VN - RPGM - Abandoned - Saria Reclaimed [v0.17] [Velminth]

Made with rpgmaker, but you can barely tell.

Good:
The art direction is the strongest point, the art design is like half fantasy, half bleak sci-fi remniscient of Dune.

Meh:
1. The level design is spaghetti-liked, reminiscent of Dark Souls, it's even hinted at with the "bonfires" you rest and teleport at. It's ambitious but didn't feel great in this game format.
2. The level exploration is simplistic, with no way to avoid enemies, unlike Dark Souls. Moving through levels feel slow because of all these forced fights.
3. The game actively tries to get the player fucked: Stamina resets between fights, but not arousal.

This is easy, but time consuming. battle voiceline making things weird, there is still a lot more that can be added (by this time, I played the latest version). But I don't think I'd be playing it. Good chara anyways, and somehow I just killed all the npc except the one that won't let me (Shy).

My relationship with this game has been severely mixed; on the one hand, it does so many things well I want to like it. On the other hand, the have been so many technical issues that most versions I can't even get to the opening credits sequence.
On this version, Version: 0.10.3 I could, so let's see how things changed since about 0.6?

TL;DR:
Combat is whack. +5 armour\level means you become invincible by level 3. (-1*)
No lore progression, extremely minimal plot progression. Okay, we killed the bandit guy, whoop-dee-woo. Beyond that, we've had neither lore nor plot progression whatsoever. (-1*)
Narrative clash. (-1*)
Quick updates and attentive developer. (+1*)
In total: 3/5.

Before we get into points, one thing I very much dislike is how lowering corruption of one body part reduces the pleasure of enemies who aren't interested in that body part. It doesn't make sense logically (they aren't directing their attention at that body part anyway, their eyes are glued onto another part) and it just hurts people who don't want their Saria to do something in particular.

• About the art: There's a lot more art, although some cut-ins are still missing. Still, it's high quality images, and in a few updates it'll probably all be filled in. No complaints in this department.
• Gameplay: Somehow, in this version Saria seems to gain 5 armour per level up, meaning that by level 6 no enemy in the game can hurt her, not even for 1 damage. And this is on normal mode, not easy. I'm not sure what's going on there. I'm tempted to not list this as a negative, since most players who play beyond the modest amount of content (which barely covers two hours if you're new and less than an hour if you're a veteran) will just be grinding lewd stats via the combat and stamina damage is the least of their concerns, but if that was the reasoning I'd have expected the patch notes to say something about it, and I couldn't find anything. So yeah, 5 armour a level up? Serious issue that trivializes combat.
• Content: As mentioned above, it's a modest amount of content. Few maps, some enemy variety though sadly most of the enemies don't seem particularly interested in Saria (potted hermits? bonepickers? harpies? etc etc) and the cut-ins don't reflect who\what you're currently interacting with, so all the enemies - be they human or not - look like precisely the same one single human man. Still, it's worth remembering that this thing gets updated quickly, so I ain't gonna pillory the game for the amount of content.
• Bugs: Now hear me out, I've been ranting and railing about the bugs in this game since 0.2, but I think I tracked the majority of my issues to a single cause. The trog pair at the exit of the cave on the second map, but only if you're exiting the cave into fighting them. I've been sent to the bottom of the map outside the playable area numerous times, I've been teleported to an entirely different area and some other issues besides. Why, don't ask me, I'm just a layman. But beyond that one thing, 0.10.3 seems to run surprisingly well.
• Lore: I think this is my biggest disappointment with the game. So far, nothing's been done with the premise. All these star shards and gemstones and whatnot have been put to no use, go nowhere and are just glints of what might otherwise have been an interesting and engaging plot. And what's up with that celestial construct on the map after the hound? Been half a dozen updates or so and don't look like we're going to find out.
• Ludo-narrative Dissonance: I've mentioned this before about the imp girl that sells you effigies, and I'll mention it again with the new art for the lewd mark girl, bright pink colours just don't gel with the dark, depressing browns, blacks and greys of the rest of the game. It doesn't fit. The same could have been said for Saria's blue hair, but at least she doesn't have glowing pink eyes. Is this a Lovecraftian celestial horror type game with monsters from beyond the veil of time and space (Celestial Hound, that Sentina the Smuggler, that strange gem we can find and the celestial construct mentioned above)? Is this an anime game? This clash just doesn't work

If you are considering playing this, I'd recommend to hold off until the +5 armour\level up gets fixed at the very least. Also, if the cut-ins for the actions you're interested in aren't available yet, you should consider holding off for those too.

well, the game is interesting, entertaining and the way to play it is easy. Until now, I consider, the game has a great future, I look forward to seeing the final result, and above all, more scenes and prostitution.

Promising but rough and light on the NSFW content.

