during well-lit scenes (sunlight).
- Starting with act 3, the tense weight of the post-apocalyptic setting kinda wafts away in the wind. The raider/looter gang is the only thing keeping things maintaining the atmosphere of of a dangerous world. A negative example would be how the narrative seemingly forgets or handwaves the food situation away. At the Marshhand house, dinner is made for weeks on end with no mentioning of establishing a food production of their own, acquiring edibles from the town or foraging/hunting/scavenging in the surrounding woodlands. Sure, there were vague mentions of a the house having a stockpile, but of what exactly is in this stockpile. 5+ characters eating daily full meals will add up eventually.
- Generally speaking, art assets looks dated, and low quality in the early chapters. The cheapness dissapates somewhat, but the age of HS1 still shows.
- Using the alleged great looks of MC as a major proponent in how relationships come to be and develop, but refraining from ever showing MC’s face and even then, rarely even his head from behind or any total or half total body shots. That’s a hard buy indeed, even though I know that HS1, especially unmodded, doesn’t have many, if any, even decently looking male character assets. An example being how 2D anime haircuts looks in 3D form, yuck.
- Didn’t really get the logic of “a couple infected are holding up in the courtyard at our apartment complex. We need to completely relocate”. I’m sure you could find other ways to exit the apartment complex. Or maybe lure them away one by one and eliminate them silently?
- As another comment I read somewhere mentioned, keeping a car that is inefficient in terms of fuel consumption, has little passenger/baggage capacity, as well as being noisy, during the apocalypse is very unwise. MC should at least have attempted to find keys for the other vehicles in the nearby parking lots or parking cellar. That, or attempt to hotwire. It was rather obvious that they held onto the gas guzzler because it was going to be a plot device. Which is ok I guess, but MC not really trying to find a better alternative was BS.
- Just a lacking sense of logic at times. Not getting dressed when woken up by the infected nearby? Why expose yourself like that? Shooting a gun inside a hallway of an apartment complex shouldn’t alert any infected outside to your exact location. It feels like the infected have the hearing of the aliens from that survival horror movie. Later (school alleyway), it is speculated that the infecteds hearing ability decays rapidly past a certain point after infection. Contradictory much.
- This might tie in a little bit with the barrage of H-scenes in the endgame, but MC started to feeling increasingly like your generic AVN whiteknight gary stu. The sappier dialogue leading up to most H-scenes was a key part of this. It felt like he started to get laid way more than I myself wanted him to. I lost touch with him much the same way I did in another AVN I reviewed a while ago.
Still a 4/5 because it is able to keep a simple narrative going and we actually get to see the end as this is a finished title. Solid characters and character developement as well. Only 2 major gripes (transition chapters and MC turning whiteknight). The other weaknesses can be overlooked as long as you don't experience them back to back.