glad you responded vvalen! because you are basically half the posts of this entire thread, i am especially curious about your opinion.
1. what do you rate this game as of today?
2. what do you think will happen in 1-2 years to change your rating of this game.
Well, seeing as you asked nicely. Story wise I love it. Probably give it an 8/10 there. But primarily it’s main plot, most of the side quests are dependent on knowing a lot of internet folk and game devs. So every reference isn’t gonna be gotten. The humor is divisive that I know, but having grown up on things like South Park, it felt more usual to me.
Gameplay wise I’d go with a 7. The fact that it is an actual game goes a long way. I like that there’s actually shit to do, as opposed to most other h-games. VN’s where ya just hold the space bar til you get to the branching story choice, match-3 style games, or the dozens of RPGmaker style games. Not to knock them, but I do appreciate that there’s some effort required. Even so they were considerate enough to add a skip system into the current version for those that have difficulties. The ship combat could use more variety than just enemy type and special weapon of choice. They’ve adding different mission goals, but things like power-ups or different music would be nice. That’s what they’ve done with Grid combat, which has been improving in my opinion.
Now in regards to the smut. It’s been hit and miss, primarily due to the nature of early access development. I knew from the start it was gonna be the most derided part of the game, from its small starting plate, to the length of the animations. And while the variety is nice to have, obviously not every scene will appeal to everyone. That being said, it’s still a work in progress, and I don’t wanna be too harsh on something that might be entirely different by the time we’ve reached 1.0
Full voice acting is also a huge blessing, as so many other games are only partially voiced, or use generic moans during its smut. Much as I like NLT’s games, seeing most of their sex scenes have about 3-4 voices among like 12 ladies isn’t exactly fun for the fapping.
Devotion quests are coming, and they’ve been told to be lengthy quest-lines with personal character interaction. And I can only hope the cinematic lovemaking at the end of it will make some people happy. Given each is supposedly a good few minutes, and there’s 10 ladies to do it with, you might very well end up with a 30 minute compilation of lovey dovey
But if I have to give it a number in its current form it’d probably be a 3. Because there’s really only a few scenes I’ll go back to watch when I feel like it. And much like a lot of people have been saying here, I like a bit of context to go with the smut. While I choose to interpret Pandora as all the fucking the crew is doing during the time in between missions, I’d appreciate if there was more to it.
I know I have the rep of basically being a sycophant for the dev, but that’s just due to me being a lifelong supporter, day 1 of their Patreon days and all. It’s easier to have faith when you see they’ve done everything they intended to do.
Do I think the game is perfect? Of course not, no game is. But I do feel it is leaps and bounds ahead of any adult game. I can’t really go back to non-voiced games after this, the difference is just jarring. Much like their films did, I think this game’s success is raising the bar for adult games. Is it taking long to develop? Yes, but I see plenty of other games here that have started back in the 2010’s as well that are still aren’t finished or were abandoned (looking at you Milfy City). Game dev isn’t easy and not everyone has the endurance for it. But since the first lengthy period between launch and the Ela update they’ve stayed consistent with updating the game in a timely fashion.
Lastly, given the game is also training their animators in the engine’s use for future films, the difference between their SFM films and UE4 ones will be astronomical. Given what they could do with an ancient unsupported program like SFM, imagine what they’re gonna be doing with a significantly better toolset is just mmmm.
So I’d say don’t lose hope on the game, as we’re only 6/10 gals in and a lot more to go and update
