VN - Ren'Py - Echoes of Deception [v0.40] [MadKoala]

Nice choices and the storyline is interesting. Like Jessica O'Neil's Hard News, though, it's the main character's look that really makes this shine. Recommended especially strongly for those who enjoy corrupting a sexy female protagonist.

My Ratings for this Game:

PROS
+ Great Characters
+ Good Story
+ Different Ages
+ Long Game Play

CONS
- Update take to long
- Just teasing scenes

STORY: 4/5
The Story starts off Good with Suspense and crime

Gameplay: 4/5
Gameplay is easy going and easy to understand, the female MC is sexy and the males of different ages and looks.

CONCLUSION: 2/5
The Game is Great, but the Updates take too long, and then the updates only contain some licking or blowing, and that is what kills the Game.

RECOMMENDATION.
Worth the Download & but not worth paying money for a Game with so little action and release dates.

+ music
+ interesting story
+ Diana is cool, beautiful girl with strong personality
+ renders

- forced lesbian content. I picked all choices to avoid Sheril but still got h-scenes with her
- sex scenes are boring, it's only few renders with description, that's all. Most disappointing part of the game

Decent avn with good story. 3 stars from me

[0.30] - overall rating: 2/10 (lowered from 3/10).

Gift-wrapped verbal diarrhea.

THE GOOD

The story has an interesting premise of infiltrating the crime syndicate that isn't explored as often as it should.

The music and SFX are decent.

The GUI in an upgrade over a typical one, so there's that.

THE NEUTRAL

The choices do not seem to matter a lot right now. The typical "good option" vs "bad option".

The GUI is, in fact, an upgrade over the stock, but the "puzzle" sections are completely redundant and needlessly annoying.

THE BAD

Let's start with something lighter - the renders.

They are, for the most part, pretty terrible. What hurts even more is the fact that select shots are actually well done and show that the artist knows what they're doing. Sadly, there are maybe a dozen genuinely good renders in the entire game.

Firstly, it's ironic that the developer decided to not render characters with their lips open for the dialogues, yet they are cranking out an enormous amount of shots for literally anything else, fidelity be damned.

Secondly, there are a lot of inconsistencies with how the lighting works across the game's scenes and the timeline. One moment the room is bright with sunlight, the next it's apparently close to dawn with lots of shadows.

Thirdly, and most importantly, the renders were made hastily and it shows. Whatever denoiser and post-FX the dev is applying are ruining the presentation. Character faces turn into shapeless, smeary blobs and the backgrounds are usually so pixelated and blocky that even the generous amount of blur cannot fix it. This, combined with the above two points, makes for an absurdly ugly viewing that sees little to no motion or action. What good are the 1500 renders the game has if 1400 of them are assaulting your eyes...

Alright, let's talk about the writing.

I have to give my praise to either the writer or proofreader for getting the grammar correct. You can tell they are proficient in English - punctuation is pretty much on point and so is the spelling.

I cannot say the same about the writing itself.
It feels like the game's author/writer has an identity crisis in regards to the characters they have created. There are multiple instances where the "sophisticated and wordy" presence that the narrator exudes spills over to the actual dialogue. The author opted for the "all-seeing narrator" setup, but forgot that the characters are not supposed to share the same knowledge.

Example: Diana, the MC, speaks to a young man about a girl involved in a rape case, but he says that the girl left and he has no idea where she went. The Detective then breaks into the man's apartment at night only to find the boy in an act with a girl. The narrator then tells us that this girl is the one that the MC was trying to find. Diana, in her thoughts, comes to the EXACT same conclusion. How does she know that? Was she shown a picture of the girl? And if so, why didn't WE, the players, get to see that?

The above is ironic since the game LOVES to hear itself talk. The narrator literally drowns us with the most pointless information in every single sentence. Did Diana just sit by her desk? Let's describe the texture of the paper and the smell of the pen that she's holding. Did Diana got involved in a fight? Let's add how it's her expertise in Krav Maga that helped her stun the opponent. JUST. FUCKING. STOP. Give us a room to breathe, please. How are we supposed to focus on the plot if you're piling unnecessary overexposed garbage right in front of our eyes?!

Lastly, the game's plot is going nowhere. The pacing of the MC being involved in a "deep undercover covert operation" is pitiful. I get that we are supposed to slowly but surely get closer to inner circles and workings of the mafia, but making the player go through yet another "MC stands butt-naked in front of the window and reminisces about the events and life in general" is extremely disrespectful. For a "trained veteran detective and police office" MC is surprisingly touched seeing one dead body. So much so that she needs to take a day off that she spends with her not-Son, but not really because he's one-dimensional and utterly boring.

Oh, I almost forgot about the sex scenes, but apparently so did the developer. No build-up, no sensuality, just a couple of static renders and job done. And lots of overdescriptive sentences. Lots.

Overall, this game, as fresh as it is, needs a major remake on all fronts. Stay away if you value your sanity.

Update: I finished the 0.30, after much suffering. Firstly, the game just abruptly ends with no obvious way to go back to the main menu. Secondly, the proofreading effort have definitely waned during the latest content (many sentences end with a comma for some reason). Thirdly, the plot flow makes even less sense with different events separated with a quick fade. Fourthly, the renders are still terrible. And to top it all of, the obvious plot holes and overdescriptive language spoiling every ounce of mystery or fun are more pronounced than before. Score lowered to 2/10.

