Ren'Py - Completed - Panacea [v0.802 Public] [BC]

I was surprised by how good this visual novel was, I thought I was getting an average VN but damn, the story is very good and the characters are very interesting, the characters really feel like characters, and I mean they have consistent personalities instead of just being normal and then horny one second later and things make sense unlike some other VN. probably one of the best or the best VN I played

For a start must say I really like most of the game. The author managed to find this good middle road bitween "too porny" and "too story heavy." Now to my points.

The story itself while nothing super amazing, work for this game and lets it flow forward which I really appreciate. Too many games story kinda just sits at one place and then suddenly ends.
My only complain, though big one, is that the endings feels like book where someone ripped out two last chapters before the epilogue.
The game despite its numerous sexual encounters never lets you establish deeper relationship with anyone.
There are even characters that before ending looks like having no sexual interest towards MC at all, and when the game suddenly announces your "happily ever after" its really weird and out of nowhere.

Graphic wise I would say at the start we sits somewhere around average and at the end above average.
It looks like that author takes later in the development more time with lighting and rendering, as the scenes looks much smoother than when we first enter the game.
At the end we are probably hitting the limit of what can you achieve with Daz.

Gameplay is a weird one. The author has implemented sandbox system but in a same time almost never uses it. The game is very linear and apart from occasional side story it never gives you freedom that you would expect from sandbox game.
For example the game gives you option to earn money but there is literally nothing to spend it on.
There is a time mechanic but again no event is tight to it.
It whole feels like as if the author wanted to make sandbox game and after setting everything up he/she changed his mind and proceed in a VN direction.

If it wasn't for the out of nowhere hot needle endings,
I would go for 4 stars, but I think this bread needed few more minutes in an oven.
3/5.

Panacea! - A female protagonist lesbian game about a young woman who is confronted with a cure for cancer.

I think the game is very open with exploring kinks, most of which I really enjoyed. You also have good control over which kinks you want to engage in, and the moral system isn't super obvious (It's mostly core decisions that a reasonable mind can forsee the consequences of), but also not at all convoluted.

That's the Pros.

The major Con in my mind is that the story is a bit flat and the sex scenes hunt one another.

The game starts out as a free roam city environment where you can decide which part of the story you want to do. I did all the side stories when they were available, and from then on, everything was linear - Which I didn't mind, but it bothers me that the gameplay wasn't a straight up visual novel to begin with. No need to let me choose locations if they are empty except for one specific one every time.

The scenes lead into each other with relative ease, the story is coherent and fun to read, however the sex scenes are just tacked on at the end. "Hey, here I am administering a miracle cure for cancer, and now that I injected it in your ass, and you have redressed and we're almost done, let me stop you and tell you I want to fuck you." - There is chemistry in the scenes but the romance just doesn't roll smooth enough for my taste.

That leads into my other major con, the story. The second I saw Doctor Shaw, It was really obvious, considering how CVD is made. There were rarely any surprises with good and evil characters and unless I made all the right choices, my choices barely mattered in the long run. (Maybe I should've tried to submit to Trayi for once).

What confuses me and makes rating this game so hard is, the fact that the story was KINDA flat but had A LOT of secrets kept me playing, kept me hooked, kept me interested all the way through to the end. It was a lot of fun - but it was KINDA unsexy. My major gripe is that I could never immerse myself fully, and could never enjoy the sometimes really hot sex scenes fully.

Oh, and
So yeah, BeCe, I loved your game, and I hope you have a long journey of improvement ahead of you, so your next couple games will be the absolute amazing games they could be, and you get the recognition you deserve. There's a LOT of good in here!

EDIT: TL/DR:

The Good:
Great reveal pacing, not too many lore dumps,
subtle story telling
great kink variety
good kink control

The Bad:
Poor romance scenes
little depth of story

Keep at it, but PLEASE take your time to set up romantic scenes. Give it some time for seduction, or if you want hard and fast like with Butch, take your time to describe the moments to orgasm.

I read through these reviews and I scratch my head as to why there are so many negative ratings.

