VN Ren'Py STWA: Unbroken [Book 1 Steam] [STWAdev]

[ename144]

Immersion is a shit here. It took me a lot of time to figure out what is actually happening, who am I, who are all those people I suppose to know (tbh I still don't know more than I do). In the introduction I set name of my best male friend(?) from the past, the second one is female and her name cannot be changed. The time until I met the first one I already met dozens of others and it does not seem I have any special relation with him (and never met the female one, just mentioned once) so I don't get the purpose here. There is some kind of Center where MC helps, his friends work there, this is all somehow related with ex-militaries but what, who, why, where it is all big unknown. How am I supposed to make decisions if MC knows those people for years and I have no idea who are they? MC was military but he is also some kind of playboy-celebrity, why is he even MMA trainer? He went to military just after school so when he get all the knowledge of fighting? Not much sense to me, so much questions, so little answers.

Decisions itself are another mystery. I played with Scrappy mod so I saw consequences of each dialogue but... they differs and I still felt blind. Love is confusing since it is often sexual and nonsexual but secrecy? Protect points? Grief? Rival? Acceptance? What does they even mean? I know variables should be hidden for better immersion but still it is a game and not real life, good understanding of made choices are crucial here.

Language level here is on another level based on what I played so far (almost all top VNs). I knew my vocabulary is pathetic but wow, this game made me reconsider installing some language learning app on my phone. I often had to use Google to find meaning of words or idioms which was pretty good actually. Dialogues seems very natural and mature but yeah, non-advanced English players should be prepared to use dictionaries once in the time.

Characters as I mentioned above should be better described from the start. It was annoying to interact with people MC knows for years and I had no idea who are they. Although overall they seem fine, just emotionless of MC kills it all imo. Tbh I skipped like 1/3 of current content because it became so boring... There is nothing happening actually, they keep talking with each other but there is nothing really from it. Amrit seems to be the best character, rest of them are ok but nothing to be remembered of.

Renders are very good, animations are slightly worse but good enough to me.

Sex scenes are very good but hmm... They are lack of something, cannot tell what that is.

Overall it is ok but has far greater potential. I think some kind of encyclopedia could help, something to store all known knowledge, there is just a lot of talking and not much of wider context information which kills gameplay. Still fingers crossed for future development.

I'm more forgiving of the game than you, but you do raise some valid points points. This game was intended to be a slow reveal so a lot of the questions you raise are meant to be revealed bit by bit. Your confusion is, to an extent, intentional. That said, I think there's an argument to be made the game has leaned too far in that direction. The fact the MC's background, personality, and emotional state are still cyphers even as LIs are starting to join the pseudo-harem is... frustrating, to say the least. Likewise Part 5 definitely feels padded, especially after it hinted we were finally going to get into Valentine's backstory only to yell 'psych!' after the cliffhanger.

On your more specific points:
I hadn't thought about how confusing naming the McKnight character might be to someone who never played as that character in the first game. (As has been noted, the game is a loose sequel to Something to Write About: The Author). This game doesn't mention the Author much, probably because it's only tangentially related, but it does give McKnight more prominence in the early game that is probably warranted.

As far as all the 'behind the scenes' points, technically it's your own fault for peeking. But IMHO your underlying point is correct: the game has way too many variables and as a result it's become exceedingly confusing where anyone stands on pretty much anything. In theory, the game looks at the ration of "Love" points to "Friend" points to determine if a LI is romantically interested in the MC. In practice, the game assigns way too many love points to non-romantic actions, and a lot of the Friend points are restricted to borderline rude choices. The myriad of other variables are frequently bundled with those other choices, so who knows how all of them will play out. Again, this is all meant to be hidden so I don't mind it being hard for us to make sense of it mechanically, but I do mind when character actions tied to these points seem inconsistent, and that's been happening for the last couple updates.

Regarding characters, I felt the game did a good job letting me know who the main people in the MC's life were. We learned the basics of Alistair and Amrit in the opening, we learned enough about Elspeth to know why she hangs out with the MC despite being exceedingly private, and we can read between the lines to recognize Viridiana as his honorary little sister even if we're still trying to work out all the details of their backstory. You definitely need to pay attention and be patient, but I felt the introduction is the strongest part of the game.

 

[pet3rquill48]

Vi scene?

 

[Son of Durin]

Vi scene?

Yes.

 

[misfolk]

This game was intended to be a slow reveal so a lot of the questions you raise are meant to be revealed bit by bit. Your confusion is, to an extent, intentional. That said, I think there's an argument to be made the game has leaned too far in that direction.

Word. STWADev loves the JJ Abrams school of mystery box storytelling a bit too much.

 

[Chuck_Bass]

I hadn't thought about how confusing naming the McKnight character might be to someone who never played as that character in the first game.

I had the pleasure of making that mistake. It was a little confusing that you are naming a character who disappears after 3 minutes and never shows up again :\
And the thing that bothers me with Mr. Knight and the MC is Knight says he is going to be in London for a few days and offers the MC to hang out a bit before he goes back to the US and it never happens actually. What kind of childhood friends are they? :\

 

[cxx]

Wrong game.

never wrong game.

 

[Juicer97]

How is this game going is this also a single relationship route game or can you romance multiple or have trio relationship like in his previous game? I was not really a fan of the way the previous game looked, the models looked unappealing except the blonde girl, there was no animation and etc.. But this one seems to have beautiful girls and animations. I am not really a fan of single route games unless the renders and animation quality can really blow me away like in city of broken dreamers, summer's gone.

