VN - Ren'Py - Completed - Now & Then [v1.00.0] [ILSProductions]

Reviewing V0.26.0

Short Version: Excellent game under almost every aspect(for a VN of course), glad to played it, will surely replay it in the future ^_^



The Good

- The Story is simple and it works, no convoluted plot-lines that create holes in the story itself, some may say it's a bit of cliché but again it just...works, why adding random stuff when the main point of the story is telling...a story...that makes sense XD? I won't spoil it but it's cliché but it works(and i'm repeating myself XDXD)

- The Graphic is good, i've nothing to say about it, i enjoy it(RIP Sydney's hairstyle in the epilogue, her first hairstyle was better than what she has in the ending XDXD)

- Consider this an addendum to the story-point: The dialogues just work, i mean if you have a good story the dialogues tend to make sense and viceversa, i just wanted to mention the dialogues

- Related to the story(more or less directly) i like how the developer used flashbacks here, which is something impressive because it's rare that i compliment a story or a movie (or anything with flashbacks) for their flashbacks XD

- There are romances and i'm very fond of them and i'm glad we don't have tons of romances, it would have prolonged the game and ruined it.

The Annoying

- (Nitpicking) The ending...well there are tons of sex-scenes which are enjoyable but at the same time the bad way of unexpected but yes i would have loved like one or two sex-scenes but i hoped that the epilogue would have focused a bit more on the life of the characters now that they've settled down, maybe with a 10years time-skip...let me phrase it in another way: i wished we got some "described and narrated" version of "and they lived happily ever after" you know something about the life of the characters after several years of peace

- (Nitpicky) the sound of the orgasms...it's ear-piercing, you can tell me to just mute the sound and i did...and i discovered that while i hate that "Kiiiiiaauhuh" it's also a necessary evil because without it the scene doesn't feel completed XD

The Bad

- Nothing really...Maybe the fact that you must replay the game a second time because the first run unlocks extra scenes...which if you're a "one-run only" kind of person can be annoying...but at the same time if you plan to replay the game in the future(like i will) is also a good thing because you get a "surprise"

Conclusion

Oh boy, this one felt like a journey! i'm going to miss waiting for the releases of this game, i'm going to miss Carol and MC(and the other characters too but Carol and MC the most u.u). It's one nice experience, despite the drama(which i usually dislike) of zombies and bandits, this one is being one of my favourite and relaxing VN so far, weird how i felt at peace...in a story about ambushes of zombies and raiders even during the moment of stress(in the game). I applaud Kinderfeld for his work, seriously thank you for your hard work, congratulations for completing it, i'm eager to explore your next project(if you have one) and i wish you well ^_^ Thanks T_T <3

A wonderful game the story grabs you and never lets go until the end. i hope the dev comes back to this world down the road maybe 10 to 18 years in the future. To see how the cast is doing and how the world is rebuilding.

Sad it's over. Best game on this platform. Loved it entirely.
Developer had regular updates with a good length.
Great balance of story and lewd scenes with cliff hangers every episode.
Can't wait to see what comes next.

Phenomenal story, characters, sex scenes, character growth, and ending to a great game. Some of you might be put off by the outdated honeyselect style graphics after being spoiled by many of the amazing Daz renders some other games have and with new honeyselect assets recently but let me assure you the story will pull you in and you will be unable to notice and will come to appreciate the charm.

Boring cliche with ugly renders, from light to camera angles.
Tried to force myself to play the entire game but theres no way I keep after about chapter 12, I simply dont enjoy this VN

Story: 5/10
Dialogues: 4/10
Characters: 4/10
Graphics: 2/10
Animation: 5/10

very compelling story with lots of detail into the character backgrounds of basically everyone involved... sometimes I do wish that the game would give some harder choices (pick either A or B at the expense of the other) to give some tension, but I love the game overall 5/5

Good story, good visuals, and zombies... I mean the afterworld is always better with zombies and cannibals. Really enjoyed the decisions actually affecting storylines and also Julie's abs. Top 10 game for me.

It's a good one. Renders look good, story is solid (few typo's here and there, but eh), the animations are good, not just a few frames on loop like some ren'py games, the characters are fleshed out and interesting for the most part. It's a solid game, if it catches your interest give it a shot. Interested to see where it goes.

