VN Ren'Py Penlight [v0.1614.1] [Angela DeMille]

[WellIGuess]

I was gonna stay quiet since most of what I have to say has already been covered, but I guess I feel like I have to put in my 5 cents as well.

tl;dr first: Despite some flaws this game is well-written and explores its specific fetish niche well.

This is, really, the crux of my post. I want to defend the game because at the end of the day it's a very well written game about a niche fetish that is often misrepresented (dear GOD I hate Japan's obsession with "Saimin Apps"). Hypnosis is often (even on this very site) lumped together with mind control and brainwashing, when they couldn't be more different. Penlight is a story about hypnosis, and moreover it's mature in the treatment of its subject - no 'wave a pendulum once or twice in front of someone and you own their soul' tripe. It's still well in the realm of the fictional with the titular Penlight, of course, but it's grounded enough in reality to not break suspension of disbelief most of the time. So yeah, it's good.
That having been said, I do unfortunately have to agree that the creator is guilty of moralising a bit too much over what is pretty much an erotic novel, absence of sex scenes or not. I can understand bein uncomfortable with writing or including sex scenes, and frankly the rest of the fetish content is good enough that I can even "forgive" the lack, but there's really no reason to present the protagonist as a horrible human being in each and every route he does what the "human", and flawed, thing would be. Even in the 'lightest' offense, when he just tries to hypnotise Nozomi to be more interested in him -without knowing that it's wholly against her will, even- , he causes a psychotic breakdown and gets called out as a horrible person- to say nothing of how depressing some of the other "evil" routes get. Yes, in reality bending someone's mind to do something they wouldn't, no matter what, would be Evil, with a capital E. But this is fiction, and fiction aimed specifically at people who fantasise about doing just that. You chose to write about their fetish, you made it as erotic as could be to "bait" as many as possible, and then you indirectly but no less harshly criticise them for having that fetish. I don't get it.

 

[KingWeWuz]

I was checking out the new content and I have to say the Hiroko ticklish hands ending was the most unsatisfying of all.

The main character was more pathetic and helpless on that route more than anything.

I really hope the author doesn't think this is a good ending. If you thought the other routes were bad and endings awful...

This like... The mc never does anything she doesn't consent to. She gets violent, then hypnotizes the mc, steals something the mc worked tirelessly on, then torments and humiliates him with that hypnosis, then treats him like shit at the tennis court...

Then after all that she says he's not as big a creep as she thought and that he should destroy the thing he worked so hard on... and they're friends? And the main character acts as a wingman. A fucking wingman. Tutoring her in all the self taught things he learned over a year. To help the girl who tormented him hook up with his crush? Holy absolute fuck. I'm guessing based on the greyed out "Evil" options that might've been one of the happier endings.

Can anyone tell me the appeal of that route? If it's there I didn't get it.

Like, the mc kinda wins in just about every other route. If it's in the evil routes he'll have fun, on the other safe routes he'll get a girlfriend. Here he gets nothing. OK a *friend* I guess? But from beginning to end he wins nothing and loses nonstop.

 

[phoenix1921]

its somewhat getting on my nerves and ticking me off that the paths the you take that are not romance and consensual all end in bad gameovers, like wtf? there is like only one way to play and its just romance option?

edit: i just saw in another path the mc lets his penlight get destroyed by the girls bcs its too powerful? like wtf how wimpy can he be? that thing is one of a kind and could make him a millionaire who in their right mind would let it be destoryed instead of having a gild like him?

haha when i read your comment i thought about light from death note, wonder what he will do with this power

 

[Asdasdas5]

I think the author is trying to make a deconstruction of the hypnosis/mind control fetish

• I really don't see a reason to deconstruct a fictional fetish that, it seems more like kink shame to me.

• It's really hard to take the story serious when the protagonist is constructed to be the worst amalgamation of flaws possible.