 

[Chuck_Bass]

How is this game going is this also a single relationship route game or can you romance multiple or have trio relationship like in his previous game?

It's not clear at this point of the game, you can sleep with a variety of different women now and none of them really forcing you into a commitment at this point.

 

[Elduriel]

It's not clear at this point of the game, you can sleep with a variety of different women now and none of them really forcing you into a commitment at this point.

it's pretty much similar to the previous game of the dev so far, so it's not a harem game, up until to the end you can play around with all the girls, but I' expecting in the end you'll have to again pick one or two of them

 

[Ilhares]

The game is being vague about that, but it looks like she was assaulted when she was young

Am I the only person who interpreted the issues as her having been attacked by a large dog?

Word. STWADev loves the JJ Abrams school of mystery box storytelling a bit too much.

Without all the fucking lens flare, at least. Small mercies.

 

[Chuck_Bass]

Am I the only person who interpreted the issues as her having been attacked by a large dog?

LOL
There is a scene where Vi was having a panic attack when she saw a crowd of people, I don't think it has anything to do with a dog.

 

[hysepReC]

LOL
There is a scene where Vi was having a panic attack when she saw a crowd of people, I don't think it has anything to do with a dog.

There was a dog in the crowd when she had the panic attack though. I thought the same thing tbh.

 

[Chuck_Bass]

There was a dog in the crowd when she had the panic attack though. I thought the same thing tbh.

Huh, Just looked at the scene again and you are right, didn't notice it before.

 

[misfolk]

Without all the fucking lens flare, at least. Small mercies.

It's not that mysteries themselves are bad as a storytelling device, it's that when they are uncovered, they should force both the audience and the characters to reassess what's happened up to that point. Right now, we can already guess that Valentine has PTSD and attachment issues because Davis forced him to choose between the girl he loved and the mission, and Valentine chose the mission.

If, for example, he resented McNab, because Davis had put him into a "Shepard on Virmire" situation and Valentine had saved the mission and McNab, then this resentment would be an interesting mystery (even though I don't really like unreliable narrators). But the only twist on the current mystery I can think of right now is Davis not being at fault at all. Which is something we've already seen in The Author.

Or take Vi's scars. Does it really matter if it was a dog or an IED or a propane tank? Not really. We already know that Valentine blames himself for letting this happen and the details are a mystery only to the audience.

 

[Ragnar]

I tried to do a faithful Elspeth route and the game almost forces you to fuck other girls. I mean, How many times do you have to say no to the same girl?
Some girls are really persistent.

 

[Defenestrator.for.traitor]

Which is something we've already seen in The Author.

May I ask what did you refer with this?

 

[cxx]

I tried to do a faithful Elspeth route and the game almost forces you to fuck other girls. I mean, How many times have you to say no to the same girl? Some of the girls are really persistent.

they all need loving.

 

[vogelbeest]

It's not that mysteries themselves are bad as a storytelling device, it's that when they are uncovered, they should force both the audience and the characters to reassess what's happened up to that point. Right now, we can already guess that Valentine has PTSD and attachment issues because Davis forced him to choose between the girl he loved and the mission, and Valentine chose the mission.

If, for example, he resented McNab, because Davis had put him into a "Shepard on Virmire" situation and Valentine had saved the mission and McNab, then this resentment would be an interesting mystery (even though I don't really like unreliable narrators). But the only twist on the current mystery I can think of right now is Davis not being at fault at all. Which is something we've already seen in The Author.

Or take Vi's scars. Does it really matter if it was a dog or an IED or a propane tank? Not really. We already know that Valentine blames himself for letting this happen and the details are a mystery only to the audience.

Depends on what the mysteries are.... It's not that Valentine was forced to chose between the girl he was going to marry and the mission.... They all agreed to the fact it's a do or die mission, their "Momento Mori" tattoos seem to be an indication too.
So the mystery itself is what exactly happened.... Possibly Davis did not share essential information with the team?

Another thing is not only Vi has particular scars, the female CIA member has them too... It's not necessarily connected but the fact they both get shown could mean there is more to it...

We know Elspeth was in a special unit, but it's not clear which one exactly.... Funny enough Valentine meets her the first time on Victoria station, the underground/subway closest to MI6 headquarters.... But neither MI5 nor MI6 are military so it would make more sense if Elspeth was part of the DI, Defence Intelligence....

We know the mission that went wrong included a CIA member (counterpart MI6) and from other info we get in last chapter we know McNab and Valentine served some time not visible without secret service level clearance...

At least that much we can conclude from the strange meeting between the 2 females.... One supplies information to more than one party, and does this in a room that's not in a secure branch office building (she talks about tripwires being evaded)
She mentions having clearance like it's something special, so either she only got to that level now or she got it illegally?
These 2 might be officials for some services like DI, MI5 or MI6.... But they could be rogue agents just the same...

If the ferry sinking was a deliberate action against Davies, it's not unlikely MI5 is looking into it.... But it could also mean Valentine and McNab are targets themselves....

The real mystery seems to be revealed very slowly...

 

[misfolk]

May I ask what did you refer with this?

I mean that we start out thinking the MC had been wronged by Chris, leading to his current situation. Then we finally learn that the only person that had ever hurt him was himself.

 

[Chuck_Bass]

We know Elspeth was in a special unit, but it's not clear which one exactly.... Funny enough Valentine meets her the first time on Victoria station, the underground/subway closest to MI6 headquarters.... But neither MI5 nor MI6 are military so it would make more sense if Elspeth was part of the DI, Defence Intelligence....

I believe the story mentioned several times she was in intelligence.