VN - Ren'Py - Pale Carnations [Ch.4 Up.5] [Mutt & Jeff]

I'm hoping this game will live up to a 5 star review, because it really is extremely well made. The story is well crafted, the characters are great and the game is a blast to go through.

I sometimes find it a little unfortunate that so many the best written games on this site are ones with dark undertones. Of course there's nothing wrong with that kind of thing, but as someone who's not always in the mood to sit through that sort of story, it can be annoying, so I put this game off for a while but I wish I hadnt.

The game does a fantastic job of what it tries to do, putting you on the shoes of a reluctant young adult having to do some morally irreprehensible things. The story walks the line between him embracing the depravity and maintaning his humanity, a dynamic that is very well explored by his interactions with Ian.

Ian is probably the most important character in the story, being the trigger for the events of the story and the foil to our player character. The story goes to great lenghts to show him in both good and bad lights, while ultimately leaving it clear that he is an asshole. He's a childish, sadistic, womanizing, cheating cunt, and represents the bottom the player could reach in his new profession. But he's also an incredible friend. He loves to have you around, which is why he gets you to work with him on what he believes to be the best job ever, being both fun and extremely well paid. He can really only be seen as a decent person in the context of your relationship with him and as such, much like the girls, he becomes one of the people the player has to save.

The rest of the people, of course, are the girls involved in the story. The three carnations need saving for obvious reasons (well, 2 of them, at least), whilst Mina may of may not need to be saved from Ian, and Hana may or may not need to be saved from *spoilers*. In contrast to Ian, who needs you to humanize him, the girls need you to prevent their dehumanization, and it's that contrast that gets the moral balance going. Having to both do your job satisfactorily all the while balancing all your relationships, good and bad is what gets the story to flow.

But particuarly great is the game's usage of sex. Naturally, it's a story that could not function without it and as such, it doesn't feel like someone just tacked on porn on a game that would be otherwise devoid of it. The games frames sex in term both of the morality of your actions and of what said actions represent to each character, making the sex scenes actually compeling for the story they represent.

So with only great things to say so far, why do I only hope the game lives up to five stars? Well, because right now the game is writing itself into a corner. One can hope that's done on purpose, to continue building up tension until the great release, but the setting makes a "perfect" path seem impossible to resolve. Only one of the 3 girls can win the exhibition, getting with mina without completely destroying your relations with Ian seems unrealistic and getting with hana seems problematic storywise for a bunch of spoilery reasons. Also particularly terrifying is mother's role to play in what's to come.

These are all just inconcrete worries of course, so I'm still giving the game 5 stars,

This is one of the best adult game I've played and it's not just bald words, because I've played a lot of them, so I have enough material to compare with.

I will try not to bore you with a long review and write down the game's strongest sides, so that you can decide if you are interested in this game.

Story/Characters

Story. The plot is unusual, it wrapping around depraved sex club where girls сompeting with each other for large prize. The prize can be anything they want, because patrons of the club are rich and influential people, so they basically can help almost with every problem. Your character take major role in this club, as personal agent for each girl. who help them stay motivated and achieve their goal and main performer during events. Overall story is intriguing and contain many plot twists.

Characters. One of the main features of the every game in this genre is how well the characters are written with which we will interact along the story. And this is another strongest point of this game. All main characters have different personality, so you won't see the same behaviors and the level of writing makes you believe that they are real. Besides, there is true villains in this game, which can surprise you with their malicious and cunning mind.

5/5

Graphic/Animations

Graphic. Some people disdain Honey Select based games for it old graphic, but this game heavily moded with graphic enchanters, so the renders looks really beautiful. There is variety of girls with which you can interact, they are of different ages: milfs, middle aged, late aged (40-55) young twenty's. Mostly they all have big boobies (not ridiculous size), which is not bad, but small chest girls also deserve some love, you know
Only two main girls looks a bit like a sisters, but overall you unlikely find clones which is plague for the most games based on Honey Select.

