Ren'Py - Ring of Lust [v0.5.9a] [Votan]

As of Jan 2025 if it were possible to rate with negative stars then this would certainly deserve it.
Of the many thousands of dollars given to this developer, none seem to be going toward improving this pitiful effort.

Since you are required to follow a step by step walkthrough it's more akin to watching paint dry than playing any sort of game. Terrible.

Still some of the worst spelling/grammar with no effort to fix any of it.
The user interface is minimal and worthless.
It's impossible to play through unless you follow the walkthrough which has many errors. The walkthrough is also semi hard to follow....if you are lost it won't help you. It tells you to do things at night...which is impossible as there are only Morning, Afternoon, and Evening.

Under the Relations area it doesn't show many of the characters you interact with so you don't know your standings with them. Few look age appropriate...the MC looks wayyy too old.
Just a terrible effort and huge waste of time.
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Older review
If you're considering playing this game, do yourself a favor and skim over the walk-through first because you're going to need it. Some of the steps you have to take are plain ignorant. I mean, the story is ok enough, but to accomplish a task you may have to repeat several steps only on a certain day 4 or 5 times but remember to skip it once or you have to start over while hopping on your left foot.........
Sounds weird? Well, It's kind of like that. lol Very poor effort.

The MC seems to me to look older than his mom a lot of the time. His younger sister looks strange but I'm not sure how.....might be the giraffe neck that some of the characters sometimes have.


Irregardless of where the Dev is from, the grammar is horrible and clunky. I'd imagine that will be easily corrected with a little help if they want it. I say this with all due respect for the fact that they even tried. It's gotta be tough. But the game has been out 6 years and the dev can't even bother to correct spelling/grammar errors or improve the poor story telling. Surely there are other devs that are trying hard and deserve your support and patronage.

Played 0.3.8 version. I wonder low points of this game. Well yes there seem to be some weak points and features in this game. Some things are more important than others. I like playability and immerse way over other criterias. I also like characters and sexual content. Cons are ballon like mega tits and mc's horse dick. I am in about halfway and I have enjoyed playing this so far.

I almost skipped this because of low ratings and missing tags, glad that I didn't.

Whatever goodwill this game accrues is lost via the insane grind you're supposed to do to get any progression. In my opinion, the sandbox format just doesn't work for these 3D porn games. The payoff is never worth the grind. Nearly unplayable without a walkthrough/cheat mod and even then it's a chore.

really good game with good animations, looking forward for more updates!
At first it was i bit tricky to find out what to do but with help of the walkthrough i started to like this game more and more.

Version: v0.3.6a

Review:
I would avoid doing a review of this game but it was a 3gb download of wasted time. Unfortunately I couldn't play for more than 30 minutes, so I closed it and moved it to the recycle bin.

History:
The game's story is bad and poor. His mother is died, his father is absent and the MC has an appearance that seems to have 30 years old and having to move in with your stepmother. She has a 22 year old daughter and other women will appear in the house. At this point, it is okay, but while sleeping, the MC has a dream that he fucks a girl and then he is presented with an invisible ring of power and during the game, you have to fill up the bar of this ring to get lust power and etc. This is pathetic, plus there is a lot of text to read and you lose interest in the story quickly. I don't usually like games where the MC has super powers to get relationship or fuck the girls, I prefer it to be something natural like corrupting through a good narrative with affectations or intimidation.
Gameplay:
I would say that it is a poorly working sandbox that you just have to grind like an idiot. It doesn't have a comfortable gameplay and at the beginning seems to be confusing, one bad thing is that you feel stuck in the same place without having a freedom to wander between places because you will know that it is empty. There are no statistics that make the roleplay better, you just have to grind to increase the relationship with the character and thus unlock new scenes. There are games that are okay, but this is not the case.
Graphics & Sexual Content:
The graphics in this game are bad, sometimes the character model is out of sync with the scene. The renderings are average to poor, I honestly didn't like much in what I saw, what caught my attention was the rendering of Michelle's model, but other than that, I thought it was average, maybe it's the only one that can save itself. I can't talk about the sexual content, I quit the game.

Why I did gave 1 star?
Sometimes we end up not caring much for the graphics and renderings, because depending on the game it might be enjoyable, but this is not the case with Ring of Lust. The game has a bad plot and storyline in my point of view, maybe you will like it, but the gameplay of the game is not pleasant. Maybe a VN or a more organized sandbox could be worthwhile, but the mechanics that the game brings need to be changed as well. I also felt a certain emptiness, you go to the bathroom and take a shower just to skip a time of day, nothing more. Practically, it is grind and follow a dialogue with texts that could be more specific and objective, in short, summarized. I could not have the pleasure of seeing the sex scenes, the porn and erotic content, I gave up on this game as I felt it would be a waste of time have to continue.

This game has such a severe case of guide damn it. Oh of course, I am supposed to take action Z on location X on Tuestday Afternoon to progress character B. How obvious! (not really).
There is zero indication of what to do next and the paths cross block often.