A slow start-up that leads to an engrossing narrative. the setting is typical but the plot stayed very interesting. the route choices that felt most natural to me typically seemed like the only real choice in a given scenario, but even seemingly-natural decisions often led to plot twists.

occasional short-comings with a scene's graphical look were a hilarious distraction, but the general use of facial expressions etc. felt pretty good for the visual medium. even the music helped convey the harsh and somber reality of the story.

discovering each new personal relationship felt very organic, even with the genre-typical use of semen-as-panacea. the efficient use of the "Now/Then" flashback sequences give well-nuanced insight to the characters and situation deeper without slowing the action.

this is real adult gaming: sex portrayed as part of life, in abundance.

I'm gonna keep this short, otherwise this would be a huge wall of text that would need me to fill 3 whole posts. Additionally, people grade this game differently. So I will tell you what I go for and why I like it.

#1: The narrative!
The inspirations this story draws on is unmistakable and is some very good source material. I have the utmost respect for the writer's choices and couldn't have done it better myself. I love the focus on the psychological aspects of a post-apoc society and it's effects on the human mind and cohesion.
#2: The plot!
I just commented the story right? True. But the overarching plot of this is something we all can relate would be important to cover in a crisis. Physiological, safety, belonging and love needs are the main themes here. Food, water and good health; shelter from the elements and dangers; the sense of belonging, being a part of a small or large group and the feelings of acceptance, respect and love as well as intimacy that we derive from them. Maslow would be proud. Perfect execution!
#3: The characters!
I don't care for the models, I don't care for the graphics. The characters are what make this game the diamond it is. The amount of time, research and development that went into making the characters is absolutely insane. Period! And the bonding that is done with them is amazing. Mad skills!
#4: The setting!
The scenes couldn't be depicting this story, the characters and the narrative any better. It's not a thriller, but it isn't a light hearted and easy take on survival either. The creator is really good at inducing the feeling of hopelessness and danger, which is greatly contrasted by the love the characters share with each other.
#5: The skill!
This creator, yes creator, not just developer, made something unique with the limited assets he had from the HS studio and the mod base. I generally disliked HS games because they felt like a rip-off, but this title made me give such games another chance. That, and the fact that the characters are charming and absolutely amazing for HS models. Kudos!

#Verdict: TL;DR: AMAZING GAME WITH AMAZING CHARACTERS AND A GREAT PLOT!

Review as of v0.24.0

Damn, I've been sleeping on this one. I'm not a fan of honey select at all but I enjoyed this immensely. The story is pretty compelling and there's a nice pace to it, with a good balance of sex and story. Although I did find myself skipping some of the sex scenes to find out what happens next in some of the later chapters.

The sex scenes themselves are surprisingly good, with some decent animations and breast physics. And though I don't find honey select models all that attractive, I did find the images—in combination with the narrative—to be fairly erotic.

The balance of horror and smut is well-managed, with the story going dark in some parts, but not dark enough to kill any arousal. There's a great atmosphere in general, thanks in part to some good music and sound effects. The visuals help in that regard too; the environments are well-selected and fit nicely with the story.

The characters are well-defined and likeable, especially the MC, whose musings about the "old world" I found to be pretty entertaining. There's a good variation between the girls, both in terms of personality and body type, and I didn't find I was put off by any of them, which is pretty rare for me.

In short, this is an entertaining zombie apocalypse story that you should play if you are a fan of the genre. If you're hesitant about the graphics, give it a chance anyway, it may surprise you.

Story it's not wow it start interesting but on long playing time you will get bored nothing interesting happens between this 3 characters after the sex all it feel flat I don't resist more than 10 chapters, dunno how so many people like this one maybe they fake account with fake rating... this game is definitely not for 5/5.

Art or graphic is poor low quality with poor details and bad lighting every scene is dark with no light it look bad

This is by far the best game I've played in a long time.
The story is well written, captivating and make sense, the characters development is the best that I've seen. It's not silly and it's not sex all the time, and it really gives you control over your actions at all times.
I haven't got to chapter 24 yet but I'm close and I'm very excited to see what comes next.
I'll definitely give my support on Patreon to keep this project going.

v 0.24.0
If you like Zombie apocalypse give it a try won't regret
Good zombie apocalypse story
decent sex seens: bad early on and get progressively better to good

So Its a good game and while at the beginning the modules really didn't look great all the time and the jizz looked like day old dried cream, and I really felt like watching "reading" sex seens was a chore they kept improving and by the time Hana is introduced I's say that got pretty good
so while not the best fapping material its a good game and deserves the rating just solely based on the quality improvements to the renders

This game is really fucking good! You won't regret playing it
- writing (dialogue and grammar) is better than 99% of the games on this site
- plot never gets boring and pacing is good
- sexy scenes are hot as fuck
- characters are fleshed out and MC actually takes care of the girls; he is not a retarded teenager trying to rape his family in their sleep

Oh yeah and there is a massive amount of content, like 24 chapters as of now and each of them makes significant progress on the characters' relations or towards the story O:

Playing on v0.23.0

When I first went into this game, I was not expecting to become as invested into it as I have. I thought to myself, "Oh boy, another post-apocalyptic story where some dude with the charisma of a walrus somehow has things go his way and forms a harem of underage girls, whooooooo." But man, color me impressed and glad that I was extremely wrong.