Another strongest point of this game, it's attention to the details. All characters have facial expressions, so not only the text give you an idea of how they feel, but the picture as well. More then that, all backgrounds and even the interior of the room received attention from the developers. So when you play this game you should avert your eyes from text and see how the environment is changing during time. The level at which it is executed, in my opinion, should be an example to all developers.

Sex scenes are hot and executed very well. Usually they contain good amount of pictures and 1-2 animations . Most of scenes can surprise the player with their unusual performance.

Animations. Animations were added only recently and the amount quite few, but devs willing to work at this direction and all major scenes are animated now. They not using vanilla HS animations, but make their own which is quite commendable.

5/5

Gameplay

While I don't count visual novels as a real games, because mostly the name talk for itself - it's illustrated books, but if the they have some gameplay mechanics I give them a go.
In this game like in most vn's all gameplay consists of choices, but as I said in previous paragraphs the game has incredible writing and the choices are really matters. They not only give you different experience, but also they can shake your moral compass, so you may find yourself struggling which answer to choose. Besides choices, there is a corruption system for every character including protagonist. In the current version (Ch. 3 Update 1) only MC's corruption fully played off, but I'm sure it's just the beginning and others character will shine later. Some stats like friendship can affect gameplay even now, though. As the devs said they wanted to give player opportunity to choose easily which route they want to play, so you won't need grind anything. There is also useful characters menu where you can track progress with characters.

Usually, when I'm playing vn and the gameplay only consist in choices I'll give it 3/5 which is, lets say, normal. But here, as I said before, choices is well thought out and there is also corruption mechanic, so the combination of this things give it +1 point for the gameplay. The only downside I see for now it's main character attributes which we choose at the beginning of the game. The idea was really good, but for now it barely affect anything in the game. The devs said this attributes has been made to see some variations in scenes and during conversations, but they barely used in the game. IMO if this attributes heavily impact the gameplay, it would encourage players to make multiple playthroughs and make overall experience even more unique.

4/5

I would also like to note one minor detail that not related to the game, but although influenced my attitude towards it. The fact that the developers are active users of this community, who answer all questions and are pleasant to talk to.

And the last, but not least, this devs got my personal sympathy for their consistency of decisions. If they decided to make mother of the MC only plot character, as moral compass, so be it. They also said many times in thread, that they won't change anything in the game, that will go against their vision.
Too many devs changing their story, characters, add or get rid of kinks that were originally planned or not, so they can please crowd. I strongly disagree with such approach. In my believe, game industry, as well as literature or film industry - it's a work of art, the vision of the world by the author. And when the authors give up on their ideas for the sake of crowd, they immediately get into my blacklist. The reason is simple, I want to see personal visions of authors, not some Frankenstein monster made from different opinions, or project which was made only because it's trend now. And I don't want to be hooked by the game at first, just to dissapoint me later, because the dev decided change direction by the pressure. So that's why I really respect the devs of this game.

I'm in no position currently to write the detailed review this game deserves but suffice to say, it's in my top 3 of all time. The devs have wrung out every last drop of potential honey select offers to create something visually captivating.

When married with writing that has very few rivals in the entire industry an exceptional game is indeed what's produced. Every character has real depth, distinctive traits and motivations that make them fascinating and alluring.

All are parts of a plot that's refreshingly original when so many games instead take the safer, more trodden paths available. Truly this is something special, even the UI shows a level of detail that's praiseworthy. It immediately raised my expectations and yet the actual game still blew them away.

One of the most impressive things is the balance present in the gameplay. Choices have weight and make you pause for thought to consider what's best. However, at the same time the devs have tried hard to ensure you're not locked out of sizeable chunks of content due to making certain choices.

In closing I wish the devs significant success in the future, their efforts and talent deserve it.

This is a phenomenal game. The attention to each and everything is astounding. The game checks most all boxes in spectacular way. Beautiful unique models, a fresh and inviting story, choices that do matter but without any grind or other tedious requirements, humor, tender feelings, depravity, lots of fetishes (all erotic and not repulsive), characters with lot of substance, well laid out erotic scenes, animations, and so on.
This is definitely not another run of the mill game producing the stale matter everywhere, this is fresh and unique and freaking great at that. A new addition to one of my favourites and this site's greatest.