And you can't even tell exactly where you are in each path since there is no in game tracking. (there is affection which is unrelated to your progress). So even if you do use the guide (an external PDF) it is hard as hell to do so.

Additionally the game itself is grindy. This game is a case study in wasted potential. Some slight alterations could drastically improve it. An in game progress tracker, a hint system, relaxing the restrictions day and hour for triggering scenes... all would be very welcome.

Absolutely not convenient gameplay, often it is simply not clear what needs to be done to move further along the storyline of the characters. I looked at the passage file, such a pile of text was piled up that any desire to use this passage disappeared. In general, the most frequent gameplay in this game that you will encounter is Groundhog Day. And yes, the animations in the game are just disgusting!
2 out of 5.

The game has some hot girls, but you've seen them in at least a dozen other games. The idea for the game seems good, but execution is poor. Huge dialog choices that don't make sense. Tedious "Engrish". I got a game over after a few minutes of playing but it looked like I had done everything right. The problem was the translation of the dialogue choices is so poor, I unintentionally made the wrong choice. When players get farther into the game, there's just a lot of repeat grinding. The renders are fairly low quality. In this game, the rewards (lewd scenes) aren't worth the trouble of playing and it's painfully obvious they never will be.

Well. Guess I supposed to make a detailed review of my experience but i'm just gonna tell that texts are overflowing out the screen and this shall be enough.

I generally give a chance for any game if there is a bunch of hot characters, good assets and I try to continue if there at least a little bit introguing storyline no matter if the developer is a rookie in designing or coding. Most of the time I respect for the work has done and ignore it rather than giving a low rate. But this work is so skectchy in all matters. I first time seen a game which has overflowing unnecessarily long texts. It's pretty abvious that developer just thinks adding some huge boobs is an excuse for a low efford job.

Unfortunately, Ring of Lust (v 0.3.2a) is not a good game. On the gameplay level it's a very generic sandbox with some good ideas (the powers) that actually don't do anything specially interesting. Characters are plain and boring, with little interest into developing their stories. And sex is unimaginative and meh. Writing in english also is relatively poor, especially as the game advances.

Renders are not of a particularly high quality either and lots of scenes have only descriptions of actions, not even a specific static render for them. Animations are done very very poorly. And there is no sound that I could be aware of.

So, all in all, I'd skip this game unless it improves... a lot.

I gave it three stars because I was clueless where to go or what to do. You desperately need a hints system, perhaps tied into the relationships screen. A grind is one thing, but blindly stabbing in the dark is not fun.

The animations are decent. The models choices are typical. Several reused backgrounds.

The story mechanic is interesting, granting new skills to grind out. You should expand this a ton, getting every skill maxed should be near impossible. Provide multiple solutions to a scene, if the MC doesnt have stealth, is there a way to do it with charm or tech? Maybe the stealth skill maxed unlocks three more sub choices, on and on... maybe lockpicking, for that dam bathroom door.

Thanks for sharing your hard work, I look forward to your next releases.

Pretty good game. It has a good flow and easy to navigate. The story is pretty good, as well. Not the same old same old and not boring. The characters are also original. Too many games uses the same characters with different names. It is nice to see one the creator makes their own characters.

Game is so confusing
Once you corrupted everyone
the game becomes rewatch everything you already saw
Only good thing is the renders
This is another game where you better off waiting for more content
Story is not bad upgrading powers is easy
no bugs

Unfortunately, what game has to offer is just nice package no content. It focuses heavily on grinding with occasional sex scenes (which you also have to grind) and somewhere in background we have a plot that is so bland and uninteresting that you may as well forget it. I have to say though that renders of older women are very nice, can't say the same for younger girls.

Based on v.2.9a and previous versions play

I would love to have a 2.5 star rating - this game is caught somewhere between poor and average.

Premise = 3 stars:

Not all that new considering it is a young man living with mom and two sisters with redheaded aunt that visits on occasion and sleeps on the couch that offers possible sex scenes (shades of Big Brother). The only difference is the Ring of Power aspect - which, again, isn't all that different considering how many other games there are with some artifact that gives the MC powers of control over his housemates, family, etc. Rated at 3 stars because the sheer number of games out there now don't leave much room for originality so taking aspects of each of those games (Big Brother, The Artifact, My Best Deal, etc. etc.) and making something original isn't all that easy.

CG/Models = 3 stars:

The basics are there and the models are not unattractive...of course they aren't all that original either; basic DAZ3D models with a few minor tweaks here and there. Having some animation helps, although it is the sames scene over, and over, and over, and over...with only a few images of the models rendered for each scene, so after a couple of times the sex-play becomes part of the game grind.

Progression/Achievements = 2 stars

Repetitive grind without much to show for the click time spent in-game. Without a cheat or mod this game would be so repetitive, only someone with very poor short term memory would find any satisfaction - seriously, how many blow jobs in the kitchen can someone get before they decide to look elsewhere for action. Add the serious issues with event progression ). Add to that the fact that a character will be in more than one room at the same moment, and you have confusion on whether any of the events even matter toward progression with that character.