I'll freely admit, this game's premise is nothing new. Zombie virus infects world, society as we know it crumbles, characters must learn to change and survive, yada yada, you've heard that song and dance before. Where this game shines and what hooked me in the first place is said characters. Jack/MC/whatever you name him is very much his own person, and I liken him to Geralt in that the player can influence where some of his decisions go, but they can't affect/change his core character. What you can do is affect your relationships to other people though said choices, and these decisions actually have a new game+ feature of sorts, where unlocking a characters route actually unlocks bonus content that you can activate on a new playthough from then on. This is a really good idea, as it not only improves repeated playthroughs, but gives even more variety to spice them up. Fair warning, you can miss characters routes in this game. I found that it made the story more engaging, so I reccommend that you play without worrying too much about girls stats and whether they're high or not. Just make what decisions you think are right and stick with them, as the story feels much more interesting that way. There's always next time!

Besides the aforementioned variation, this game just has a lot of content. At first I thought that since the game was labeled as being in v.23 that it'd only be a fifth of the way finished, going by the standard 0.0 to 1.0 formula. But that was a ruse, as the number actually symbolizes the number of chapters that the game has, and a chapter can take you anywhere from 1-2 hours to finish,. Your mileage may vary, but that's about how long I found it took me to finish them.

Overall, I really, really recommend this game to anyone interested in harem shenanigans ( if you so choose), pseudo-incest ( as Carol is Jack/MC's adopted daughter) and well-written dialogue and characters/scenarios. I had hours and hours of good times with this game, and I hope you do too. My thanks to ILS Productions for giving us this game, and I really recommend going to their criminally underfunded Patreon, and if you enjoy this game in the slightest, showing your support to them.

The story is not great, and it happen in a cliche american zombie apocalypse setting.
The writing is descent and the characters are not very deep, but good enough.
There is a main girl and unfortunately, you are forced to her, you can't choose to be a good father or to exclusively romance another character. It is an incestuous relationship, but you are not blood related.
The sex scenes are numerous and they are animated, but this is Honey Select's animations, and the breasts physics is so much exagerated that it become ridiculous.

Honestly, not a big fan of HS... like at all. But...

Holy shit! Didn't care in the least! The writing is top notch, completely distracting from the HS feel. The characters, all of them, felt like they were real people, giving an excellent view into their lives.

Also, not a fan of flashbacks. But, Kinderfeld did it in a way that made the game cohesive, revealing what you needed to know about a specific character in a given situation. I'm not a bad writer, but I would definitely benefit from a wealth of their ability.

Like I said at the beginning, Honey Select, so the visuals aren't the best. But, also as I said earlier, the writing makes up for, and then some, the renders.

It's a bit slow burn, but totally worth it if you want to know the characters before they bone/get boned. The sex scenes are well done with incredible detail, long loops with no stutter. If only more devs paid this much attention to their animations.

The characters have a real feel to them. They are vulnerable, emotional, and weak or strong depending on the situation. I think I probably played 4-5 hours in my first night, just to see (or feel) how the characters responded to different situations presented to them. I had to remind myself of the time several times throughout the night/early morning, but my response was always 'Just 5 more minutes...', which ended up being at least 30+ minutes later.

TL;DR
Try it if you're ok with a slow burn VN. If you're not, then just skip through the text. I wouldn't advise it, but to each their own. Also, don't let HS keep you from trying this one. I would say 'diamond in the rough,' if that diamond hadn't already been polished to a shine. Totally worth the time invested.

Give it a go, you won't be sorry.

just got to chapter 9, and till now its really been nice.
Carol is a nice character, Naomi isnt really clear about what will exactly happen but maybe because im not that far into the story yet.
Love the game

Now and Then had me playing hours at a time. The differentiating dialogue that changes based on several different previous choices, small or large, makes me really appreciate the developer of the game. Animations are great, and the characters are fleshed out well. I'm definitely looking forward to more!