Ren'Py - Parasite Black [v0.160] [Damned Studios]

The combat is fun overall, sometimes they are a bit of a grind for attacking one round, healing the other.
Story is great, really enjoy it so far.
Character development is solid; I enjoy all of the characters, even the "bad guys".
Art isn't "quadruple A", but is still pleasant and well done.

Really looking forward to the continued development.

After the fiasco that DAV was, I was left with hunger for proper Dark Fantasy games, so I ended here again, and with that banner art and overview, Parasite Black captured my inmediate attention...But as the butcher said, "Let's go piece by piece"

Story: 3 Almost-Hard Bananas out of 5
Parasite Black begins stomping hard, with a world setting really well built (writter even created his own calendar) and a conflict against an enemy so strong that makes us realize our MC is uttermost screwed, and survival is a prize only for the most fittest.
At the moment just before receiving our "gift" I was completely ecstatic with the absolute brutality of the plot.
Sadly, all that dark fantasy fades away the moment we get to freeroam the city and we get the Disney's Dark Fantasy™ instead.
Weird thing is, the pacing is there, the setting is there, the powerful foe is there...But the inherent darkness of the dark fantasy genre is completely absent from now on (It makes a brief comeback when dealing with a certain enemy, but thats it)
Maybe the prologue sets the bar too high, but the moment a furry is included here, my jaw dropped from the shock: Fluffy and cute furry beings don't mix well with dark fantasy, they are cute, and cuteness wont last long agaisnt hellish creatures.
The plot moves slowyly after we receive our "gift" and chit-chat is not really engaging either most of the time, much to my regret

Characters: 4 Solid Bananas out of 5
Heroines look good most of the time...And by this I mean before the artstyle switches when on a scene, then quality drops and some may look way different or they are inconsistent with the character, main proof of this is the MC itself, Caspian, sometimes he looks like Lorenzo Lamas and other times he looks like Branscombe Richmond (Yeah search it m8, I had to do it too)
They are generally well written, except the MC again, He is an inconsistent character: on the outside he looks like a Viking but on the inside he is tender and shy as a teddy bear.
I got the reference with Myu, Elfen Lied was such a good and inspiring piece of media that many of us, children in that distant 2002, remember this anime even today.
Vizura best girl, but Nijah and Regina are close too.

Mechanics: 3 Almost-Hard Bananas out of 5
I knew from the start that I was getting into a sandbox RPG, so I was expecting grinding and a lot of battles, but the battle system needs more polish, as the RNG is really screwed and makes the combat not as enjoyable as it should be.
And the Scenes Gallery...This one must be the best integrated into the game I have seen so far, including the music selection that plays in the background while you are there with Babazhul, that particular track reminds me a lot of the games that marked my childhood.
Originally, I completely forgot talking about the stress mechanic...Its good and makes sense for the lore of "the gift"and the way to manage it works to integrate the adult aspect of the game.

Content: 4 Solid Bananas out of 5
There's plenty of scenes with plenty characters, mostly vanilla stuff.
Art on these scenes have big room for improvement.

Ending: *404*
Current version doesn't have an ending yet, so this department is pending of rating.

Parasite Black promises a mature dark fantasy RPG but somewhere in development the Mature Dark Fantasy got lost, but like I said before, the game has potential, with some serious compromise (and some sacrifices) it could get back in the original setting, will this happen?, plotwise is their reach exceeding their grasp? nobody but Babazhul knows for sure...

The game is great, it feels complete. It has hot animated sex scenes and it is kinky, combat with perks and skill tree. The infection bar is a new mechanic that introduces a new element of danger. I like to keep old saves from previous session to prevent being stuck in a perma death loop. I hope there's more morality choices in the future updates and mutation being explored more. For example shedding humanity and going full mutant like perks or passive skills that make mutant form more viable in combat. I don't know how, but sometimes auto battle help me win battles that otherwise I would've lost. The monsters are hard, even if you're at the recommended level.

However, there are a few things that don't make sense or don't mesh well for me:

• You die if the infection bar is almost full, even though you're having sex.
• You can't pick previously unchosen perks, only new ones. I like to unlock new sex scenes in a playthrough.
• You don't get exp from every combat. I'm guessing I'm over leveled and I need to go a new area.

Delivers an interesting story with adult themes. Good artwork, very good world building and lore, and the melding of sandbox, story, and turn based combat works well enough. While there is a lot of dialogue, it is interesting dialogue that builds on the story and provides background. If you are not into dialogue or story based games, you may not like it. If you are in it just for the fap material, this may not be for you.

As you enter the world, you will see some nods to Starship Troopers, Attack on Titan, and Kaiju-8. The similarities end quite quickly and the game has its own stand alone story and feel. Think Fantasy RPG mixed with Sci-Fi body horror with adult elements mixed in.