The story is still far from completed, I would suggest developing more strong points to the protagonist.
I also think the story could use a better balance in the evil paths, right now it's difficulty to enjoy the story because it's kind of a railroading, you either be good and have a good ending or you are bad and you suffer the consequences, when we know the story is being built to do that it feels really forced and unpleasent, I think we can enjoy being evil or good and decide what's we liked best.

 

[Linkolek]

I agree with Sansik above about the deconstruction of a fetish, but I don't think characters not knowing what they want is a bad thing as KingWeWuz makes it to be.
It's pretty damn spot on for a teenagers to not know what to do and how to live their lifes.
What gets to me is not even how the game present forced mind control as evil, but rather HOW it does so. We start with our protagonist as a antisocial stalker "genius". While many of misunderstandings in interpretation of answers given by hipnotizied girls is very forced, it's still possible. Emotions are high and so are MC delusions on the girls, after all. His conversation skills, not so much. It's bigger problem, however, when we make choises that turn our protagonist into certain kind of a person and the game states that he is, at least, content with the choice, only to imply at the end that he will lead a sad life (shadow eminence ending).

Once, I played the game on DS called "The world ends with you". I didn't agree with the point that the game was making, but it's logic was sound and I could understand How people can get to this kind of answer. With bad endings here, I end up thinking "wait, WHAT?". It's even worse when contrasted with how good the writing usually is.

 

[BaasB]

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c release of Penlight is upon us!
Although to be honest, there's not much new writing to be found this month :/ I've been spending my time developing Sayori's Doll storyline, and it was very slow going. Still, the first in-game week is done now, including its first CG. It's not as much as I wanted, but what's there should serve as a decent taster for what's to come.
Besides that, the Spanish localisation's been tidied up a bit and there's been another round of CGs added to various routes. The one on Hiroko's second storyline is especially good~
For next month I'm cautiously optimistic about having the Doll storyline written to a conclusion, so look forward to that. In the meantime I hope you enjoy this update, such as it is, and I'll see you again soon!
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What's New

• New CG for Sayori's route, on the new and in-progress Doll storyline
• Added a new CG scene on the Villainous Devotion storyline, towards the end
• New CG for Hiroko's route, at the end of the "Ticklish Hands" storyline
• New CG for Nozomi's route, during her "Trance" storyline
• Sayori's Doll storyline has been scripted up to day 7
• Word count is now around 223,000
• Spanish localisation: Various edits and corrections to the existing script
• Updated the end credits with the latest backers
• Lots of typo corrections (did a sweep of the whole script to find them)

Known Issues

• Changing the language on a line where an animation occurs (like screen shake) will throw up an error.

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[T51bwinterized]

To counterpoint to the discussion above.

I think that the game's evil route is interesting, and I appreciate the balls of a game going for such a thing. As an art piece it's quite fascinating. Same with it's role in the genre. But, as a game expierience it's kind of limited.

I think that this game goes *almost* far enough to produce an intiresting game, but it doesn't have the follow through to produce something engaging from it's good critique. In my mind, the game is an interesting failure. But, I like intiresting failures, because they make me think.

I've spoken to the author about this, and as I expected she was quite insightful on the subject. Overall, I think a critique of the game is in bounds. But, it's certainly worthwhile even in its flaws.

 

[drcynic22]

I think the author is trying to make a deconstruction of the hypnosis/mind control fetish

• I really don't see a reason to deconstruct a fictional fetish that, it seems more like kink shame to me.

This is what I felt after I'd played this. I felt like I was being yelled at for what I'm into no matter how I played. The writing is probably good enough if it's not your primary kink, but since it is for me, I just hated the whole experience no matter what route I went.

 

[T51bwinterized]

I definitely don't think it's that. Angela is also an open hypno fetishist who enjoys the kind of material. It really seems like a genuine attempt at deconstruction, rather then a mere statement of moral revulsion.