The combat and map design immediately stand out in Saria Reclaimed. Enemies deal Stamina damage, but Saria also uses Stamina for her attacks. Stronger attack costs much more Stamina to use, so you have to weigh whether you go all out to finish off an opponent. Or take a breather to let Saria withstand the next attacks.

The Map design brings to mind 2d platformers instead of your dime a dozen RPG maker maps. Frankly, I frequently forgot this is an RPG maker game because of that.

Unfortunately, the hentai content is in need of some serious pacing improvements. The smashing of reproductive parts together is tied to Saria's current "corruption" level. That rises if she's horny or if enemies are doing lewd acts. When corruption is low, the enemies jerk off or say crude things at her. To get actual sex, you have to grind, grind, and grind for Saria to gain corruption. For an example of just how tedious this is Saria has 8 different parts enemies can lewd. Each part needs anywhere between 20 and 40 corruption before they can engage in actual penetration or rubbing. When an enemy does a lewd act, it increases by 1. When Saria is horny, one random part gains 5 corruption. Also, corruption is reset between battles.

There's even more reasons on why it takes so long for the sex to happen, but I doubt I need to go on.

??? The fuck ???

This would be hilarious if it wasn't sad. When I first tried this game, it had its share of problems (old review under spoiler at the end, for posterity), but at least it was clear what this game was supposed to be: a stylish Karryn's Prison with a more open-world narrative. Yes, the combat system was really grindy if you wanted to get Saria down on all fours, but there were some promises baked in, with expansive talent trees (that yes, were useless because the talents were over-nerfed, but they could have been made interesting with a few strategic buffs that never came by).

The lack of narrative back then was the game's asset, at least in my opinion. There was something alluring with Saria being a nobody who just got in trouble for stealing from the wrong guy and having to navigate a harsh desert because of that. The 2D RPG part, styled as sidescroller instead of regular top-down view also looked nice, unique, and immersive.

Then the dev tried to change that, adding a hard-structured narrative about some nonesense of serving some Golden Gilded Queen (sic! I do love my royally buttered butter), and a card game. All of that was hit and miss in my opinion, but the core 2D RPG remained. All it needed was more lewd, and a reasonably balanced combat progression.

Come 0.16. Wew lad. This is now a Visual Novel with a very dumbed down card battle, and even in this dumbed down state the dev does not have a clue how to balance it. The 2D RPG aspect is completely gone. The talent trees are gone. Saria's resources, like focus, basically gone. Inventory, gone. 75% of lewd content, maybe even more —you guessed it— gone, we're back to version 0.3 in terms of content. This game was not perfect. But it just got worse.

It is hilarious that my reaction 18 months ago and my reaction today is an identical "THE FUCK???" but for entirely different reasons. That said, this is the part where I say ha! I had a premonition back then:

The fact that it's version 0.3 and there is no working or slightly balanced prototype of core mechanics is... worrying.

Click to expand...

This dev does not know what game they want to make, and so an attractive and honestly unique chocolate muscle mommy Saria is probably never leaving developement hell. Shame, really.

Review as of version 0.3.1

This game looks very promising and I guarantee you, in terms of quality it's as good as some of the top H-games we've probably both played (it's a shame I can't mention what games I'm referring too, but it's against the rules).

Pros:
+ Cute dark-skinned tomboy protagonist (I've just figured out it's my thing)
+ Character art is gorgeous, neither too 3D, nor looking like it was made in 2010
+ Skill/corruption trees both look very promising
+ Wide array of fetishes (forced, bestiality, probably more coming in the future)
+ Corruption messages during battles are very immersive
+ The gameplay is fun, quite dynamic for this type of game
+ Author is very active on his discord channel, so integration with fans (or answering their suggestions/questions) is a thing


Cons:
- Personally I don't like the new map artstyle, but it's a subjective thing, so I don't really take it into the account
- Few minor bugs, which is expected at this stage of development
- Lack of content, which is also an expected thing for a 0.3 version
- The H-scenes (the art/animation) can feel a bit static; it's just one way of doing it and I don't really mind it that much, but if it bothers you, there's a possibility you could not dig them; still should try out the game though

In summary: judging the game at it's current state, objectively speaking it definitely deserves 5 stars instead of just 4 stars (contrary to what one could expect from my review); the bugs will definitely be fixed later, content will be added, and if everything goes well, in my opinion it will definitely be in the top 10 H-games to ever come out. Highly recommend trying it out!

To sum it up, this game is like Karryns Prison, but in the really early stage of development.

The art is gorgeous, gameplay is fine right now and looks like fun if developed further, overall it looks like second KP which is amazing.

There are three reasons it didn't get a 5 stars from me:
1. Way too many corruption stats that are risen seperately - in KP it was sometimes a chore to focus a specific stat with just 5 areas, here we have 9.
2. Not that much content as of yet means repeating the same fights for grinding corruption.
3. This is a RPG MZ game, not RPG MV so while cheat menu mod still works, the more important (for me) speedhack doesn't, bummer.