First, I want to say I avoided this game for quite a while. Partly because of the tags, the description, and simply just don't have enough time to play all the games I want to. But after I saw all the high amount of 5-star reviews, I was really curious. I am glad I finally played it and wish I didn't wait this long.

If I could describe this game in one word, it would be "polish." The main menu, the UI, the transitions, and so on. It has a presentation that is really nice and has its own style. The images and animations look excellent and the story has a high ratio of images per lines of dialog.

The thing that stuck out the most to me was the writing. There are very few games that are written this great and it has this touch of elegance to it. Something you rarely see. Which seems like an odd combination with the subject matter, but it works exceptionally well together.

This game is definitely not for everyone, but if you are not sensitive to certain subject matters (or tags), I highly suggest checking it out. It's one of my top games on here now. Keep up the great work Mutt & Jeff.

P.S. Hana and Mina are best girls

All right. Just finished Ch. 3 Update 1.

And call me impressed.

First, i am not a fan the s/m plays in every role. So that part i won't say anything. Good thing this game have more than that.

Graphic. Well, everyone has a taste, so if you may not style, but you still would notice hard work for the scenes. 10/10 no doubt.

Sound. Well, pretty standart, but her, not all games even have that.

Characters. All characters pretty unique and established. Each has its own story, So, they are great.

Story. At first i thought that story will be all about sex, but its more interesting that that. MC have inner conflict and damn i love those. Whats right and wrong, resisting corruption. Relathionhsip with other girls in club. his best friend, girlfriend of his best friend.

Great game and i hope it remains it.

The level of polish and attention to detail, in all regards, is incredible. Character models, degree of branching story-line/options, incredible music, and just general little touches everywhere. This sets a new standard for 3D Renpy games.

I should start this review by saying that I am not a great fan of VNs, to put it mildly. Also, photorealistic 3D renders do not work for me really when it comes to porn games, as too often I will find myself in the Uncanny Valley, not sure whether I find a depicted person attractive, ridiculous or downright repulsive.

Thus, I was pleasantly surprised with 'Pale Carnations', as despite being a VN illustrated with 'Honey Select' 3D models I quite enjoyed playing reading it. And it all due to almost perfect writing, at least as far as erotic entertainment is concerned.

It's a story of a male student, your typical geeky, relatable, bespectacled young man, who is still figuring out who he wants to be, confronted with an array of superattractive females of apparently all ages, shapes and personalities and a group of shady, powerful, lecherous old men serving as a contrasting (or complementing?) background to his masculinity. The story setup, consisting of a private club where one can indulge their 'secret' carnal desires inevitably leads to BDSM territory. There are so many things you can do wrong with piecing a hot story using these tropes, but so far (chapter 3) the authors manage to tell an engaging tale, bringing life and sort of authenticity to all but few personae dramatis, while at the same time depicting quite rough (and hot) sex scenes. There is both dick and heart put to it in almost perfect proportions. The protagonist is not simply a kinky moron, who somehow manages to enchant every woman he sees with his larger-than-average meat-rod and neither he's a complete, clueless nerd accidentally thrown into situations he's in. He's a mixture of both: full of sexual, oftentimes dark, desires and at the same time genuinely interested in women he meets, apart from their (exaggerated) boobs, asses and pretty faces.

The objects of his interest are also more than one-dimensional clones of one another. The player reader is presented with an interesting menagerie of female NPCs, though admittedly, most of these types you've seen or read about before: a cruel yet sultry, domineering, elderly woman in charge; a tragic mother figure with a shameful past; a sexually adventurous, proud, rich tart with a heart who just might end up biting off more than she can chew; a plucky, muscular (a bit too much for my taste) Amazon of a redhead who one would both enjoy submitting to or trying to break; a demure, mousy, doe-eyed darling that any sadistic sicko just loves to abuse; an East Slavic (thus enigmatic in the eyes of Westerners) woman; a naïve, lollypop-licking blonde contrasted with a rebellious, gothy brunette, the latter of course being a delicate flower inside only protecting herself by thorny exterior. The writing of these characters is so good that you simply forget it's all been done before. Sooner or later you just start rooting for one or more of them, not just enjoy sex scenes with them.