 

[Asdasdas5]

Honestly I really don't understand the point of deconstructing a fictional fetish, but I would say ignoring that fact still even for a deconstruction the game feels kinda forced, playing the game I felt like the protagonist was specially created to be the worst in almost every way, basically it was like he needed to be like this in order for the game to be the way it is, the rest of the cast is realistic. I think the game has a lot of interesting ideias, and it could be a lot better if it wasn't so focused in trying to make the player feel bad with their choices. Also, the game is far from finished so it has a lot of ways it can improve yet.

I think the game can follow it's current direction but it could also appeal to hypno fetishists that just want to play the game for fun, and in order to do that the protagonist could be a bit better developed and the story in the evil routes that the protagonist wins could use a bit more content, right now the evil routes are pretty much a conquest of the girls and a jump to the epilogue, and this seems like a bit of a waste of material, in a game about a hypno fetish/control fetish the player doesn't really get much choice to control the girls even when the protagonist has a lot of things he could do.

 

[jhs_reika]

I think the main problem is that the MC is far too wimpy in many routes. It fits with his initial character and the story about wimpy character was fleshed out quite good, but many of us players wants more not-so-wimpy character development routes. The game is still in development, so let's hope that our MC can acts manlier more often in the future.

I just hoped for a route where there is someone who symphatizes with the MC and dislikes the blatant rudeness of the three main girls (which was somehow ignored by everyone else). Was there really no one in that class who cares about our MC?

About sexual content. A mind control game with no sexual content is rare, and a game with no sexual content in this site is even more so. How about changing the "no sexual content" tag to "implied sex"? You don't need to show the sex explicitly (I think it's quite alright; the game already have nudity, rare as it is), and it conforms more to the nature of this site. Because I think it is quite weird for a game about twisted hypnotism to have a hypnotist that never even mention sex even when surrounded by many devoted cute girls.

 

[KingWeWuz]

About sexual content. A mind control game with no sexual content is rare, and a game with no sexual content in this site is even more so. How about changing the "no sexual content" tag to "implied sex"? You don't need to show the sex explicitly (I think it's quite alright; the game already have nudity, rare as it is), and it conforms more to the nature of this site. Because I think it is quite weird for a game about twisted hypnotism to have a hypnotist that never even mention sex even when surrounded by many devoted cute girls.

According to the tag rules:

• No Sexual Content [Adult themes including mild nudity but no actual pornographic content.]

The author has been clear this game will have no pornographic content, though there is nudity.

There is no "implied sexual content" tag, though it could be placed in the genre's tab. If the porn content was text based, with little to no art, it would receive a text-based tag and lose the no sexual content tag. But as it is right now, there's no sexual content written or shown content wise, so the NSC tag should remain.

 

[jhs_reika]

There is no "implied sexual content" tag, though it could be placed in the genre's tab. If the porn content was text based, with little to no art, it would receive a text-based tag and lose the no sexual content tag. But as it is right now, there's no sexual content written or shown content wise, so the NSC tag should remain.

I forgot where I got that "implied sexual content" tag, but I guess it's my fault for not checking whether that tag exist or not in this site. I just thought that that tag would be appropriate for that one route where MC x Nozomi ended up in doing it off-screen. Then again, I was suggesting "implied sex" tag and not "implied sexual content"; which I guess also doesn't exist. Thank you for the explanation.

 

[Asdasdas5]

I was checking out the new content and I have to say the Hiroko ticklish hands ending was the most unsatisfying of all.

The main character was more pathetic and helpless on that route more than anything.

I really hope the author doesn't think this is a good ending. If you thought the other routes were bad and endings awful...

This like... The mc never does anything she doesn't consent to. She gets violent, then hypnotizes the mc, steals something the mc worked tirelessly on, then torments and humiliates him with that hypnosis, then treats him like shit at the tennis court...

Then after all that she says he's not as big a creep as she thought and that he should destroy the thing he worked so hard on... and they're friends? And the main character acts as a wingman. A fucking wingman. Tutoring her in all the self taught things he learned over a year. To help the girl who tormented him hook up with his crush? Holy absolute fuck. I'm guessing based on the greyed out "Evil" options that might've been one of the happier endings.

