VN Ren'Py The Adventurous Couple [TACOS S2 P3b] [Mircom3D]

[Deleted member 396172]

Hi , i wanted to ask the sharing its optional , and is there a sharing her with females not with males option ?

 

[Segnbora]

Sharing is optional only in the sense that you'll get an early game over if you try to keep Anne to yourself. In any case, there's absolutely no point to playing this particular game if you're not into Anne having sex with other people.

Anne's certainly not averse to women, but in the revamp there's only one opportunity thus far.

 

[PTM666]

In any case, there's absolutely no point to playing this particular game if you're not into Anne having sex with other people.

This should be pinned in the 1st post.

 

[Footiethug]

Iam i bit confused at the moment, do we get chapter 5&6 at the end of july in the next 2 weeks or was it done with the suprising chapter 4 and we still have to wait for 5&6 for august?

 

[PTM666]

That's the million dollar question at the moment

 

[Segnbora]

Mircom3D has been shuffling scenes around, adding scenes — maybe deleting scenes; I haven't cross-checked — so only he knows for sure what's coming next. Personally, I find it more rewarding to pretend the original chapters don't exist and just let the revamp happen. He's already introduced enough differences that whatever follows is unlikely to track scene-by-scene with the previous version.

 

[Alleykatt]

Mircom3D has been shuffling scenes around, adding scenes — maybe deleting scenes; I haven't cross-checked — so only he knows for sure what's coming next. Personally, I find it more rewarding to pretend the original chapters don't exist and just let the revamp happen. He's already introduced enough differences that whatever follows is unlikely to track scene-by-scene with the previous version.

While I understand the need for a revamp and indeed would have called for the revamp if I had been asked, I am still getting a bit itchy for new Anne scenes and the development of the story beyond the last chapter of the original. The revamp is a bit different, true, but it isn't different enough to shake that feeling that you have played it before.

 

[PTM666]

Even if you have, everything is better.

 

[muschi123]

Pretty fun game. Really like Caroline.

 

[Segnbora]

itchy for new Anne scenes

You should look into an ointment for that.

Anne has quite a few completely new scenes already: the woman from the bar, the MMF threesome, Will (I might be wrong about that one), bartender blowjob, teasing rather than straight-to-sex with Eric, and Dre in the locker room. And isn't the old dude fingering her to orgasm at the pool bar also new? That's a lot of fresh Anne material vs. existing material, and all we've lost — or, more likely, had held back until upcoming chapters — is full sex with Eric and sex with Kenny.

 

[sovper88]

Love this game.
Any recommendation for other games like this?

 

[Segnbora]

Any recommendation for other games like this?

There almost aren't, really. Almost all open relationship/swinging/hotwifing/cuckold/etc. games are decidedly slanted towards the woman being seduced away and the man slowly falling into submission, or jealousy, or misery, or worse. Even this game will provide that as a potential path, if it follows the original version.

The closest two (Western) games I've seen to this one are Happy Marriage and My Wife's a Star, though the former is a lot more "excused semi-secret cheating" and the latter is a little messy (though I have hopes that things will work themselves out). There are some other games that play in this realm — Project Hot Wife (really, really female-dominated so far, despite the choices and variables that lead you to play it otherwise; again, the jury's out) and Because I Love Her (initially went in a heavy unwitting cuckold direction, dev pulled back, we'll see what happens). Most everything else is serious cheating, serious NTR, serious femdom, serious Bambi in Lechertown, and so forth.

One of the reasons there's so much enthusiasm for and debate about this game is that it fills a niche almost nothing else has tried to fill: a potentially successful opening of the marriage/relationship. The thing is, I'm still not sure that's what Mircom3D originally intended. But it's certainly how a lot of players "took" what he gave them, and I think a lot of the complaints that led to the revamp were about this desire to see a game in which, if you played it right, either Anne or both Anne and the MC could have a diverse and crazy extracurricular sexual life without devolving into horror. He's still writing that game...it's just that he seems (or at least I hope he's trying) to be writing several others alongside it.