Speaking of sex scenes, these are also well-written, never becoming those boring 3-page walls of text with clinical, overdone descriptions of what's already visible on screen, instead adding a lot of psychological dynamic context to what would otherwise be just a physiological act, not that much different from eating or breathing. Seldom you'll find the predatory, animalistic nature of (hu)man sexual desire and the internal conflict with the more cultured, considerate part of the (hu)man psyche depicted better than here, only an erotic visual novel after all.

And because it is only a visual novel after all, I cannot give it a 5-star review. The limitations of this format are too fun-spoiling to me. I am aware that for a lot of people it doesn't matter and they will enjoy this game immensely. I, however, really appreciate more freedom of choice when it comes to games. Virtual novels just occupy this weird space between a novel and a plaything, like a book with carboard cut out dioramas and choose-your-adventure skippable/go-to chapters or sections. Too many things in 'Pale Carnations' just happen to the protagonist, without any meaningful input from the player reader. His days usually start with a phone call from someone telling him to bring his ass over there. You just can't refuse, say you have other business to do and instead of seeing your Mistress mentor in her office, go to a cinema with Mina to see all those B and C-class movies you both love, or learn something more about haute cuisine with Felicia over a plateful of fettucine all'Alfredo like it's 1925 and jokingly ask whether sous vide techniques could also be employed elsewhere to improve texture and taste. Nope, you have two to four choices to make every now and then, and unless you've made them and then went back to a previous save and chose another option, you never know whether they were important, story-diverging choices or just options only adding colorful variety to scenes/outcomes that will happen regardless. Quite often, you do not know what your answer to a particular question is going to bring. So with most of these diverging story types of games you need a walkthrough prepared by other players or the devs themselves to make informed choices.

But, if you're not bothered by that at all, then it's a five-star production, though there is always room to grow.

Honestly, this game is the measure by which other dirty games should be judged. The storyline is great - honestly entertaining, funny, enjoyable to read, and pulls you into the story as an active participant. That alone is a rarity in the genre. Then add in the women who have depth to them beyond cum-dumpster (though they excel at that too), and the whole sexy premise of the club, and you have a winner. Hell, even the sound choices in the game are good.

If I had to complain about this game in some way, it would be that the animations, while already quite good, sometimes lack a bit of oomph - the fucking seems to be a bit placid, despite the rough and ragged nature of the scene. Even that's getting better with the newer animations though, so really this game earns every bit of its 5/5.

I've loved this game since it first came out. I've shilled it to real life friends. I've shilled it to strangers. Every update that comes out is somehow better than the last. Hell the game has even made me self reflect a bit about myself.

Story is 10/10
Girls are 10/10
Lewds are 10/10

If you haven't played this you're missing out.

What an awesome game! I really enjoyed every minute of it!

The writing, story, and characters are in the top 3 of best games on this site!

I was a little skeptical with this being a Honey Select game but it was well worth it!

I don't really like the borderline cartoon looking character models. They all have big breasts, hips, and asses. Some different body types would have been nice.

Pale Carnations doesn't apologize for the type of game that it is and I love it! Many games of this type attempt to rationalize it and this game doesn't apologize for anything which is very refreshing!

The game is an amazing piece of work and a real joy to play! It has some of the best writing that I have ever seen in a game!

I highly recommend it!

Fantastic artwork and character development. I found myself engrossed and engaged with the story, MC's character, and the girls. It is one of the most Lewd games I've played... and spoke to some of my kinks - all good things.
I hope the developer keeps up with the outstanding work.

