Ren'Py - The Bum [v0.8.1 Beta] [JTStudio]

I managed to power through this obscenely grindy sandbox game using a combination of console commands, an online guide which should be linked in OP, and the in-game stat cheat menu. Four hours on Sunday plus a couple hours into this week... gone forever, probably wasn't worth it.

Let's dispense with the positives first - if you're into light femdom, as in females being sexually cruel/domineering within the purview of conventional fucking, this game offers a not inconsiderable selection of h-scenes exactly along those lines. Graphics are good to excellent - a unique cartoony 3d style with emphasis on thicc bimbo type models, but also a few conventionally attractive ones.

The story is your standard issue anti-hero with a heart of gold crime drama but refreshingly free of both the "all men are rapists except for the PC" and "anti-ntr" tropes so annoyingly common in pron games . The PC actually has male friends who are sexually active incl with the women he fucks, and it's not presented as some horrible ntr ordeal. Writing/dialogue isn't "good" but mostly manages to avoid the pron game tendency of over-the-top pseudo-drama as substitute for literary talent.

Negatives... *whew* - the sandbox gameplay is tied for first spot in the category of most pointlessly, deliberately byzantine time-wasting porno gaming experience that f95zone has to offer. Even armed with every workaround I could find it took me the better part of six fucking hours to see h-scenes with like four characters and I've probably only covered half of the available content. The content itself btw is around 40 minutes' worth of clicking without the so called gameplay.

Timers for every little interaction, random variables for quest rewards/requirements, horrible time management system, unnecessarily convoluted quest lines - in short, the design is clearly meant to stress the player out rather than entertain them. And yes, I am aware this is a deliberate "creative decision" to simulate the life of a bum trying to survive and what have you. There are far better ways to convey that though, for example ones that do not involve boring or annoying the players.

Someone might object that the grindfest is meant to be "realistic". To them I say - you need to go out more often if you actually think a ren'py sandbox about fucking thicc hoes using the secret PUA technique of giving them drinks and gifts so you can raise their stats to a level where they suddenly think you da man, is a simulation of reality.

Apparently some people love the sandbox. Good for them. Reports indicate however that the vast majority do not. I'm not saying get rid of the sandbox, but a total redo of the stat and quest system would go a long way towards making the game accessible to the average fapper.

4/5 for story and sex scenes, -2 for tedious gameplay and bad design.

Art looks good. Looks like a great sandbox game until.....

I literally die every single time out of the gate just walking around. Two dudes show up and just shoot me. Really terrible starting point.

I would skip this as you can't even get out of the starting area without being shot. Wth is the point of this game anyways? Make your players instantly uninstall? If so, good job!

You know, I wondered why this game has such mixed reviews. It's actually simple. There are hardly a dozen such charismatic and atmospheric games on the 637 pages of the site. There are many complaints about the author, but the game objectively gets better with each update and the author is not afraid of alterations for improvement. Unlike two other authors I respect, his updates come out very regularly, which speaks of his potential and efficiency, and not once a year . Summary. If you are not imbued with the atmosphere, this does not mean that the game is bad, it is not always bad that you do not like it. I subjectively recommend it to those who like Mario Piezo, but without excessive moralizing .

what to say about a game that is good on the graphic point of very good rendering the milf models are excellent but it is a shitty game for all the rest worst sandbox of all time; DEV should have kept the same principle as for GORDON!!!!!

This is a painfully dull, overengineered unintuitive, boring chore to play with messy, annoying mechanics. Add a skip day button or make it less of a bother to do...anything.
To make matters worse, DEV doesn't like being criticized and thinks the choices he made for the worse sandbox ever are good in a game.
Badly written walkthrough put the crown on the whole thing.

To the Developer, i really really want to like this game,But this UI/UX of the game makes me want to pour 5 Liters of bleach in my eyes.

I suggest you fix the UI/UX. Milfcreek has the best UI/UX ever. Simple. Even a mini walkthrough telling you what to do with yourself and every available character in game. It toook me 4 hours to understand that

1. Go to the cops to stop those Mafia guys from harrassing you
2. You need to deliver packages to improve Rep + Make money
3. Once you get to Rep 3/4 and you have enough money,Go clean yourslf at Salon
4. Go get job at Bank
5.Rent Apartment

at this point,I just never went back into the game cause i was annoyed

I am begging you,I like the models in this game very much. Please Fix the UI/UX

Eventually i managed to complete a couple characters but i had to really heavily on the 0.75 walkthrough, the website that shows everything about the game and URM to the point of no return.

