Nostalgia for the pre-Prohibition era of Patreon: a short but atmospheric experience
This game is a typical indie project from the "prehistoric era" of Patreon, a time when the rules allowed for much tougher content. The visual style of the characters and the staging of the scenes openly refer to the early works of NLT and ICSTOR. This is exactly what attracted my attention, as I like their old projects, despite their technical primitiveness by modern standards.
Technical nuances:
RPGVXAce will be required to run — the installation is simple, but the control in this engine is frankly poorly implemented. The keys cannot be reassigned, so you will have to get used to an inconvenient scheme. Fortunately, the gameplay here is primitive: you just walk around the locations and look for active points.
Graphics and music:
The environment and sprites are taken from standard RPGVXAce assets, but the character renderings in dialogues and scenes are made in DAZ3D — just like ICSTOR and NLT in their early projects. The animations are primitive: a few static frames, followed by jerks. In 2025, this looks pale, but for 2016-2017 it is a common thing.
The character of the main character, Chloe, raises questions. In the story, she's about 25, but visually she looks like a 40-year-old MILF. NLT or ICSTOR would definitely have her in the "mature women" category. There is no music or voice acting — even the background melody is missing, which was already a rarity for games of that time (NLT BGM was already present in the game).
Plot and content:
A short story about Chloe, who visits her mother for Christmas and faces a strained relationship with her stepfather and stepbrother. Why are they so toxic? The developer gives an explanation in just a few sentences, which in my opinion isn't enough.
After a short exploration of the locations, the player is offered a choice of four paths: either Chloe leaves the next day, or finds herself in bed with one of the three male characters. As a typical Patreon product until 2018, the game includes scenes of blackmail, rape, and sex with a sleeping heroine. There is not much content — 1-2 scenes per branch.
The quality is average: nothing outstanding, but not outright slag either. It is clear that the author was inspired by the works of ICSTOR, but could not repeat their level.
Result:
This is an archaic project by today's standards with simple graphics, minimalistic gameplay and boilerplate scenes. The plot is short and secondary — NLT and ICSTOR had much more detailed stories in the same period.
Key’ has two more games in the same universe, but after getting to know this version of Chloe, there was no desire to try them. If you're nostalgic for an era when indie developers could afford more hardcore content, or if you're just looking for games with the tags "rape" and "blackmail", you can try it. But it's not worth waiting for something outstanding.
This game is a typical indie project from the "prehistoric era" of Patreon, a time when the rules allowed for much tougher content. The visual style of the characters and the staging of the scenes openly refer to the early works of NLT and ICSTOR. This is exactly what attracted my attention, as I like their old projects, despite their technical primitiveness by modern standards.
Technical nuances:
RPGVXAce will be required to run — the installation is simple, but the control in this engine is frankly poorly implemented. The keys cannot be reassigned, so you will have to get used to an inconvenient scheme. Fortunately, the gameplay here is primitive: you just walk around the locations and look for active points.
Graphics and music:
The environment and sprites are taken from standard RPGVXAce assets, but the character renderings in dialogues and scenes are made in DAZ3D — just like ICSTOR and NLT in their early projects. The animations are primitive: a few static frames, followed by jerks. In 2025, this looks pale, but for 2016-2017 it is a common thing.
The character of the main character, Chloe, raises questions. In the story, she's about 25, but visually she looks like a 40-year-old MILF. NLT or ICSTOR would definitely have her in the "mature women" category. There is no music or voice acting — even the background melody is missing, which was already a rarity for games of that time (NLT BGM was already present in the game).
Plot and content:
A short story about Chloe, who visits her mother for Christmas and faces a strained relationship with her stepfather and stepbrother. Why are they so toxic? The developer gives an explanation in just a few sentences, which in my opinion isn't enough.
After a short exploration of the locations, the player is offered a choice of four paths: either Chloe leaves the next day, or finds herself in bed with one of the three male characters. As a typical Patreon product until 2018, the game includes scenes of blackmail, rape, and sex with a sleeping heroine. There is not much content — 1-2 scenes per branch.
The quality is average: nothing outstanding, but not outright slag either. It is clear that the author was inspired by the works of ICSTOR, but could not repeat their level.
Result:
This is an archaic project by today's standards with simple graphics, minimalistic gameplay and boilerplate scenes. The plot is short and secondary — NLT and ICSTOR had much more detailed stories in the same period.
Key’ has two more games in the same universe, but after getting to know this version of Chloe, there was no desire to try them. If you're nostalgic for an era when indie developers could afford more hardcore content, or if you're just looking for games with the tags "rape" and "blackmail", you can try it. But it's not worth waiting for something outstanding.