 

[Retromancer]

Even if you have, everything is better.

Yep. Better renders, better storytelling and logic, and more sex scenes. For those who want more development of the "story" as it was left off after the old game, I would ask what story? There were multiple stories that were conflicting with themselves and really impossible to follow in any sense that you could call them a story. I am now a Patreon because of this rework - Mircom's care and attention to it has convinced me that when we do get new scenes beyond the old timeline they will be worth the wait.

 

[Segnbora]

Among the many things that are better in the revamp, one is attention to Anne's motivation. In the original it was all about mindlessly following the emails until they went to Punta Cana, at which point Anne dove in with both holes* and never looked back, though it took her a while to loosen up back home. But it was always in the context of the MC's desires; what he wanted, who he wanted her to flash/have sex with. How Anne felt about it — if she felt anything at all — simply wasn't part of the narrative until very late in the game, at which point it was mostly too late.

In the revamp Anne's not only an active participant in her adventures, we're party to her interest and her excitement. If we play it right, we see her wanting the same for the MC (and if we don't, we see the massive difference in how they view what they're doing). The MC's still being a cad (pending player choices), but there's at least some hope for him. Meanwhile, Anne's sexual odessy is much more consistent: a potential threesome, a potential rendezvous with a woman, the locker room with Dre, exploration rather than just immediately banging away with Eric. Her own sexual drives are part of the plot before she decides that the MC isn't worth her attention, which is a complete reversal of the previous version. Unlike the original, there's now a sense that Anne is into this for her own reasons, but also — and this was the critical thing missing in the original — that she sees how this could add life to their relationship, yet also understands how it could hurt that relationship if it's not done properly. The MC still doesn't see it correctly, and I'm hoping the game will offer her opportunities to correct his mindset.

Another thing that the original sort of halfheartedly introduced was the idea that Anne's sexual past was a lot more adventurous than the early game let on. (Via various Nicole scenes and Marcus on the beach.) This is an idea I've seen in a fair number of written stories: the reserved wife who was sexually ravenous in her younger years and is hesitant about opening that door again because she knows just how dangerous it might be for her relationship. I'm not actually suggesting this because it'd be a branching nightmare, but an ideal game might — if certain conditions apply — switch perspective to Anne a half-dozen chapters in, letting her take control over their games because she's actually played them before.

* One of the odder things in the original was just how long it took for her to engage in anal sex. Chapter 9, right? Given the relentless attention that her allegedly irresistible ass receives, especially from the MC, I find that...unlikely. Either she's done it or she's been fiercely refusing it, but there's no way pretty much all her lovers haven't at least tried. I understand why it wasn't part of the MMF threesome in Punta Cana because that's really early in the game, but it really shouldn't wait until chapter 9 again. A well-behaved MC probably deserves the first shot; an ill-behaved MC should probably lose that honor to someone else.

 

[Retromancer]

One of the odder things in the original was just how long it took for her to engage in anal sex. Chapter 9, right? Given the relentless attention that her allegedly irresistible ass receives, especially from the MC, I find that...unlikely.

First off her ass isn't allegedly irresistible, it IS irresistible. Seriously though, I have also been confused by this and I'm glad it was brought up. She never does it and suddenly she's fine with it and acts like it's nothing unusual? Hope it gets addressed in the revamp and I wish I had commented on this before, it's such an obvious point.

I don't like the idea of perspective switching to Anne, I think players would dislike it and as you said, it would add a ton of complexity. If this game is shaping up the way that I think it is, part of this game is the MC (player) figuring out through gameplay whether Anne is happy or not, if he cares about it and what he's going to do about it. I could be wrong, but there were subtle hints in the first game (and some not so subtle hints in the last reworked chapter) where Anne's reactions to the MC, when getting up in the morning, going to bed etc let the MC know where Anne feels about their relationship through in-game conversation.

I like this better than some sort of "naughty or nice" bar or icons with numbers or whatever in a corner of the screen. It feels more realistic and also more challenging and rewards multiple playthroughs

 

[Segnbora]

First off her ass isn't allegedly irresistible, it IS irresistible.