I hope the dev doesn't get discourage by the reviews and give up on the game. This game is better than some of the good games on this website

I love this game so mutch.... Dev have made a very good work with characters , renders are totally killers with very good assets and original .The universe is awesome with real mature contents , the plot is about mafia cartel and have a good flow. we follow the MC who seek vengeance and it's refreshing, enjoying multiple protagonist on this story . keep the good work

the game is so grindy thai i need more then 72 hours to complite it , veru update the old save dosn t work . so it s a huge nono. no gallery no dicent walk true in game just hints. this is just stupily grindy. dont waste time

Don't understand way people can't focus on the good side about THE BUM. for me this a excellent game, it is difficult without passing, but this is just a game, and not a mindless gag, as in the novels, of answering dialogue options. The game is unique in that all the heroines are very beautiful, made by hand, and not just minimally altered from other games. Special thanks for the scenes of girls in pantyhose and stockings. I don’t see any disadvantages for such a game in beta status.the story and the new updates maybe one of my favourite games of all times with GORDON. I hope more update this year with better mechanics.to be honest giving it less than 5 stars its just not possible. and the thing that I didnt like is that the game doesnt have enough anal its just the thing that makes the game little bit not that enjoyble.do not forget that the game is still in development and with each new version it improves, so stop suffering and be patient. The developers are doing a great job, look at the updates are coming out stably, other developers take several months to update one and sometimes they just postpone the release and everything is stable here. Yes, you have to start over every time, BUT this is due to the fact that the developers improve the game every time so that we can have a great time.
Pros : excellent graphics, interesting events, stable release of new updates
Cons: start from the beginning but it's not fatal and in the end, join the developer's discord there you can get a walkthrough that will simplify the passage of the game. there's one thing that the MC is not going to get some from Bridjet and only Nestor its gonna tuck her, now tour gonna sah than dont do it its option but the thing is that i want to see sex scenes with Bridjet but not with nestor fucking her at least if its NTR the one thats gonna do it at least its gotta be Enrique and there is not so many new characters some we already seen in gordon.
more the thicc milfs on the game, the story fit a lot with the theme and the role of each character on it, the only thing to me is a bad point, is every each new version you need to start a total new game, the old saves never works, so meaby is that a point to fix, but the other things on the game are really good.
anyway bestluck for you dev and keep good working. by a way Bella and Licinia is SUPER HOT MILF!

This review will be about the mechanics, the designs and the scenario:

Firstly, I like the mature and big bodies. There are no other alternative games with these designs. There are at least 4-5 of them. Hence my "5" score for the character designs.

Secondly, the mechanics are very bad. Driving by car was a big update for this game. I liked that but not these:

-Slowly skipping times (there should be an option to "skip day" or "skip 12 hours")
-Unsupported old saves (if I want to play the new update, I can't use my old save; I have to start over)
-The fighting mechanics are very difficult (if you can't click fast to "kick" you will probably lose).

Thirdly, the script is not bad. I don't care about the script. I'm on the job . One thing:
-There are not enough sexual scenes. There should be more.


I know the developer is only one person, it's very difficult. But he can do it. That's it!

I just can't do it man as much as I wanted to play this game I can't get passed the annoying game play in this sandbox.

Story is ok for a porn game nothing special didn't get hooked to play it and the grind is not helping either.
Renders are good though.

+ The theme is interesting, renders and character design are above average.

- "The Bum" - "A Little While Later" flashscreens that take nearly 5 seconds after every fucking thing.

- The game design is completely destroying everything good about this game. It's just unplayable at the moment.

Advice: Try to create minimal gameplay, remove "the bum" screens, weird cinematics that takes too long, and it will be a decent game.

- Game story in itself is ok like drugs and politicians and their power that they hold but the thing in MC is too normal for this kind of setup , I mean don't give him power, money, or some powerful mysterious people or organization backing him but come-on at least make him cunning, MC is just a normal thug.
- Car issues: Dev just introduce car for mission mode and not to travel fast and less time consuming, you still have to take public transport for travel far places.
- I don't know but looks like Dev introduce HotShot game, Drunk and Happy Mood system and a wasteful time skipping system to lengthen the gameplay because game in itself is not big. stretching the gameplay without captivating interaction is just getting boring after few hours.
- using cheats or not the day system for missions are too much inflexible with not so much useful time skipping system.
- using walkthrough while playing games like "what to do next to move forward when hint system is not clear" is like read read and read, walkthrough and dialogues.
- some dialogue are not skippable and if you accidentally skip something you can not go backward to read some useful info again.
- fighting system is not good you can't dodge, counterattack like stuff and the punch and kick marks sometime do not appear for longtime, I need to load game for a single fight for like 10 to 12 times with even 90 like energy.
- I do not know what to say about NTR in this kind of setup but it is not even NTR and the sexual scenes which do not include MC are kind of ok for a story ( I don't not support any kind of violence against anyone in any form) I mean people who hold power in game are not good people and their is some sort real life similarities too.