Panacea is a story about a young woman who is saved from a terminal illness by a revolutionary drug. What follows is a story of lies, betrayal and deception. Panacea is an original story that is a very welcomed break from the typical tropes that we see all of the time. I found the Female Protagonist and largely female cast to be just what I needed.

The story as I said is original and the premise is compelling. It seems to point to the issue of "What would a woman do for beauty and vitality"? Each character is well thought out and the interactions from character to character work well.

Panacea isn't really a visual masterpiece. the renders are good but not great. I do not really feel though that this is really an issue to hurt the game. What the lower resolution renders have done is reduce the overall download size which is a plus for players with slower internet connections.

If you are looking for a story with an original premise, Panacea is perfect. It has the right balance of story, character building and all of the elements that make up a great adult VN. Keep an open mind, dive into Panacea and see for yourself. Do not buy into all of the negative reviews.

Between a lack of player agenda & unlikable, one-dimensional characters all that could save this game are a good story (which makes it less apparent and appalling that the player has little control even over some of the sexual encounters) and amazing renders for the lewd parts.

Sadly, the story is about as weird and flat as the characters and the renders, while decent, aren't groundbreaking either.

An average game for me is 3 stars, not 5, so this has to be rated below 3.

Since the idea and initial premise of the game (minus the nonsensical, forced sex with a character that had exactly 0 chemistry with the protagonist at that point and basically rapes them, which the game refuses to acknowledge) aren't bad, the renders are okay and 1 or 2 of the characters potentially could have been intriguing I give this game 2 stars.

Honestly, though, it's scratching on the 1 star rating for being tasteless and just pretty subpar.

I am really surprised this does not have a higher rating.
It could be partly due to more to the much larger male member base on here.

For myself though, I love this VN. As a bi woman, I enjoy being able to play a lesbian female MC in games and the protagonist in this one is so likeable.
She has grit, guts and playing her as a domme is rewarding to see when she takes no shit and looks after those she cares about - the scene where she turns the tables on her sisters tormentor is so fucking awesome.

The renders are fine and look more attractive than quite a few I've seen in games on here. The story is compelling enough to hold your interest and makes me want to find out more of the plotline.

I normally dislike sandbox games pretty badly...and while this does have that structure, the lack of any grinding and a quest log, makes it very easy to continue the story.

I think we need more lesbian MC themed games on here among the sea of male orientated titles. Thank you dev for giving us a female themed game.

Overall I really enjoyed this and will be keeping an eye out for future updates.

[Rev @ Panacea [v0.74 Public]

Art's fine, girls are nice looking and tits are present.

Writing is bad. Scenario's a neat idea but narrative pacing is nonsensical and not at all helped by poor signposting, random logic leaps and overreliance on an attempt to ape sandbox games. Characterization is fine.

Porn was shockingly vanilla for a lesbian-styled character. Too much pee.

Gameplay is the other half of the writing issue; just as nothing in the plot makes sense nor has any weight, so does the progression stumble. The UI seems to wish it were nonlinear or sandbox, but all the events gate each other weirdly and trigger at the oddest times. Occasionally I'd click a place to advance on character's story only to have the event take a couple left turns to focus on another completely uninvolved and often never-before-mentioned person.

TLDR: That right thar's a mess ye got.

Review v0.74

Story starts off okay, but it just gets less interesting and boring as it goes on.

Renders are alright and the sex scenes are alright. Probably the best thing about this game.

The worst part of the game are the characters. Most of them are annoying or in-your-face, and it makes the game unenjoyable.

Very enjoyable game. Good art, good visuals, good fetishes. The only complaint I'd have is a lack of sound, and the free roam feeling a tad content-lite. A few random events when visiting various locations would be a good addition.

I’ve been a supporter (albeit at a low level) ever since the first game and while I was initially a bit concerned about the sandbox aspects, thankfully BC really has this under control and doesn't do anything that could reduce the enjoyment of the game.
The updates are relatively small, but come along often and in regular intervals.
This is a dev you definitely know is working on his game with not only passion, but also with a creed and drive.

There is a possibility of missing some content, depending on your choices, though I have to say, for me, it isn't a problem at all, since I only miss stuff I'm not really interested in anyway.

I'm curious to see where this one goes, whether there will be deeper relationships at some point, or if the MC will just continue to sleep around, or whether we will get a positive harem ending, but I would probably be fine with anything.