Can anyone tell me the appeal of that route? If it's there I didn't get it.

Like, the mc kinda wins in just about every other route. If it's in the evil routes he'll have fun, on the other safe routes he'll get a girlfriend. Here he gets nothing. OK a *friend* I guess? But from beginning to end he wins nothing and loses nonstop.

I agree with that, it's interesting that the game tries to be realistic at some points but in other parts it kinda just gives up, really it seems like the story is being written to convey that the protagonist is the in the wrong and he has to apologize and be miserable to the girls in order to repent, but it fails in that regard and I end up only thinking the girls are self centered bitches and the protagonist is miserable, I also think it's a fair interpretation that the protagonist goes along with it because he is so miserable that he genuinelly thinks this is a good option for him. While I think some of the grey options in the route are really interesting and also realistic to the protagonist perspective based on the previous routes I find it difficult to imagine the route ending without the protagonist ending up regreting his decision or in jail.

 

[WellIGuess]

I think the main problem is that the MC is far too wimpy in many routes. It fits with his initial character and the story about wimpy character was fleshed out quite good, but many of us players wants more not-so-wimpy character development routes. The game is still in development, so let's hope that our MC can acts manlier more often in the future.

I just hoped for a route where there is someone who symphatizes with the MC and dislikes the blatant rudeness of the three main girls (which was somehow ignored by everyone else). Was there really no one in that class who cares about our MC?

About sexual content. A mind control game with no sexual content is rare, and a game with no sexual content in this site is even more so. How about changing the "no sexual content" tag to "implied sex"? You don't need to show the sex explicitly (I think it's quite alright; the game already have nudity, rare as it is), and it conforms more to the nature of this site. Because I think it is quite weird for a game about twisted hypnotism to have a hypnotist that never even mention sex even when surrounded by many devoted cute girls.

The "problem" with this lies at the core of the game's writing, sadly. (Problem in quotes, because both intention and outcome match on the writer's side, they just clash with the typical reader's expectations). Which is to say, the MC is supposed to come out as a creep. Hiroko, Nozomi and Sayaka aren't just being rude (well, ok, Hiroko pretty much is), Kyou has truly been hopelessly stalking Nozomi since at least the beginning of the year and has alienated everyone in the class as a result. By the same token, I wouldn't really expect Kyou to ever become "manlier" in any route unless the writing suffers a major turn of events (which would require at least some rewriting of the common route pieces). He's meant to be an unlikeable asshole who manages to create a hypnotic penlight and either somehow reforms himself upon coming in contact with the heroines or villainously enslaves them to his will (which, thus far, universally leads to bad ends, or at least unhappy ones). Long story short, Kyou isn't ever getting laid, and not just because the writer doesn't want the hassle of writing sex scenes.

 

[jhs_reika]

The "problem" with this lies at the core of the game's writing, sadly. (Problem in quotes, because both intention and outcome match on the writer's side, they just clash with the typical reader's expectations). Which is to say, the MC is supposed to come out as a creep. Hiroko, Nozomi and Sayaka aren't just being rude (well, ok, Hiroko pretty much is), Kyou has truly been hopelessly stalking Nozomi since at least the beginning of the year and has alienated everyone in the class as a result. By the same token, I wouldn't really expect Kyou to ever become "manlier" in any route unless the writing suffers a major turn of events (which would require at least some rewriting of the common route pieces). He's meant to be an unlikeable asshole who manages to create a hypnotic penlight and either somehow reforms himself upon coming in contact with the heroines or villainously enslaves them to his will (which, thus far, universally leads to bad ends, or at least unhappy ones). Long story short, Kyou isn't ever getting laid, and not just because the writer doesn't want the hassle of writing sex scenes.

Ouch. I was hoping that the writer will expand the routes to cover the aforementioned manlier (read: more aggresive) possibilities, but I guess that won't happen. Now that I've actually read all the previous posts more carefully (and also while more awake), I can see that I actually had some very wrong expectations because I didn't realize that the author is actually a lady. Sorry about that. I've been impolite with my lower-head-oriented suggestions.