Still, with more content/updates this will be an amazing game and the flaws mentioned ealier will be most likely worked out, especially since the game is only 2 months old on this site as of the time of writing this review.

The game got reworked into a VN card game, so I have reworked the score to reflect that.

Some content got cut, the gameplay was changed and it's a VN now, on it's own as a first release I could give it 4/5, as a v0.16 it would get 3/5, but considering what it has been and the way it's heading I give it 1/5.

Also, despite changing into VN it's still RPGM, which is not the best engine for the job (before changes engine was a non issue, I have nothing against RPGM when it fits the game).

Nice. Very nice
The game is similar to Karryn's Prison, which is good.
Interesting setting, excellent drawing, derogatory main character
I don't know what else to write
I hope the game doesn't get abandoned :/

This has the potential to be on par with Karryn's Prison(or even surpass it given time. Cutin's are great,general art is good, but I will have to wait to give the final thoughts about perk trees once they are finished. Thank you Velminth for making this game, good rpgm games are really proverbial needle in a haystack.

Amazing game I hope you can finish it in time! Still there is a long way a head of you but I hope you will make it! I loved every second of playing it! And the charchter design is amazing too, such good looking and the muscles help too!

[v0.1.2]
it's very early in development but looks promising.

It seems, that the developer have focused firstly on the overall mechanics rather than putting CG, which is okay. However, if you're thirsty for those images, you'd need to wait bit longer.

Pros:
+ great art
+ good mechanics
+ well designed UX
+ enjoyable (the progress is actually fun)
+ Little to almost no bugs
+ Slow but polished development strategy

Cons (but it's still early dev):
- Skill tree could be a little more various
- The background could be more interesting
- It would be nice to see more loot and interactions

Conclusion:
Great game, totally recommended to try out. Keep in mind that it's still very early alpha, so don't have too many expectations

Very promising game honestly. [version v0.1.2]

Pros:

+Cute Tomboy protag.
+Detailed Virginity-Corruption system.
+Good art.
+Karryn's prison like battlefuck system.
+Detailed skill tree.
+Can kill npcs like Blacksouls.
+Good platformer.

Cons:
-Lack of content.
-Lack of cg.
-Not losing virginity despite getting penetrated???
-Text only npc lewd interractions take too long (It shouldn't take like 15 turns for someone to ejaculate)

Summary:
The game shows good potential and i'm looking forward to it however it has barely any content in it at the moment.

I believe this game beginnings will seem humble, so prosperous will it future be. I love this character. it just made only week ago, but i belive it will be good fuckin game. if you like dark, tanned skin, will be glad when this game be completed.

Many others are being a touch critical as they are expecting a full and entire game when this is simply the initial release, little more than a demo. However if one were to look at just explicitly the demo, they would see a gem of the caliber of Karryn's Prison or other highly regard H-games. The art is phenomenal, the character looks unique and attractive. The game will surely progress to great places.

The game in it's current state when looked at as just a demo is clearly five stars.

May be a preemptive five star rating, but I really like what I've seen so far. As others have stated, the author clearly has derived inspiration from Karryn's Prison, which I see as a good thing. What really caught my interest is the inspiration from Lisa, from the vertical RPG gameplay to the style of the atmosphere and NPC interactions. The author has explicit plans that they are updating daily on Trello and is fully transparent on the development route while being responsive to feedback (the v0.1 bugs were fixed in a couple of days). Very impressive for a 0.1, seems extremely promising and definitely looking forward for future updates.

Edited for [0.16]

I don't know what happened. The buggy but very promising game was gone, now it's just your run of the mill VN. Even the hot, muscular tomboy couldn't save it at this point. The dev seems to just... Gave up? Well, regardless, if you're interested in this game current version--don't, it's bad. Find the previous versions when it's still buggy but the charm of passion still existed. Alas, such a shame.

A little bare-bones at the moment, but has a very unique aesthetic we don't often see in RPGMaker games.
The limited content it has is well polished if a little buggy (e.g. some items can't be picked up)

as of version .1.2 there is a lot of potential to be a great game but needs some work. only a few cg adding more def needs to be the first priority to improving the game. similar fight and rape system to karryns prison but alot more simple. a ton of potential to be a great game, the few cg avaliable are really hot.

So, I realized I had this review here from the 0.1 version, now having played the various releases since then and the latest v0.16.0 and oh biy.

So, the game seemed to be going along a decent line of development, including the card game system introduced. And then the v0.16.0 dropped on itch.io. It has changed the basic premise from an actual rpg to a VN with rpg fights that basically have no real RPG elements in them.

It this had been the original premise, or had been pitched as a remake version of the game this would be fine. However, this isn't the case and is a continuation of the previous version while ripping out like 95% of the previous content.