In all fairness, this is a female protagonist game, with body transformation, though you can get rid of content you personally don't like, IF you really have a problem with that kind of stuff, this probably isn't for you.

The graphics are fine, the writing is too, I like most characters and the porn is hot, there really isn't much else you could want from a game.
Meaning no disrespect to BC, whom I cherish and whose work I really enjoy, this might not rank up among my top five games, but it also hasn't anything negative related to it, which is definitely a thing to make it stand out and makes it something special for me.

Panacea is a game worth playing if you are a person who can enjoy the journey without worrying about an ending. The fact is, most of the material through the first third of the game is pretty solid, with good renders and scenes, and some fun body mod action, exploring a good amount of kinks.

Unfortunately, the first third of the story is pretty much all there is. Without going into spoilers, at a certain point in the story a 'larger' and actually pretty interesting conspiracy plot will be alluded to...and then a few updates later, it will be completely resolved...super easy. Barely an inconvenience!

A lot of the fun characters you meet...you will never see again...and the less said about the endings the better. To call them rushed and unsatisfactory is ennobling them.

It is of course up to a developer when they are no longer interested in working on a project, and perhaps a rushed ending is superior to an abandoned tag...but it's always a shame to see a game that had so much promise and potential leave so much of it unrealized.

I hope the additional endings and side stories will help ameliorate some of these issues...and if they do I will adjust my rating accordingly...but if the initial endings are anything to go by, I'm not going to count on it.

In the end my recommendation is to play the game, there are some fun individual scenes...but don't worry about the plot.

This is now one of my favorite games on this site.

After playing the first game BC (the dev) made, i wasnt expecting much but dayum, was i surprised by Panacea.

I really enjoyed the story, sad to see it end tho. There is more content to be release for the rest of the characters but the main story and 2 endings are done. I cant say i liked the 2 endings here but they werent THAT bad and im curious to see the rest of them when they get released.

I wished the whole Vampirism thing was explored more but sadly it was only mentioned towards the end even tho i knew 2 of the people you interact with were vampires from way earlier in the game, nothing was done with it. (or i just missed it somehow)

The MC is awesome, enough said.

Renders, models, etc, pretty good.

There are no animations but i dont care and this applies to all other games, i dont mind having animations but im fine without them as well, especially when the story, characters are good.

There is plenty of lewd content and its mostly well done

I highly recommend this game to anyone.
I had an awesome time with this. Sad its over

Pros:

• Decent renders
• Good story
• Decent characters with actual personalities and stories

Cons:

• The endings

up until 0.5-6 this was easily a 5 star for me but after that a lot of the story and progression felt pointless for the endings as they feel really shallow and rushed. Got the same feels as the final season of GOT. I understand that writing about 6 different endings with different characters with tons of variables for each ending is very difficult for one person but that is why it felt that at the end the dev just got tired and wanted to finish this game and move on to the next. To anyone who's come this deep into the reviews now, i do recommend actually playing the game, cause it's actually fun and interesting at a lot of places. But beware of the end cause it will feel like a cop out.

It's kind of odd to find myself saying this, but I've never gone through an AVN and wanted to feel so close to a mc, but felt so unable to get close, almost shut out, before. Try as I might I just cannot get a sense of who and what Liv is as a person and, thus, any of the other characters of the story either. It seems so tightly focused on the female/lesbian point of view that I, as a heterosexual male, quite understandably, of course, cannot relate at all. I'm not mystified as to why I feel this way, I'm just unavoidably frustrated by it.

That preamble might easily imply that I absolutely hate this story and consign it to the failed experience drawer in my lifing (spelling as intended) cabinet. In fact though, as the 5 star rating shows, I consider this experience to be (because I'm not done with Panacea yet) quite the opposite.

The story is great, the underlying circumstance (experimental treatment) is interesting, refreshing and quite fascinating. Irrespective of her sexual inclination, Liv, the leading lady, is not only breathtakingly gorgeous, but also smart, self-assured, open-minded and wholly likeable. Based on my own personal experience, she certainly does feel really very well observed in the context of real life.