Well, if I had to try to see this game through the female's point of view, this game does actually cover a good amount of mind control fetishes for women that doesn't objectify them too much without also telling the man that the deed was actuallly wrong. I guess that's what the author intended to create? Then this is indeed a good game with solid writing. I'd say that the wrong expectations was stemmed from the fact that the MC is a male, which often times would also means that he is the protagonist. The disappointments wouldn't be so abundant if the player knew beforehand that the MC was actually the antagonist/victim and that most of the routes was written with the women as the focus.

...though beware that most of this site's patrons are men. Men who are looking for good f*pping materials. And so "some" of us may still complain. One way or another. *cue ominous music*

 

[KingWeWuz]

The game did update, doll route led to its conclusion. But not much erotic content added.

 

[Asdasdas5]

Ouch. I was hoping that the writer will expand the routes to cover the aforementioned manlier (read: more aggresive) possibilities, but I guess that won't happen. Now that I've actually read all the previous posts more carefully (and also while more awake), I can see that I actually had some very wrong expectations because I didn't realize that the author is actually a lady. Sorry about that. I've been impolite with my lower-head-oriented suggestions.

Well, if I had to try to see this game through the female's point of view, this game does actually cover a good amount of mind control fetishes for women that doesn't objectify them too much without also telling the man that the deed was actuallly wrong. I guess that's what the author intended to create? Then this is indeed a good game with solid writing. I'd say that the wrong expectations was stemmed from the fact that the MC is a male, which often times would also means that he is the protagonist. The disappointments wouldn't be so abundant if the player knew beforehand that the MC was actually the antagonist/victim and that most of the routes was written with the women as the focus.

...though beware that most of this site's patrons are men. Men who are looking for good f*pping materials. And so "some" of us may still complain. One way or another. *cue ominous music*

I would say that's one of the main complaints about the game, the reader thinks this may be a cool english story about mind control in an interesting scenario, but they end up getting a story that can be resumed in "Mind control is bad."

I liked your reasoning that the author doesn't want to objectify the women too much although I would say this is questionable, if that was the point I think the story could be really good with some toned down themes and questions about morality, but based in the protagonist getting railroaded into situations, it feels like the story is trying to force you to come to the conclusion by doing something like "see? you're evil and that's what happened" and I'm pretty sure people can come to their own conclusion without the condescending writing.

 

[jhs_reika]

I would say that's one of the main complaints about the game, the reader thinks this may be a cool english story about mind control in an interesting scenario, but they end up getting a story that can be resumed in "Mind control is bad."

I liked your reasoning that the author doesn't want to objectify the women too much although I would say this is questionable, if that was the point I think the story could be really good with some toned down themes and questions about morality, but based in the protagonist getting railroaded into situations, it feels like the story is trying to force you to come to the conclusion by doing something like "see? you're evil and that's what happened" and I'm pretty sure people can come to their own conclusion without the condescending writing.

Um, as I said, the MC was not the protagonist. But neither were the girls. And even good intention can have bad repercussions, so the MC wasn't necessarily evil. But I can somewhat agree that the story can be summed up as "Mind control is bad." Though I guess the more complete summary is "Mind control may be interesting, but can have really bad repercussions without proper rule and limitations."

It's true that the morality issue thingy was quite heavy in this game that I couldn't help but to think that that is exactly what the author actually intended to create. This VN took an interesting take of who's actually the antagonist and who's the victim, and that they may wanted this as a story with no clear protagonist. Which is good if this is simply a novel. As a game this is a fail though. A game is where one was hoping to have fun choosing and exploring their own destiny, and because most of the player was men, they would obviously want more good endings for men. What's more is the fact that those moral thingy was mostly directed to the male MC (which maybe can't be helped because we can only read his thought). That can be seen as a sign that this game was created for the guilty pleasures of women rather than for the men as many other games in this site do. The what can be perceived as "condescending writing" was the proof of that. The story has expanded a bit and the author has tried to pander more to the male audience, but the males still wasn't satisfied with so many heavy morals already.