While I agree, I'm working with in-game text here.

I don't like the idea of perspective switching to Anne

I don't either, but the fact is that a fair bit of the game is played via Anne's POV. You can even read upthread that people who prefer a purer form of netorare-style narrative (which this game rarely is) don't like that we can see Anne doing her thing when the MC doesn't know what she's doing. Even aside from the variable/path inconsistencies of the previous version, a lot of those issues would've been made much clearer if we were playing Anne rather than her husband. In any case, the game already switches perspectives. In an unlimited resource universe, a forced perspective switch would be interesting. But no, I don't want the dev to attempt that.

The Things We Do For Love will, I think, be an incredibly savvy mixed-perspective story that makes excellent use of perspective-shifting. TAC would have to be very different to make that work.

 

[Otyi]

Thanks for this game! It was great.

 

[Retromancer]

You can even read upthread that people who prefer a purer form of netorare-style narrative (which this game rarely is) don't like that we can see Anne doing her thing when the MC doesn't know what she's doing. Even aside from the variable/path inconsistencies of the previous version, a lot of those issues would've been made much clearer if we were playing Anne rather than her husband. In any case, the game already switches perspectives.

This is I think my biggest worry for the revamp and how it manages things. In the original, there was this weird mix the MC being in the encounter, of Anne telling the MC things she had done alone which were done through flashbacks, the Player seeing Anne do things the MC should not see, things hinted at that Anne did but was never revealed, and also the stuff with Kenny where it was sent to the MC via hidden cameras and later Anne's phone. These are a lot of different ways to tell a story and I'm not sure that all these ways mix all that well.

I don't mind the flashbacks or voyeur stuff - that seems standard in a game like this. Where it gets really tricky is giving the Player knowledge the MC should not have or having hints that something happened but it is never revealed (or is revealed down the road), both of these things will take care and skill to work successfully.

I hope it is path dependent - where most sexual encounters down a swinger path should have the MC mixed in of course, in a hotwife/cuck path more flashbacks and voyeur stuff, in a cheating path more hinted at and then later in the game they get revealed. Something like that.

I don't want choices assigned to Anne, in the sense the player gets to assign choices to her. She should make her choices based on how the Player/MC treats her. This is not to take away from Anne's agency, but rather to cut down on complexity. If the Player treats Anne like shit (never sleeps with her and only sleeps with other women) her choice should be to return the favor, not stay loyal. He treats her well and is honest, then he gets to have some fun as well, no arguments or cheating from her. I'd like a Nicole scene where Anne asks the MC to fuck her after he's shown he's been honest about the lifestyle and not a cheater, and she watches and gets off on it.

 

[Segnbora]

Where it gets really tricky is giving the Player knowledge the MC should not have or having hints that something happened but it is never revealed (or is revealed down the road), both of these things will take care and skill to work successfully.

I hope it is path dependent - where most sexual encounters down a swinger path should have the MC mixed in of course, in a hotwife/cuck path more flashbacks and voyeur stuff, in a cheating path more hinted at and then later in the game they get revealed. Something like that.

It seems like a zillion years ago, but that really, really long post I wrote outlining how I thought the game could be fixed had this as one of the ideas. It's pretty easy to implement in the sense that some scenes can just not be shown while on certain paths, though the writing in the "common" scenes needs to be done carefully.

The thing is, I'm mostly here to see the sex. So I'm not particularly interested in a game in which I know Anne is having sex that I can't see. I'm not here for the MC's feelings — I'm not into real netorare at all, or at least not the emotional part of it, even though I pretty much always pursue that path in a game if it's available — I'm here for the swinging/open relationship/hotwifing/etc. So, for me, I want to be able to see everything either character can do. Both sides of the Adventurous Couple.

I don't want choices assigned to Anne, in the sense the player gets to assign choices to her. She should make her choices based on how the Player/MC treats her. This is not to take away from Anne's agency, but rather to cut down on complexity.