I hope Dev make a breakthrough progress in the future updates and wish him for his future projects.

Looks good, but this is a painfully dull, overengineered unintuitive, boring chore to play with messy, annoying mechanics. Add a skip day button or make it less of a bother to do...anything. Have some lorem ipsum for char count.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

Dear Reader, beware! This software, for it should be a capital offence to refer to it as a game, is a giant digital middle finger to the concept of game design. Every aspect of it seems to have been explicitly constructed to waste the player's time and sanity. Do not be fooled by the large download size or the teaser images in the Overview: I spent 3 hours in the software and didn't see one teaser image. In fact, I didn't see any scene at all post opening cinematic.

The software's intention to waste your time is made clear from program start when it takes 5 seconds for the unskippable Patreon and socials slide to progress. It takes 10 seconds (!) for the main menu to display in a cinematic, 10 seconds that you can't click through. In total, from window opening to me clicking the Load button, it takes 20+ seconds.

This impressively pathological desire to waste the player's time extends to the main game. You are dropped in an alley, with no guidance on what to do or where to go. The player would naturally start exploring their environs to get some hint of the objective. You don't find any. You then exit the alley and enter a large sandbox with over 15 locations. The player, in search of some clue, clicks a location, but is then greeted by a cutscene where two thugs intercept the player character, spout some nonsense and off him.

That's it. Game over.

The player thinks, 'OK, unexpected. I'll use RenPy's awesome feature and just rollback. Oh, it seems that the developer has blocked any rollback functionality. I do hope I've got a recent save!'

The player will soon realize that the thugs appear at RANDOM when a player is traveling to any location in the sandbox. The developer is actively punishing the player for attempting to explore in their software. And without any objective, what entices the player to leave the starting alleyway? Nothing.

Another example of prodigious time wasting is when the MC knocks on a door. The developer makes you wait 5 seconds for someone to answer the door, if at all! You can't click through the scene to speed it up, you have to wait the 5 seconds.

The other baffling decision is the skip time button. The in game clock tracks 24 hours, with character locations and availability being determined by time of day and day of week. You want to wait until 10 p.m. to be able to buy something from a vendor? Press that skip time button and despair that it only skips between 10 and 30 minutes.

I don't usually review games (or software) that I don't like because I know the effort it takes to get something even mediocre together. However, this software was such a cock and balls slap in the face of common sense and decent game design that I had to say something. It seems to be created to disrespect the player and their time. I didn't even cover the grammar or the narrative - mainly because I didn't get to see the latter. Though, judging by the design philosophy and the developer's previous game, maybe I've dodged a bullet.

To all reading this review, avoid this software like the plague. Do something more meaningful with your time, like me. I'm counting the grains of sand at my beach.

I appreciate the art and original stories of this dev, but, like many others, I abandoned it due to the ferraginous gameplay, which was difficult for him to manage considering the countless and sometimes unmanageable bags encountered during development.
I think that if this dev, take into account the opinions and reviews of the thread, in a near future project, he could easily achieve significant success, abandoning this even worse game logic than Gordon.
In short, countless wasted potentials involving: art, stories and technical skills ; that this developer demonstrates he possesses.

the story looked interesting to me so i tried to game but damn this game is bad. Terrible grind with stupid rng which will get you killed where ever you click. You will need more than 1 hour to even start playing the game. Even after that you will mostly roam around without a clue what to do. Game has less than 15 minute content but the grind will drag the game into 1 day game. not to mention the weird transition on every screen swap

This game is horrible from a game play prespective, shit like barber being closed on Sunday and the random coin flip between travel points is literally made just to waste time. Art is nice but the creator forgot that games are first and for mose supposed to be GAMES, not this cluster fck

I love sandboxes, that's why I paid attention to this game. But alas...
One of the few pluses - yes, it's a game, not a VN.
But: the game mechanics are just something indecipherable.
It's impossible to get through the game intuitively. But the walkthrough is written in such a way that it is of little use.
Models - not for me. Giant breasts and asses cause me only disgust, although yes, many people love it.
The immmersion 0 out of 5. I could not bring myself to sympathize with the main character, what is happening on the screen does not evoke any emotions. Potentially interesting plot just killed in the development process. Yes, the developer tried to make characters with a certain background, but alas, it is impossible to sympathize with them.
From the positive elements I can only highlight a relatively good user interface, easy navigation through the locations.
As a result, a potentially interesting project turned out to be a complete failure.
And the development of the game has gone too far to seriously rework it, at least so that the sandbox elements would not become a mockery of the user.
Thanks to the developer for trying. But I do not intend to return to this project.

I' m sure this game must have redeaming features but I can't get to them. The UI is painful to use. Events are often hard to spot as they're not highlighted and if you miss an event which is hidden you're killed.