RPGM - Project Red [v1.61] [Danny Phoenix]

I play a lot of RPGM games, but this one really takes the cake for trying to make a unique and interesting story that actually had me come back after the first time I had to stop. I really enjoyed the story and the unique way of managing time with saves for this game. I didn't feel necessarily underpowered or super overdone, but had legitmate enjoyment over a lot of the features in this game. It also passes the fishing test so already a peak game

Honestly more of a 3.5 than a 4, but since that's not an option I'm erring more on the higher side because the game does have a lot of effort put into it already. It has voice acting, great art, and some real effort put in, to the point that if they keep it up it'll turn out as a really great game.

The main reason I don't consider it higher though is the insistence on limiting saves. As far as I can tell, the only way to save is via a consumable item, and only at the goddess statues. This is somewhat mitigated by the fact that it autosaves, in theory, but the problem is that the autosave happens too frequently. Basically every action you do, every screen you go between, etc, all trigger an autosave.

This means if you accidentally click the wrong thing in a choice, or walk to another screen at the wrong time, you have it autosaved to the only autosave slot. Since manual saves are limited, this could mean the only way you can undo a simple mistake would be to lose quite a bit of progress. To make matters worse, if you return to the main menu after dying, the default load option is on the most recent manual save, and if you load a manual save guess what happens? It autosaves when you load in. I lost about half an hour worth of progress due to that, and it was enough to make me decide I was done playing it for now.

I know that the intent behind limiting manual saves is to force you to stick with choices more readily, but it can also be frustrating if implemented poorly. Particularly when combined with the time crunch mechanic, which makes it so a misclick can cost you a portion of your limited time.

The game does have potential, as I said, which is why I'm still giving it a good rating. It's just that sometimes you have to decide if a mechanic actually needs to be there to improve the game, or if implementing it detracts from it. I don't think the game as it stands now feels like limiting saving improves the experience, so much as adds an arbitrary limitation.

Good art and voice acting, lot of turn based combat.

I don't enjoy turn based combat all that much, so for me an easy mode or something to speed encounters up / skip them, as there are quite a few monsters around that chase you, would make it a 5/5.

Besides getting clothes ripped and therefore less armor, there isn't really any H content in the combat either during battle or losing. Some times you lose but will just get teleported away if what you are fighting doesn't finish you off, or you just get a game over if it is the type that does finish you off.

The game itself is well made with a real options menu and a combat system that does try to do more than basic turn based combat usually does. There is just a lot of it and for someone more interested in the H part, it can become a bit of a slog.

But you can tell a lot of real effort is going into it and the art, and the fact that having any voice acting at all is so rare for H games, makes it an easy 4/5 looking forwards to future updates.