This has more, better content than many similar games that are up for purchase on Steam. The writing is excellent and erotic, and all the characters are different and gorgeous. This game deserves every bit of attention it gets.

great art. most of the characters written in a pretty decent way. the MC makes me wonder how he got into a game involving straight sex though. literally every scene is filled with him going "oh, my lady. me doth thinkist though is but an angels wing on the heavenly form of women' then getting smacked in the face for it. would like to see choices from the MC that aren't him in a competition with himself to get pegged but. to each their own I guess. still a 4/5.

It's got one of if not the best graphics, and the plot is both engaging and enthralling. Easily my top 3 games of all time even not completed. Graphics and plot are two components which I find extremely paramount and this game doesn't have the recognition it deserves. Props to the creators for delivering such a promising game.

Version Reviewed: Ch. 3 Update 1

This game was a welcomed surprise! I've played a lot of games on this site and it just recently hit my radar.

Pros

• Brilliant writing
• Unique and excellent story
• Interesting and unique characters with unique personalities
• Good graphics
• Good renders
• Good animation
• Good sex scenes
• Good stat and profile system
• Fun and engaging game
• Lots of content

Cons

• It isn't finished
• The animations in the first chapter are broken up with text in between the animation frames. It feels and plays oddly. I would much rather have multiple short looped animations than this method. Luckily the authors didn't stick with this method for long.
• One immersion problem is with one of the first carnation club events with the girls. The carnation girls have any means available to them to make the MC cum as quickly and often as possible. Penetration is by far the fastest route here and none of the girls use it. No where in the story or text are they forbidden from using this method. I was deeply immersed into the game until this event occurred (destroyed realism - very immersion breaking). To fix this, the authors really need to add text saying that vaginal and anal penetration are forbidden for this event! It would be a simple and easy fix.
• Females in the game all have the same basic body type - Voluptuous with huge tits, huge hips, a small waist, and a big ass. This may be appealing to teenage males but I'm an adult and like realism and variety. Their hips are so large it looks downright funny and out of place. The problem is quite pronounced.
• I wish there was more options during sex. I would have loved to suck and play with Hana's breasts the night of my birthday. Hana not wanting to go all the way was quite a shock. She is the rebel and adventurous type.
• Minor spelling errors and missing words. It is cleaner that many games I've played however. There is really no reason to have this type of problem in a game if it is reviewed and proofread at least twice. Perhaps have patrons look for and report these errors.
• The MC has all this free time between the busy Saturday and Sunday carnation events (aside from college) which just gets skipped for the most part. A few free roam events would be very welcomed here. I would love to hookup with some of the house girls at the club such as Dalia during the downtime between weekends.
• The game is a 100% story driven kinetic novel. This isn't necessarily a bad thing but giving the player more freedom helps to break up the story driven novel and allows the player to feel like they are in control instead of being dragged along the whole time.
• The perk/trait system is brilliant but rarely used (at least in my playthrough). I used my 'social butterfly' trait twice, used my 'voyeur' trait once, and never used my 'tireless' trait to my knowledge (if it was used it was never openly displayed to the player). These traits should come into play more frequently. It would greatly help the player connect with the MC they are playing. Update: After my second playthrough there are some perks/traits that are clearly unbalanced. The Social Chameleon trait has, by far, the most content and is the most useful.
• One minor gripe is the flower pattern semi-transparent text background. It makes the rendered character's skin look like it has a very light flowered tattoo pattern. I would ditch this and just use a semi-transparent dark color. Currently, anytime this background is over a character's skin it looks funny and is noticeable.

Despite the cons, the game is a near masterpiece. The writing and story are brilliant! The characters are all unique with excellent character development! This is what makes a game great! Sure, I've seen games with better visuals and animations but lacked good writing and good characters. This game has both in spades!

I rate the game 4.5 stars but since I can't I'm giving the authors the benefit of the doubt and giving it 5 stars.

As a side note, I do hope that if I can get Killian to enroll back in school that having sex with Grace will be an option. Grace kind of left the reward open if I didn't want the $5,000 she tried to bribe me with.

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

I don't like HS, but I can't pass up this game. Even using HS you can see the age difference between Mina, Rosalind, and Kathleen, and how tall and strong Veronika is compared to other female characters.

