v 0.4 Final
Most of the graphics are pretty good. The animations aren't bad either. I don't get much out of the jiggle animation for every new expression from a girl during dialogues, but it's fine too.
That's about the end of the compliments for this game, because it is tedious. If I had it all to do over again, I wouldn't look at this project until I see a completed tag. The problems with the game are not just bugs, of which there are oh so many. The real problems are the overly complex set of game mechanics, inadequately planned out game design, and awkward, inconsistent dialogues.
In order to trigger events you have to memorize the schedules of a half dozen girls. With 24 time slots in each day and more than a dozen locations in whichever town you happen to be in, this isn't a trivial task. The girls also don't always follow a daily routine, doing certain activities only once every two or three days. Dev gave little thought to the schedule of the NPCs, because often there are time slots in the day where you have three different events you have to choose from, and other hours in the day where absolutely nothing ever happens. There's a time limit on each location as well, so you better have a notes app open with your game plan detailed or you're missing a lot of content. On top of that, the unlock criteria for scenes are too complex: achieve the required intimacy and/or love and corruption, have previously completed an unrelated quest in a certain way, have your charm stat high enough, and answered two questions from different conversations 36 and 60 turns ago correctly, then you get the scene. Didn't get all those requirements done? No problem. That opportunity is gone. You won't see that option again. Also, while NTR might be technically optional in many cases, in order to achieve the corruption levels needed to get to even third base with some of the girls, you have to "outsource" some of the corrupting events. You get to watch, of course. You get to peep on your girlfriend being molested by other dudes, to which your character thinks to himself "Hmmm, she's becoming more open-minded". It's not a once or twice thing, either. Your women and constantly under attack from sexual predators. I actually don't hate NTR in a game, but this way of handing corruption is so weird and unrealistic that I can't get interested in the game. While it's not unique to this game, this conflation of intimacy, trust with generalized lewdness is the problem with NTR in games. The idea that one becomes emotionally close with a romantic partner, parlays that intimacy into something sexual, and that act has a corrupting influence on one's partner is absurd. Just because she was willing to give you a blowjob doesn't mean she's suddenly open to the idea of giving a handie to the biggest asshole she knows. Conversely, just because she got forcibly fingerbanged by a stranger, doesn't mean she's more likely to let her crush do the same. In fact, it's just the opposite.
The travel mechanic in the game is ridiculous. The rules on when time advances or when your chibi avatar advances on the path was not something I had the time to fully figure out. It seems that if you hit an encounter, time doesn't advance, but you may gain credit for the movement before the encounter was triggered. On the frequency of encounters, the code gives a 20% chance on each step, but RNG is weird in Renpy, and the result is that waaaay more then 20% of steps trigger an encounter. The most frustrating thing about travel, though, is when you make camp, and cook a meal, no one ever makes enough food. When you have enough fuel and ingredients, this is a dumb way to code the game. IRL, if you and your friends went camping and the friend who was preparing the meal handed you a tiny piece of chicken after an hour of cooking, you'd ask where the rest is. If he replied, that's all I made, you'd ask why. If he didn't have a good answer for you, you'd take off your belt and start whipping him until he begged your forgiveness and promised to stop being a shitty human being. I have no fucking clue why the dev wanted "insufficient meal sizes when camping" to be a game feature, but it's dumb. It just makes you waste another turn and another 30 seconds of your precious time, doing something that adds no value, advances no plot, but does make you wonder if the whole game is just a troll.
Even though the game is developed in Renpy, you shouldn't treat it like a Renpy game. I'm not sure what about the games variables doesn't work well with the rollback feature, but if you use it at the wrong time or scroll back too far, you will again block yourself out of dialogues for 24 turns. Instead, you should save often and load your saves or the autosaves instead of scrolling back.
With the enormous amount of variables documenting each and every decision you make in the game, you'd expect the characters to react appropriately to the MC, other NPCs, and events, but nope. Your girlfriend shows up unexpectedly in a town you've adventured to. Her reaction to you starts lukewarm and never changes. She's staying in the same inn you are, but you don't gain access to her room, like you have with your party members. Your activities with your girlfriend during your two week stay in this town are not tailored to your relationship status. Characters tell the MC about things, then later he tells those things back to the same character, and they act shocked at the revelation, instead of surprised at the low intellect and poor memory of the MC. The playful, flirtatious themed dialogues are the worst, though. They aren't witty or sexy, just cringey.
Oh, and for the love of god, will someone teach this developer that the word is "butt", not "butts".
I wrote a longer, more comprehensive list of the problems with this game, but I think I've made enough of a point.