Too annoying to play, barely any content considering how long it's out and too much pointless text. I really hate it when games make you click an option, when in reality there is only 1. Also not only do you have to grind for material, it is random if you can even do that.
This game is way too overrated, especially compared to others which have lower ratings and deliver a way better experience.
The content which does exist is also quite boring and mostly vanilla.
At least the prostitution and pregnancy tag aren't a lie, which is a rarity.

Challenging Erotic Sandbox.

Imagine being able to become Elon Musk in a Hentai Game of Thrones low fantasy milieu. Plow hot babes, Sire a plethora of kids & become fantastically wealthy.

Also, you can become a brutal Carnage like creature with a raging libido who'll die of blue balls if he doesn't get freaky. Kinda like the Stress mechanic in Darkest Dungeon. Lucky for him, there are hookers, war refugees, a childhood friend & a Futa priestess ready to aid our mutant protagonist.

The ladies/others are well drawn & animated. Furries, Monster Girls & hot human women are all available once proper questing is done. The game rewards hard work. I love the combat system & crafting.

A lot of work went into the world building & story. I'm looking forward to where it all goes.

This is a really good game, the kind of good where you could have fun even if it wasnt a porn game. The art style is very nice, the animations look pretty good and the story is really interesting. Also have a lot of different kind of fetishes, even though some of them are only hinted at coming soon.

The combat is the kind where you actually have to try a little bit, but not overwhelming and annoying and if you just want the sex scenes you can just easy mode and chill. Do wish you had some sort of warning or a roll-back option if you let the infection get too high though cus I did at times forget about it and got a game over while in the middle of nowhere, but I guess thats more on me

Oh ye, forgot to mention the gore. The gore is strictly non-sexual, no vore here. The gore actually made me feel unease, very visceral art in the gory death scenes which added to the vibe of the story and world, usually I dont get too affected by gory death scenes, but these ones got me

Good potential, but frustrating realization. Sex scenes are good, but compared to other game events - very rare, so it don't do much. Gore-stuff - looks fine. Yet it looks hella strange that even being a PiMp, your character make a girl fall in love with him. Every relationship here is nice'z friendly, and i wouldn't even metioned it if not a DaRk FaNtAsY setting with blood, ripped guts and other fine looking stuff. What else? Combat system - a full garbage. Delete it, abandon it, throw it away - RNG is ALWAYS suck cause it's always made by a lazy dev's who don't wanna waste their brain cells on something complex, so instead of t hat they just hit da playa with a boring JPG-file casino, where your 85% chances to hit turning into Miss-miss-miss. Bruh.
Almost forgot about a braindead time-wasting map management. Okay, in da city it is fine, BUT when you comes out to travel between locations - it turns into a huge boring chore, cause it is empty scenes you already saw or a boring/annoying fight with a 4 lizards or whatever. And it doin real emotional damage when you walk through it just to see one text-event with a damn orc that will send you traveling another circle. I mean. Seriously? ZERO respect for not just a players who tried it but for da whole time conception.

Great game, love dark fantasy rpg games

Now they only need to tweak the combat system (feels like when you attack at 85%~ hit chance, its actually 60%), Update all the old art, implement perks and meaby some better sounds/music for (combat/epic moments in the story) and then we are golden.

Ps. Bought the game on steam

Very good game, hope for more sharing or swinging scenes. Shoud be more choices that make impact in this game.
Characters and NPC are written good.
Love the art style and animations.
Story is excellent hope the dev will flesh it out even more.
UI and combat could be better but still its good.

I played the 0.153 version, and I've actually really enjoyed it. I'm usually not a big fan of VN or Ren'Py games, since to me at least, they tend to get boring even before halfway through the story. However this game, to my surprise, has managed to keep me captivated, and here I thought I would only play it for only a day or so haha.

Pros:
Story: Honestly it's pretty good if you ask me, though there's definitely a lot more that needs to and will be added. Honestly I was surprised that I even managed to reach the last quest, though that just means I enjoyed it to the point where time went by quickly.
Artwork: *Chef's kiss* Both the Art and animation are some of the best I've seen, and honestly I’m excited to see what’s more to come. The backgrounds, the characters, they all look fantastic, especially for “certain ” scenes.
Characters: While some are your typical NPC’s, there are some characters where they didn’t feel 2 dimensional. I really liked how some of them had some personality to them, hell I even had a couple chuckles and shock from some of them.
Sound: By the Gods, the soundtrack and atmospheric sounds definitely help with aiding the story. To be frank, it really does help build suspense, or bring the atmosphere to the environments..

Cons:
Combat: It can get a bit repetitive at times, especially when trying to get to from one location to another, so I think the devs should add a skip battle system, or at least give the player the option when their character reaches a certain level.
Content: I understand drawing and animating take time, so i’m not too upset from the lack of some content. I know more will be added, and patience is key, however there is still a lot that needs to be added. Personally, I’m excited for more *Ahem* Regina content .

TL;DR It’s definitely one of the best Ren’Py/VN games I have ever played, and this is coming from a person who usually gets bored when playing them. It ain’t finished, it ain’t perfect, but it’s definitely an unpolished gem I would recommend to anyone curious enough to play it.