I have, in my life, been socially and emotionally acquainted with lesbian girls (not sexually, of course, though some of them really are stunning) so I am not completely out of my depth here. I am just understandably unable to observe through female, lesbian eyes and this aspect, is so well handled here that my immersion is to a great extent blocked and my overall experience detached and externalized.

Nevertheless, I truly enjoy the story and the characters, but only as far as I am able. I wish it could have been further, but this obstacle is solely the fault of circumstance and not, in any way, the creator's writing, characterizations or portrayals.

Anyway, good luck for the future BC. I wish you all the success, because to me you certainly merit it. This is a great AVN of which I hope and expect you to be, suitably proud.

Thanks a bunch for sharing the pleasure and the challenge that your talent and dedication to your craft provides and will hopefully continue to provide to your enthused and devoted audience, myself included.

It's been a minute since I reviewed anything (Slim pickin's) But here i go. As of v0.7. This game is Fine. With a capital "F." So better than alright, not quite great, maybe a little better than good. The BIGGEST issue I have with this so the fake sandbox. There is absolutely no reason this can't just be a linear VN/KN. Especially seeing as the only real choices are what content you want to see. There's an option to get a job and earn money but you don't spend money or do anything at the job. You can explore the city and rooms but there's nothing to do. The only and I mean ONLY thing you can do is take a shower. I'm fairly certain the Dev watched a certain series of tutorials for RenPy and the guy goes on and on about setting up sandbox games with no content. Which is par for the games the guy making the tutorials gave up on. But I digress.

The story starts as you, the MC, ironically named Liv, in the hospital with Leukemia. And just as everyone gives up on remission, shady Big Pharma comes in to offer a cure. You graciously accept and you miraculously get better and have to live in a special home with others taking the drug. It's named CVD, wonder where that came from, by the way. And it does everything and anything because it's programmable. Immediately everyone in your immediate family makes you feel guilty for having cancer. Which is actually the dumbest thing I've ever seen. And no context was given on the type of person the character was before the hospital. So it's impossible to have any thoughts on how the characters would be acting in these situations.

Anyway they give you the pretense of monitoring you after getting the doses and you interact with your roomates. A cam girl, an obese woman, and a man transitioning into a woman. Needless to say this game focuses on a transformation fetish not mainly a trans one. That's whatever to me. Not a plus or a minus, really. The drug works for you best and eventually you have control over it. Obviously Big Pharma is up to no good and the people that want to stop it contact you and it takes its true form; an erotic mystery novel.

I'll be honest I saw a lot of the twists coming, the writing has the subtlety of being hit with a brick. But it's written better than 90% of the smut that's on here. So a foam brick we'll say. The sex scenes were okay, but you never feel attached to any of the characters. But if you like stories along with the sex this is better than the usual "Yep... That's me, I just got out of college and moving back in with my NOTmom, NOTsisters, and other NOTfamily. Suddenly I'm sexually attracted to them and so are they." This story has reason to everything. At least more than usual. I'd rate it higher if the sandbox wasn't there and it didn't feel like they were trying to swap the girls out constantly for no discernable reason.

This one is for sure one that I'll want to finish once it has the COMPLETED tag. My biggest thing is why is Feet Stuffs the most prominent optional fetish outside of watersports? It's not my thing at all, but it's much less polarizing than some of the other content.

The game is "fine", but could have been better.

It has sandbox controls that are superfluous, because only at the very start is there any kind of agency. Afterwards, you're just checking the handy guide for what is coming next, and then going there. It's decently coded, and had it actually been a sandbox game, would have been great addition.
The game also pretty much abandons the need for money, stamina, and checking what time of the day it is. They should just remove the sandbox component.

And the story is slightly bonkers. It starts a lot of, essentially, spy drama and different kinds of "Who can you trust" nonsense, but not in a very good way. It's also quick to change narrative around characters for some reason. The old best friend, comes back into the characters life, in a very fun, touching moment, but then the narrative changes, and she's a villain all of a sudden.

And the models are... okay. They aren't good, they could be a lot better. Alot of the same stock models seen in other games, touched up by a hand that is new at it. Which is fine. Gotta start somewhere, but it just means you can't really say "At least the renders are nice". Because they aren't.