In an ideal world I very much agree with you, but in terms of gamecraft I think it's easier for the player to retain at least a little control over Anne. The sex club scene in the original is a case where I think it was useful; we see both the MC and Anne making choices about how they're going to treat that encounter. Whereas something like Marcus on the beach is a perfect example of a scene that should've been driven by existing variables. Assuming (as I think one can) that by that stage there's no reason for Anne and Marcus not to have sex, if we're on an open and honest route she goes ahead and does so. If there are trust issues or if she's cheating then she goes to lunch with him first and they reminisce about all the sex they used to have, which sets him up as a threat/rival. If they're on a swinging path (irrespective of the other variables) she joins the orgy. I don't need it to be a flashback or a recap as long as, if they're on an open/honesty path, it's clear that he knews about it in the aftermath.

MC: "How was your day?"
Anne (path 1): "I ran into an old friend on the beach."
MC: "And did you get reacquainted?"
Anne (path 1) "Of course! Get on the bed and I'll tell you all about it."

MC: "How was your day?"
Anne (path 2): "I ran into an old friend...well, actually an old lover...on the beach."
MC: "And did you get reacquainted?"
Anne (path 2) (hesitates) "Yeah, we did."
MC: "And...?"
Anne (path 2) (impatiently) "We had sex, of course. Isn't that what you always want me to do?"
MC: (thinking) Old lover, eh? I should try harder to make sure she's happy.
[choice] "Babe, would you like a massage?" or (thinking) Never mind, I'm tired and I have to get an early start tomorrow.

MC: "How was your day?"
Anne (path 3): "I ran into an old friend...well, actually an old lover...on the beach."
MC: "And did you get reacquainted?"
Anne (path 3) "Of course, and it was so hot! But it's what happened next that's going to surprise you."
(scene dissolve)
MC: "Wow, that's amazing! I wish I'd been there!"
Anne (path 3): "Join me on the beach one day and maybe we'll both get lucky."

MC: "How was your day?"
Anne (path 4): "Nothing much. More beach time."
MC: "Did you meet anyone interesting?"
Anne (path 4) "The usual attempts and crude pickup lines, but I wasn't interested."

The reason I still want to see that beach scene as it happens is that it gives all these post facto discussions context. We know she's telling the truth, we know she's holding something back, or we know she's lying. Either way the game's giving us feedback on our choices, even if Anne isn't doing it with words.

Actually, thinking back, there aren't all that many consequential choices that the player makes for Anne when she's by herself. I tend to think of choices made for Anne when the MC's present (like what kind of sex she's going to have with the pizza delivery man) as reflective of the MC's desires, whereas deciding what kind of sex she's going to have with the plumber is the sort of choice the player shouldn't be making. (It's weird, anyway; the scene's rendered, just have her give him both a blowjob and intercourse.) I'm trying to remember...does she get to choose whether or not Phil's photoshoot includes sex with his son?

He treats her well and is honest, then he gets to have some fun as well, no arguments or cheating from her. I'd like a Nicole scene where Anne asks the MC to fuck her after he's shown he's been honest about the lifestyle and not a cheater, and she watches and gets off on it.

My recollection of the original is that her telling him she'd like to see him with another woman comes completely out of nowhere and isn't dependent on any previous choices. As for Nicole, Anne's reaction to the MC having sex with her is quite different in the revamp, and that makes sense because the MC is able to tell her about it. I agree with you that I'd like to see Anne take a more active role in encouraging his adventures. Since they've both been with Nicole, there's really no reason there shouldn't be a threesome.

 

[Retromancer]

As for Nicole, Anne's reaction to the MC having sex with her is quite different in the revamp, and that makes sense because the MC is able to tell her about it. I agree with you that I'd like to see Anne take a more active role in encouraging his adventures. Since they've both been with Nicole, there's really no reason there shouldn't be a threesome.

I should actually do a playthrough where the MC cheats. Just looked through the gamecode, and it seems it is a very quick reaction about how she's not mad about it but then the whole thing gets tabled after Nicole gets injured. Yeah, the cuckquean thing came out of nowhere in the original but it should happen much earlier on a more loving/swinging path.