NOTE: I find it odd and not a little frustrating that the MC can have sexual encounters with the women, yet can't approach them in their own rooms - While, admittedly, this is not the only game with this issue, it always leaves me thinking, "What the actual fuck?!?" Seriously, if the MC can fuck a girl in the kitchen, living room or bathroom when other people are supposedly wandering around the house, why in the Hell can't the MC sneak into the bedroom and do the same - ESPECIALLY WITH INVISIBILITY?!?!? (has to be one of the biggest logistical flaws in the game - and many others I might add).

Overall progress = 3 stars

Considering how long some other games take and that most never see completion or any progress after v0.1, Ring of Lust has that much going for it (of course that is assuming Votan completes the project). The sheer lack of any meaningful progressions with either: 1. New characters with the potential for more. And, 2. The over all lack of any progression of any of the primary characters leaves me wondering if it would be better to just wait several versions until playing again.

This is the kind of game that has potential yet, ultimately, for an adult game that is supposed to be about sex with all of the women he meets and that the MC has to repeat the same actions to the point of this becoming a grind fest, leaves the player wanting more than the same blowjob in the kitchen, living room, et al.

If he dev wants to take this to the next level, they should be focused on adding more imagery to the already existing scenes (more poses/positions), adding more sex scenes (not the sames thing over and over) and allowing for outside the house activities on the weekends. Lose some of the grind without rewards and this could be a 4 star game.

update review for version 0.3.9a
PRO:
- some progress since 0.2.8a version
CONS:
- ui elements r same- no hints, no higlight, no border(tv, clocks)
- game remain unplayable even with w/t. as example- for story advance u must end previous day certaily(set alarm to wakeup early), then wakeup in certain weekday, then do certain action after wakeup, then say compliment to certain pnc, then u must go in certain location... oh, and u must be on certain progress stage with 3 other npc. there only reading code can help...
- as usual, bugs presents. as example- beth, u can get anal scene(in girl room) BEFORE unlocking such activity.

CONCLUSION:
rating reduced from 2 to 1, cuz there no gameplay.

review based on 0.2.8a version
actualy i like similar games with sandbox and some grind, but this game was terrible for me.
PRO:
- good cg
-animations presents
CONS:
- in text some error presents
- part of UI terrible- map looks like ****, icons hvnt borders, interactive objects have no border/hint (like smartophone, tv etc) and find that *** similar like to find black cat in black room(actualy, player need to find some dark objects in dark rooms), text actions for sandbox also looks like ****.
- w/o reading code game unplayable. as example- im a very good coder, have w/t, but i spend almost half time for reading code, cuz w/t not point all conditions and depenes in actions/scenes.
- game need serious scene guide (look previous)
- during p/t i got error, when variable was undefined

CONCLUSION:
try to avoid game, but if u masochist- use cheats like:
lust_energy = ###
day_time = #
week_day = #
money = ###
normaly i dnt like "choice based" VN, but in that case- this ll much better, than this ***.

Everything is a bit off. Gameplay: could be tighter and less confusing. Visuals: could be better and more consistent. Story/writing: could be better. But it's not a bad game. The characters are good looking and the sex scenes are nice if sometimes a bit short. Play with the walkthrough and you shouldn't have any problems progressing with the game. the game also makes it very easy to skip time and cheat lust (which is used as a kind of currency), Overall worth a playthrough

The porn is pretty good and story is fine. The big two strikes aginst this game you basically need a guide to find your way through the convoluted steps in order to progress. Secondly is the repetition required to progress. You have to keep repeating scenes over and over with no real change to move on and nothing telling you if this leads to more or if you just finished a path. Even no sex stuff you have to repeat an annoyingly amount.

If in the future if they update it to remove the pointless grindy steps it might be a 4 or 5 star but as is it is a 2

v0.2.5

I rate based on version 2.5a having played many previous versions.

Pros:
- The game has a couple of really hot and different characters with their own personality.
- Renders are good, not great but good enough to be hot.
- The story is ok.
- There are A LOT of scenes and most of em are hot.
- Good pacing, no BS teasing.

Cons:
- MC looks totally weird, like a short adult in comparison with some of the girls.

- Biggest Issue: The game has a lot of triggers for the events that are totally random and some of them require a certain order or you may get a bug, you may want to use the walkthrough for this, but it's not up to date and even if you follow step by step you won't be able to trigger the events needed, so this leaves you free roaming in a game full of scenes that are hidden, losing hours and hours and not being able to see the content.

I personally apreciatte and respect my time a lot (even when I spend some of it playing porn games) and I hate when a bad developed game makes me lose so many hours and searching for answers for buggs.

So that's it, 2 stars. At this point I highly doubt the dev will fix some of the bugs with triggers, but may be if he does a complete exact walkthrough that allows us to unlock everything, I may change my rate to 3 stars.

This game won't ever be able to reach more than 3 stars because of bad programming mostly, and that's a shame.

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This is a great game man. Good work. Some things are hard to figure out, to get things to trigger, even with walk thru but other than that it is great. Definitely going to throw some money your way.