Plus, a whole lot of fetish content, with various characters, but that's more a subjective thing. Some of it I was into, some I wasn't. You do you. You might like it.

And all of this is a bit of a shame. I actually like most of the characters, even if some of them turn on a dime. The dialogue is usually quite good, but it really is the only objectively good thing about it. The rest is just not good, and just barely "fine".

[0.63]

You see almost every person nude when you first meet them, leaving you with no feelings of rewards and then they fucked. The game is a heavily lesbian game (witch can be fine) with a bunch of people that don't know if they want a dick or not.

it says it is a sandbox but plays like a VN.

The models and UI looks good and i did not have any bugs.

The prologue is good and unique besides losing a bit of track of who i was cause of the MC change. However the story is pointless since its just "Then they fucked" type of story.

so its 5 minutes in the game and my character raped by a lesbian and i have no options so you lost me, if you gonna make a game always let the players choose who they wanna fuck if you wont then just call it a kinetic novel

there is a pointless sandbox that doesnt serve anything
models are meh, seen better, seen worse
story is boring



no need to play this

Review on v0.54. TLDR at the end.

Intro

I really like this game quite a lot. I've been following the updates for quite some time now but I've been hesitant on writing a review because it's hard for me to put into words exactly what it is that intrigues me so. Thus with my thoughts in disarray, I'll try to write a somewhat cohesive review by debasing myself once again to the formulaic pro-con structure.

Cons

So let's dive into it with the negative aspects of the game which is honestly the more boring part of this review; most of the points that I'll mention have already been chewed out in great detail in other reviews so I'll try and keep this relatively concise.

Useless Sandbox
The dev decided to structure this game into a sandbox format but the gameplay is actually extremely linear. As far as I can tell, they probably had something more akin to your typical sandbox game in mind when first designing the game to possibly have a broader appeal but decided to pretty much abandon any sort of use that you can get from the sandbox structure in later updates because it got in the way of their preferred way of linear storytelling so that any and all player freedom now feels very extraneous.

Bogus Sci-Fi
The science fiction in here doesn't make any sense, the body transformations and all that. Maybe go for magic and fantasy in this instance instead of impossible sci-fi.


And that's basically it. Those are my somewhat grudging cons that I only included because I understand why people might see them as "objective" points to criticize. They never bothered me too much though. The sandbox is useless but doesn't really stand in the way of the storytelling and the bogus sci-fi is... well what do you want? It's a fun body-transformation porn game, we all know that all of this is impossible, that's why we like to live out these fantasies in the animated world where they can come to life.

I debated putting in "people are too horny and there seem to only exist lesbian women in this world" as another con but it falls into the same useless category of whining about a lack of realism in a porn game. So that's the last time I'll mention "realism" in this review because I really do think it's pointless.


Pros

Now come all the reasons for my high rating which took me a lot of effort to put into words.

Characters
I'll start with this point because it feels like possibly the most important one for me. The characters are all, in my opinion, very well written.
It is one of these rare games where the main character, Olivia, is actually my favourite character. She has a really unique personality and is deeply relatable; she's intelligent and charismatic, full of confidence and yet humble when she needs to be. She knows the importance of keeping a cool head without abandoning her principles and considering the consequences of her actions.
But the dev doesn't misstep with any of the other characters either, even those that get relatively little screen time are shown to all be very unique, with their own motivations and desires and personalities and none of them end up feeling like chlichés.
This is quite an achievement for a porn game like this and I'm really impressed how much the dev managed to make me care for all of these characters.

Plot
While it takes a while to get going, the dev really managed to put in a very intriguing main plotline. Our heroine continues to get pulled to two very different sides of a conflict about an experimental pharmaceutical without being able to make an obvious choice.
It's clear to me that both sides have sort of selfish motivations but also good arguments and reasons for defending their position which is just the mark of a great writer; to be able to not debase the storyline to a simplistic good vs. evil conflict. I'm really intrigued to see where the plot is headed and whether or not Liv will come to regret the choice that she will, in the end, be inevitably forced to make.