Review of v0.154...

3 1/2 Stars

I knew nothing about this game going into it other than I liked the artwork in the previews. The story is okay so far. Basically a medieval Venom.

The writing is very good. I only noticed a few typos. However there are massive lore dumps. You will easily spend ten minutes reading a conversation with a character talking about the lore of the game. I appreciate the attention to detail to wanting to give the game a rich backstory, but it would have been better to save the lore dumps for codex entries so the player can read up on it when they want to.

Like I said I really like the art. However there are inconsistencies when the characters are portrayed in different situations. The art is still good, but sometimes they look like completely different characters. And apparently there is only one tit size in this world and that's fantasy large. Sigh.

The battles are repetitive and get old fast. Aside from the mandatory battles you will have to do at least 1 to 3 battles while travelling from one place to another, and you will travel a lot.

I'm not familiar with the development of this game, but from what I've read in other reviews they've been working on it for 2+ years and this is as far as they've gotten with the more recent updates being underwhelming. I'm willing to give them a little slack because I know creating art like this takes time, but there are only five locations right now and I think ten more planned on the map. If it took them this long to get this far I'm not hopeful for the game to be completed.

And also apparently every new version breaks your save making you have to play from the beginning every time. There is no reason to have this problem.

For all it's faults I did like the game, but like I said if they've only gotten this far in over two years and with all the other areas they seem to have planned I wouldn't be surprised if they abandon Parasite Black. I hope they don't, but I think their reach is exceeding their grasp.

Miss, miss, miss and more miss... As much as I appreciate the drawings and animations and this fantasy VN work, I would advise the developer not to be so RNG-obsessed. If the combat is like this early in the game, it's frankly unbearable for long hours. The constant misses of attacks on enemies make the game unplayable. I wish success in the development process of this game, but I hope the developer remembers the purpose of such games. I honestly don't think anyone would want a challenging turn-based combat system. If I personally want to play something turn-based, there are already plenty of AAA games.

Potential to be a 5* star game but has been trending down. The first two years of development were rapid, with tons of new content that was high quality. The main story line has not advanced in a year now, with development instead focused on tinkering with existing game mechanics and adding unnecessary grind features.

Adding side quests for the adventure guild was a good decision. Making it so you have to do several battles every time you travel somewhere was terrible. No one likes grind features, so why add one in 3 years into development?
For those having trouble with the battles - they are very easy. Just upgrade your strength and you can one shot everything.

The addition of a new character (traveling merchant) also seems excessive to me. When a game is several years into development, adding new characters without advancing the plot line is not a good sign towards game completion. As it stands now, I do not think this game will ever be completed. If you look at the map, there are dozens of planned cities/villages when only 4 locations on the map are even remotely complete now.

Good game, just want more progress in combat and character stories
And luckily the game does updates, not the fastest per say but still good amount of updates.
Also as I said the combat is still early in development from playing the game same for equipment but slowly it is improving in different ways.
That's all for now

A game that reset with each new update, introducing systems that worsens the game mechanics and makes simple resource obtaining a nightmare. Previous drop rates of resorces from enemies has gone to shit. WIth this new update map system has become worse, Infection drop rate from fighting is not happening, RNG has become worse, and even after so many updates Dev doesn't know how to make previous saves compatible. FK this game and Fk me for wasting my attention and time on this game that turned from gem to trash with each new update.

V0.152

Pretty good game overall. This fantasy story's something we've seen before, where an expendable group of soldiers are sent on a dangerous mission, and only the MC and friend escapes with superpowers. Of course, in the realm of hentai, the cost of this power is you're very horny.

Reading that, expect an overarching story, and plenty of different characters to breed. Artwork's nice and overall was a very good experience. I'll probably wait from this point until a full release. 4/5

Arguably one of the top five games in this site. Dialogs, art, story, and just the sheer possibilities it entails. There are entire cities yet to be explored and the whole story while very well told, is still in it's early stages. I can't wait for more.

One of the most fantastic fantasy game I've seen on this site. The world is fleshed out and makes me excited to learn more about it. The characters have distinct personalities and models, setting each one apart. And the sex scenes are fully animated, well-drawn and voiced (although they're background noises rather than the lines). And the fetishes! Not just regular women or fantasy races, but a futanari, a trans woman and a femboy. Definitely recommend it.

TL;DR I think the final, polished version of this game will be one of the best adult games ever made.

+ Great writing
+ Great art
+ Uncensored
+ Big focus on breeding/pregnancy

= Updates are a bit slow and light on content. Not necessarily a bad thing when the quality is high, but it's always a concern that games like this will never actually be finished for whatever reason the longer development takes.

- While most of the art is outstanding, there are a not insignificant amount of scenes of way lower quality, often even with the same character. Hopefully they get reworked before the final release.
- Quite a few typos.
- Saves seem to break between versions. I don't take that into account for the rating but it is incredibly annoying.