"Rawr! We men want to have fun with women, screw it with moral and repercussions!"

Well, tough luck, I guess. This game was simply not that kind of game. This is the problem with VN, which is basically an extension of a novel; the story may or may not be suitable for your palate. So please stop forcing your ideals. You gotta respect the author man. She is at least good enough to write and create a game like this, which is already much better than most of us. You know the rule. Constructive criticisms and suggestions (with proper and polite wordings) are alright, but you can't forcibly demand things. And no flames. If you can't even do that, then I guess you can simply find another game, where the story was simpler and more pandering to men. Even though they were never enough, they are so much already.

This explanation of mine might seem a little biased, but I think this is necessary to balance the so many complains.

On the other side, I agree that the author can tone down the moral thingy. Or maybe balance it with the women. Because as I said, this is after all is still a game and not just a novel. Too much realism can be bad considering the theme used will forcibly separate the casts into either the perpetrator or the victim. And the victim's side will obviously feels bad. The routes can still be expanded, the casts can still be developed, so keep up the good work and good luck.

I will stop here, because my head is hurting again.

 

[Asdasdas5]

Um, as I said, the MC was not the protagonist. But neither were the girls. And even good intention can have bad repercussions, so the MC wasn't necessarily evil. But I can somewhat agree that the story can be summed up as "Mind control is bad." Though I guess the more complete summary is "Mind control may be interesting, but can have really bad repercussions without proper rule and limitations."

It's true that the morality issue thingy was quite heavy in this game that I couldn't help but to think that that is exactly what the author actually intended to create. This VN took an interesting take of who's actually the antagonist and who's the victim, and that they may wanted this as a story with no clear protagonist. Which is good if this is simply a novel. As a game this is a fail though. A game is where one was hoping to have fun choosing and exploring their own destiny, and because most of the player was men, they would obviously want more good endings for men. What's more is the fact that those moral thingy was mostly directed to the male MC (which maybe can't be helped because we can only read his thought). That can be seen as a sign that this game was created for the guilty pleasures of women rather than for the men as many other games in this site do. The what can be perceived as "condescending writing" was the proof of that. The story has expanded a bit and the author has tried to pander more to the male audience, but the males still wasn't satisfied with so many heavy morals already.

"Rawr! We men want to have fun with women, screw it with moral and repercussions!"

Well, tough luck, I guess. This game was simply not that kind of game. This is the problem with VN, which is basically an extension of a novel; the story may or may not be suitable for your palate. So please stop forcing your ideals. You gotta respect the author man. She is at least good enough to write and create a game like this, which is already much better than most of us. You know the rule. Constructive criticisms and suggestions (with proper and polite wordings) are alright, but you can't forcibly demand things. And no flames. If you can't even do that, then I guess you can simply find another game, where the story was simpler and more pandering to men. Even though they were never enough, they are so much already.

This explanation of mine might seem a little biased, but I think this is necessary to balance the so many complains.

On the other side, I agree that the author can tone down the moral thingy. Or maybe balance it with the women. Because as I said, this is after all is still a game and not just a novel. Too much realism can be bad considering the theme used will forcibly separate the casts into either the perpetrator or the victim. And the victim's side will obviously feels bad. The routes can still be expanded, the casts can still be developed, so keep up the good work and good luck.

I will stop here, because my head is hurting again.

I agree with you, also I do think it's important to clarify that I like this game and respect the author, I am pretty much just sharing my thoughts on the things I dislike about the game, I am in fact trying to do constructive criticism, and if I seem disrespectiful it's probably just because I am just being too informal in a forum.

I just like to talk about this topic

Also I don't think morals and repercussions are bad, I do think the story rn is too one-sided and as you said could use some balance.