Sexual Content
The variation, and often absurdity, of the sexual content in this game is, in my opinion, another very big point in its favour. The developer really isn't shy in using their introduced possibilities of body transformation to get into all sort of freaky, kinky shit. And I'll just let your mind run loose with that because whatever you're imagining, it's probably at least on the table in this game (if not actually implemented up to this build).
At the same time, there also is no shortage on tender, emotional and/or passionate sex scenes, an often overlooked aspect of these games. These scenes are important to make the player relate more strongly to the characters and root for their relationships which the dev manages with ease.

Representation
There's an unusually high but deeply welcome amount of positive representation of some groups of people in this game which rarely get a time to shine in any media, let alone these smut games.

Firstly, and most obviously, LGBTQ representation. One could arguably object to the unrealistically little amount of hetero presence in this game but so what, there are enough straight games out there. But what I particularly like about this game, is that the characters are actually unapologetically gay or bi or trans or whatever.
Liv isn't a straight girl who enjoys girl-on-girl action on the side as a male-gazey fantasy, she's just simply gay and not afraid to show it in her manner, fashion style and sexual advances (and so are a lot of other women in this).
And the same goes for the bi and trans representation here, it's just great, I love it.

Then, and it shall not remain unsaid, it's extraordinarily rare for these games to have the protagonist and their whole extended family, be people of colour. And specifically South Asian which is just so deliciously specific, and unique in this sort of setting. And the best part about it: it's actually not important at all in the game.
The characters are all obviously Americans and they are simply that, with no great need to get into the complexities of race relations or Asian-American identity or whatever; the dev could as well have made them white but they chose not to, they thought, why not just make them South Asian? And once again, I love it and I applaud the choice.

There is also some minor good representation of people that usually aren't depicted well or at all in these games, like fat or older women so thumbs up for these as well.


Closing remarks

I could probably say a lot more small positive things about this game that don't really warrant their own pro category (like the fact that the dev puts out very regular updates, or that I really like the art style and the renders as well as the differing body types of the characters, and lots more) but I think I've already rambled on for far too long in this review.

As I said in the beginning, it's hard to put into words for me exactly why I enjoy this game so much. I can see its technical flaws, its need for a very high suspension of disbelief, and so on. But still, I'm always very excited when the next update for this game drops and basically need to immediately download and play it which is not something that many games manage to excite in me.

If you couldn't tell before, I highly recommend this game; people who've tried it but were annoyed by the useless sandbox? Whatever, just ignore it and enjoy the story; people who find the plot to be lacking in the beginning of the game? Just give it time, it gets better; people who have a problem with unrealistic body transformations and lots of casual and/or kinky sex with lots of people? Well, I don't know what to tell you, this game probably really isn't for you.
But other than that, yes, definitely give this game a chance and a go and I hope more people appreciate this little gem in the future.

TLDR:
Great complex and unique characters, intriguing storyline, lots and lots of great sex scenes of huge variety, does require high suspension of disbelief and has a pretty underutilized sandbox game. But all in all, highly recommend!

Panacea is a ridiculous game with a nonsensical story that is further ruined by copious amounts of porn logic. Major spoilers below!

The game revolves around an MC whose mother was raped by an adult when she was 13 years old. MC's grandfather wanted his underage daughter impregnated so he could medically experiment on both the daughter and granddaughter. So, he arranged for an adult to rape his daughter for money. Everyone involved, that is: the MC, her step-sister, step-mom, birth mom, cousin, aunt, friends and acquaintances are at least partially aware of this and the ones who know are all perfectly OK with it. Most of them spend a minute or two with platitudes ("oh, that sucks!") and then immediately change gears into "whatever, let's fuck!"

Yes, every single female character in the game wants to fuck the MC, and most do. Taboos are not a problem in Panacea, everyone involved thinks it's hot, so they just go on with the fucking.

The only upshot to this game is the various kinks and fetishes you can explore with the metamorphic drug the story revolves around. Beware though, there are many, many unavoidable sex scenes so you might experience fetishes that are uninteresting and/or revolting to you.

There are some missing tags as well. Sexual harassment at a minimum, but probably sexual assault too.

If you are in it only for the sex scenes and you liked the fetishes involved, use a scene unlocker. Beyond that, I recommend skipping the story.