I just wanted to write to share my deep admiration for the developers work in creating this incredibly well written, beautifully rendered, AAA quality work of art.

The creativity and thought that goes into the exhibitions is truly impressive, and their ability to humanize the characters, and make you eager to see the levels of depravity plumbed (or for those people more wholesome than I, to see comeuppances delivered) is phenomenal. I can already tell I will be on the edge of my seat waiting for each update to come.

edited 1/23/22
The more this story continues, the more it ramps up everything. The art started out great, but it's still found room to improve. Some mysteries are brought to light, while others deepen...as do the characters and their motivations. To my initial glowing review, I can only add that somehow it seems the best is yet to come.


LOVE this story. Can't wait for what's next!
(edited to add: I urge everybody who can to support the developers on Patreon, quality like this is unusual and worth backing)

I am really astonished by the love, the author made here with this piece of art. The story is really very well written and fascinating, a lot of aspects between the perks, traits and choices. The renders are very nice, good atmosphere with shadows in the rendering, the music and soundeffects. I just started playing and I am really looking forward to the next chapter. Loving it!

Version Reviewed : Ch3 Update 1

It is my first review on anything in my life so there will gonna be a lot of flaws especially grammar cause i didn't live in a English speaking country. I'm gonna kick out the review by saying this game are truly amazing in every aspect, i jump on this game with a fairly high expectation and yet how this game still manages to exceed my expectation is truly awesome.
With that being said let us see the pros and cons :
Pros:

• Renders and Animations looks exquisite and really clean, the mod that the Dev used are really improving the scenery a lot and it looks super pretty in the eye. The animations are fluid and the angle that was provided is great. Easily the best looking HoneySelect both in renders and animations.
• Story is definitely one of my favorite in AVN, the story is set in our daily modern life but with a focus on high society brothel, that path makes the game unique yet still realistic that it makes the game far from just a 'slice of life' genre (no offense to people who like that genre, i'm just saying the game have unique story). The pacing was definitely on point and the event that happens in the game is both interesting and somewhat entertaining(I can't say how long is the game cause damn, time definitely flew fast when i'm playing but the amount of content that was in the game was a LOT).
• I also wanna talk about the soundtrack which is kinda rare to be talk about, the jazz soundtrack of this game really fit in and add atmosphere to the scene. Every update that this game got it makes the soundtracks keep getting better and better.
• I didn't encounter any bugs, so that's that.
• CHOICES DO MATTER
• Characters are realistic and have some kind of depth, at the same time they have a good backstory, distinct personality and an all round well written, which bring us to my favorite aspect of the game.
• The writing of this game is to put it simply 'poetic' but that's still an understatement, since my hobby is to write short stories which involved a lot of writing, it is really easy for me to notice this game Beautiful writing, TD has done a really hard work on writing this game and it clearly paid off, by that hard work, what we got is a realistic dialogue and a superbly written story and character, not to mention the poetic style of monologue in sex scene (i still remember that one time i keep looking at the text box while a naked pretty girl is in my screen xD). It is my favorite aspect of the game.
• I also have some subjective opinion for this game like my favorite music genre is jazz, my favorite tag is milf, and i really like game in a brothel settings. but i'm still very sure i would give it a 5 star even without my specific liking.

Cons:

• This game is not universal, as u see in the tag, this games contains contains stuffs that you may not like or comfortable with. Although i still highly advise you to atleast try one or two hours of this game to know if ur fine with it or not.

I think that is it lol. it takes a lot of time to think about what is bad in this game and but it only took me a second to remember how good the writing in this game is.
Conclusion:
This game is a must try for anyone even if the tags disturb you (u have the right to stop playing if u feel uncomfortable ofc), it nails every aspect of a good AVN and it has set a new bar for me on AVN games or any VN games.

Note: idk if this is allowed but i have no idea writing a review could be this much fun, this is my first ever review in my life and i wanted to get better, so any messages including criticism would be appreciated (if this is not allowed please notify me i will delete this note).