I do really like this game, the quality of the render and even enough the plot.

What I do not like are the sex scenes, so poorly represented, just few images, almost a checkbox exercise.

Sex scenes should be built, contain eroticism, be long and well described.
If the dev is more interested in developing its plot rather than exploring the adult aspect of the game, just do not make adult games and stick with normal games without any sex.

That is the biggest disappointment for me!

For the rest it is a well written game.

Version 0.40.
Again great plot and render, but the sex scenes are really dull, poorly represented and really don't give credit to this good game that allegedly should be an adult game too

Holy molly, this is so good. Feels like a mix of AWAM and JOHN. One of the best freaking game I played like ever. Pace is good, writing is good, models are top notch, story is A+.

Version played: v0.20

The first 15-20mins of this game, I was like "holy shit this could be awesome ", but unfortunately... at least for me, after getting the actual assignment to infiltrate the mob bosses network try to bring him down. The game just devolves into nothing but her going to work for a few minutes, choosing to be nice or strict with her coworkers, and then going back home spending all her time with the kid Jason. After that point almost half the game is just spent piddle farting around teasing a playing with a little kid. That's just not my thing, if the dev wants to get back to the original premise and plot that he setup in the beginning and involving some of the actual adult characters, the good and the bad and choosing how to deal with them, then I'll gladly a update this review, but if all I got to look forward to is her messing with little boys... Well like I said that's just not my thing. I'm not into that kinda stuff, and this is just quickly going in the wrong direction for me.

Excellent renders. MC is beautiful and the renders are done very well. Storyline so far is also good. Would appeal to those who like slow corruption. The teasing could be done better ( personal opinion).

The game is actually good.

+Sexy, Believable, MILF, wife FMC. I'm usually not into FMC, but this one is an exception. MC is not some brain dead whore with nothing to lose. Even when you go for degeneracy, the overall situation is believable and Hot.

+Amazing Story. Most adult games have a corny story with corny plots, not this game

+Green Eyes

+Italian characters

I really like this game from the start.
Pluses:
+ Hot and beautiful female protagonist.
+ Quality of renders is awesome.
+ Interesting Story.
+ Content per update is enough.
Minus:
- No animations so far, but Dev said when he will upgrade GPU they will be present in game. I believe in this.
Overall very solid start and I hope this project in future will become very popular

I have seen games with excellent graphics and very bad story ,but this one has very good graphics and story that makes you believe it is true. Reminds me a bit on Jessica O Neal Hard News ,but still its amazing to play it for sure. Its not slow and its not to fast ,very logical and has a lot of potential to go on top 10 games. Just keep it smooth,and try to invest more in graphics and animations. This game deservers it. Also keep updating it on weekly base and dont hasitate with story upgrading,adding new characters etc. I will keep this game as my favorite. You have a lot to do more beacause this game si very good. Sorry for my english in advance.

Rendering: Excellent
Appearance MC: wonderful
MC's personality: Excellent, he is not a sloth, he has a heavy personality
Appearance and personality of other characters: between good and very good
Story: attractive and logical
Logic: Slowborn and logical
Writing: Most of the time excellent
Atmosphere: Excellent
etc.: Excellent!

Inteesting and unique premise, with the main character working for an undercover espionage/police government department. Her being confident in herself and her strength is a nice touch, as well as her other side which has love for her family. Hopefully this allows for a variety of interesting scenes and kinky routes at work and at home/daily life. The game is also well written, and CGs nice. The point and click are simple enough, nothing too grindy which is good. The character models are also great and unique and not ones that have been used to hell. Overall, a very nice and much appreciated female protagonist game that I'll def be checking in on.

WOW! great story great art i love it really teasing and dont overdo it really wel done! love you! Continue this way my friend, would love to see her in more Lingerie and that stuff really wish to be able to change jasons name thasts it

Great renders. Visually, it is very appealing. Game-wise, though, not much to be impressed by. The choices are opaque, not offering anything more than hint of what you're choosing. Point-and-click puzzles are insultingly difficult. The story tries to be ambitious, but ends up lengthy to the point of tedium.

very good start for .2 update there is a lot of content the renders are very good. the story is different to what you usually see on here. This game has a lot of potential If each update is every month with as much packed into each this game will 100% go far

the game as a whole is cool, but you can kill more time and make a perfect and beautiful game about a policewoman and pay attention to the world around you, too, you can make everything else beautiful too

Great start to a VN. This is a high quality game with high quality renders and high quality writing. I am looking forward to future updates, but also hoping that more sexual content will be available soon to keep plaeyrs interested.

Review for v0.1
The writing story progression, simplicity of decisions and interactions with the world, CG, FMC character, character designs are fan-freaking-tastic. The only improvement which is very obvious for me is the lack of reactions from Jason or the CGs which show how he is reacting to the situations which he is facing in front of him. Like the The length of the game is more than sufficient for the initial version.
The only hope and request I would make is that....Please for the love of everything don't milk this and make the update frequent and long enough. If needed take help from the community to make things faster, listen to the fans and supporters and finally do not fucking abandon the game. I have my hopes up because this has all the recipe to be the next big thing in this site.