RPGM - Completed - Succubus Rejects [v1.00] [hnrdigitalstudio]

Review of the full 1.0 version of the game.
This game is quite good, with well-made character models, decently titillating lewds, and really selling the atmosphere when it comes to being dark and gritty.
Unfortunately, that's all the good things I have to say about this game.
The darkness may sell the atmosphere, but also adds a "where the hell do I go?" factor, not helped by the monochrome aesthetic or lack of conveyance beyond a basic quest menu. I'm not asking for a map or waypoint system, but some way of figuring out where to go besides literally fumbling in the dark would've made this game more accessible (unless inaccessibility was the entire point, in which case it works). Given the limited resource and inability to farm for XP, money, or items it's clear the devs were going for a resource management-focused gameplay similar to certain survival-horror type games.

Tl;dr
Pros

• Dark fantasy atmosphere with some morbid humor sprinkled
• Decently titillating
• Somewhat open-ended; at least two ways to resolve roadblocks.

Cons

• If you don't like blindly flailing in the same dark biomes for 10-15 minutes until you finally stumble upon wherever you're supposed to go, you will not like this game.
• Monochrome aesthetic with occasional color splashes can be hit or miss, especially with how everything is already dark and hard to see.
• Potential to softlock yourself and brick a save due to certain choices, meaning save editing becomes unavoidable.
• As far as I can tell, no gallery or free battle mode to leisurely enjoy scenes or the H-battle system.

Overall, 6/10. I would rate this higher, but I am currently writing this review in the throes of darkness-induced disorientation and subsequent motion sickness due to the lighting and color aesthetics of the game.

This review loses a lot of stars, it's a "decent" game but ultimately an empty RPG maker adventure game. The biggest star it loses is due to why I quit playing, a soft lock.

First off I like the premise, though I felt that the game sort of jumped the gun on the first sex scene, she seemed to go right for it with no hesitation, also the inclusion of the mechanics of having a bow but losing it and never getting to use it just to have the first option in the combat menu rendered useless seems odd. The idea of running around draining the life force out of people is something many people will enjoy.

The mechanics seem to pile on pretty quick, you get fully built before your first job upgrade and you don't really get any additional powers for the second and third chapters. You can seduce pretty much everybody, though the "anti-succubus" crystals are put in places where the dev clearly wanted to skip out on dialogue.

That does lead to the first MAJOR knock off of a star here, and that is the fact that you can seduce shop keepers, and doing so drains them and you can't shop from them any more. There's a "benefit" to doing this, but if you don't buy enough lock picks before screwing the guy that sells them then you can soft lock your game when you need more of them. This is because the game is heavily designed around save scum, where you're permanently punished for mistakes with the only option to reload the game. There's no recovery.

Second the encounters are all pre-placed, this means that there's a defined grind, defined amount of experience, chest loot is pre-defined (and there's lots of empty chests that cost lock picks which goes back to the save scum design problem). There's no way to recover if you don't have enough gold to buy all the lockpicks you need, lockpicks raise in price at some point which can mean not stockpiling early makes it super expensive. Frankly the design of all of this is mostly frustratedly cursing the game for not having a load game feature without backing out to the menu. This is where we lose the second star, the design is frustrating because the balance got "patched" by simply raising prices. Empty chests requiring a lock pick that is used up is an absolute gaming sin, and yes, that alone is enough to carry a loss of a star.

The character design is where it loses yet another star, and that's because of character consistency, yes yes I'm the guy knocking games down a star for the "big titties" tag, and while I WILL say that the big titties are mostly designed ok, my issue is the fact that the progression of the characters is they get to be more powerful succubi which makes the characters we liked for having their modest breasts are quickly replaced with balloon boobies. I push for body type diversity. You can have the big breasts, but it's cursed to lure people in with other body types just to have them transform into the same body type we've seen over and over again. Something I tire of with "transformation" is that it's always about trending towards that same "ideal" body type. I don't mind it happening, but at the very least the rogue of the party could have gotten even flatter to at least acknowledge the existence of other ideals.

Ultimately I was happy with the lack of "subscribe to my patreon" and demand for people to donate to their project. And I do hope to see improvements on future releases, but my major concerns are definitely the potential to soft lock the game with the hard requirement for lock picks and dispel scrolls and not having a farmable way to get money. Honestly, at least for the third chapter, she offers you a bed to sleep in, why can't we use that to full heal and respawn all conquered enemies, even the shop keepers in case you screw something up? I'll definitely try the game again if a patch comes out that addresses any one of these three major issues.

Great start. Off the rip, it's actually a good RGPM game which in and of itself is crazy. Also the dialogue doesn't make me want to blow my brains out so it's already better than 95% of games on the site. The animations, art style and renders are all clean and well made. The characters have personalities and aren't 2D sexdolls. There's a few grammar and spelling mistakes but I don't really give a shit. Will be watching this game closely and praying the Dev doesn't drop it after two updates.

[v0.25]
A good start, but needs more h-content

-Story, Originality
You downloaded "Darkwood" from F95.

-Renders
Interesting filters for Koikatsu 3D models.

-Sound
Okay sounds (overall).

-Playability
Standart "you walk, fight, get corrupted" gameplay, with unique visuals.

-Performance
Runs okay.

-Bugs
Didn't see any.

-Animations
Okay animations.
A little too stuttery for me.

-Voice Acting
No voices.

-Grammar
Didn't see any mistakes.

-Amount of content
Several h-scenes and a lot of potential.

I hope it'll grow nicely.

0.25 review:
Good game. A good plot, adequate dialogues, pleasant characters and animations. The gloomy style and the top view stand out separately. The updates contain a good amount of content. Definitely worth keeping an eye on this game.

0.01 review:
Short game, essentially a demo, but it hits it from the beginning.
Koitatsu models well done and fit the general theme of the game.
Top down world map which is quite different from the usual isometric view, it takes a second or two to orientate yourself to but it is a nice throwback to the games of yesteryear.
Sex, plenty of scenes although they are repetitive and basic. Hopefully will be expanded upon in later versions.
Gameplay, in essence run round suck/fuck a village, after getting the head of your life from the demon queen. Battle fuck is the basics of combat, but this time you are the one doing it.
Bugs, I couldnt find a way to close the succubus stats page, could open it, but had to restart the game.
Length, ~10 minutes, basic story and ~11 dudes to fuck.

Hope the dev keeps up with this one, it has real potential.