Ren'Py - The DeLuca Family [Season 1] [HopesGaming]

The DeLuca Family [v0.07.2] [HopesGaming] is one of the first adult games I ever played, and is still one of the best to me to this day. The story is unique with amazing differentiated characters that I could honestly see as a well-made TV show, minus the porn of course. The renders are amazing with the animations as well that we currently have at the moment. The only downside of this project is how long it takes for an update, but if this isn't a game you don't support at least once, you probably won't support anything at all. I absolutely love this game and can't wait to see what's next.

Nice game and enjoy the story line, its awesome experience. For the wonderful plot and expecting what comes next was a wonderful thing with Deluca Family. Enjoying every bit of it.

Thank You for the wonderful gaming Hopes.

The DeLuca Family (0.07.2): 3 stars. Spoilers ahead.

“All happy families are alike, and each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”, Tolstoy wrote in Anna Karenina. The DeLuca Family skews somewhere in the middle of the happy-unhappy curve; the individual characters hide behind a mask, their moods indiscernible. Behind the veil, the DeLucas are deeply and profoundly depressed, and it is up to us to make them feel secure in their minds. (If one hasn’t gotten the hint yet, the DeLuca Family is not really a porn game. It is a self-described "story based adult game".) There is nothing pornographic about the content. Pornography is about what Schopenhauer called “the objectification of the will”, the violent acting out of the passions, of sexual urges and desires. Elements of porn are present throughout, but the porn is rarely the focus; there’s very little sex in the game. It’s also not about the story, because the story, as with the porn, is used as a counterbalance to tell what is essentially a character drama. Due to the game’s proximity with other porn and story-driven experiences by lieu of its engine and render choices, the DeLuca Family is unfairly judged under the same criteria of either/or. Yet it should be judged on its own merits. As of this moment, the game does occupy the middle ground, a solid three out of five rating. It is an entertaining and jaunty romp hampered by pacing issues, which as of this moment, remains unresolved.

We control a new initiate of the DeLuca clan, a figure clueless as to his talents, as if he were an amnesiac. He’s a total blank, with little recollection of who he was. (He functions mainly as the story needs him to act. Most of the time, he’s the straight man.) In time, the protagonist works up the ladder, and joins the crew, with the help of Cordia, the Godmother, her adopted daughters Luna, Gracie, and Isabel, and her inveterate consigliere, Uncle Wilfred. (It goes off the rails when the underclass of capos is introduced: a pair of nuns, a rollerskating chick, and a samurai cowboy.) The main thrust of the story concerns the protagonist’s quest to find out who his mother is, and her relation to Lady Cordia. How did she get involved in the mafia, and what changed in their relationship, as to treat the main character in a destitute manner? Initially wanting to get out of the contract, he takes on the Omerta oath to fuel his quest. The overarching plot concerns the purchasing power of the families and their territorial disputes. The DeLuca Family, being the strongest, deals with challengers to the throne. The threats are explored in small minigames called “contracts” (there are many nods to Hitman throughout) as well as through the main questlines. Contracts are well-written and enjoyable text adventures, and a nice change of pace from the monotony of the free-roam sections, which the game does its best to reduce the amount of grind that these types of games inevitably have. Progress through the game is dependent largely on these contracts, the main character has to finish these contracts for money and upgrades.

Visually consistent, the character design is unique and is arguably the strongest aspect of the DeLuca Family. The renders on the characters are often stylish, a lot of work has gone into making the women look distinctively striking and beautiful. The dialogue writing is great, and all too commonly, overlooked and underappreciated. The characters have a droll, sarcastic pitch, while being oddly prim and hyperfixating on manners. It also seems they are always ribbing each other when they are together, a bit reminiscent to how one might laugh with their friends when placed in a ridiculous and surreal situation. Genre-bending stereotypes are employed to comedic effect: Cordia, the cold, frigid, and blonde ice queen; Gracie, the innocent and precocious daughter; Luna, the crazy gun-toting psychopath; and Isabel, the mob wife and part-time yoga instructor. They all work well together despite these well-worn traits, because the writing is self-aware, and it feels like everyone is playacting at being in the mob, which adds a level of charm and wit to the humor. The music is well chosen, and works when needed.

However, one significant and severe moment, a flashback scene (“My Name is Luna”) is a major sidestep. This sequence is an extended howl of anguish, and it sticks in my craw for one particular reason; Luna’s tragic downfall is unearned. Not in the context of her suffering, but how her scene was written. Her character suffers a mental break through severe and sustained abuse. She is beaten, stabbed, and forced to commit the most heinous acts. These acts are elaborated on in the most minute detail. Now, before this scene, the tone was fairly light, and the game does not take itself seriously to warrant such a moment. This lightness of being is suggested in its verisimilitude, as it plays around with genres: action, crime thriller, comedy, and a coming-of-age romance. The jump to horror and torture porn for the sake of it felt cheap and manipulative. Luna was sacrificed at the altar of plot. Her scene, which should have worked on an emotional level didn’t, because of how crude the approach was. Compare it to how the other characters were handled. Isabel suffered from postpartum depression following a miscarriage and her subsequent struggling marriage problems with her husband, Antonio. Those scenes were tactfully hidden. Imagine if there was a hospital flashback, and her baby was shown on screen, it would have ruined the casual relationship between the main character and Isabel. Gracie is emotionally stunted and psychologically, she resembles more of a child than an adult. The game doesn’t focus on her fall or how she arrived at such a point; instead there is a focus on her intelligence and capability in other scenes. There are other scenes, the mobster killing his son, but this was more melodramatic than dramatic, and since the son was the villain, it wasn't emotionally affecting. The Luna flashback, it felt like the game was trying to do too much, and in doing so, the plot trumped over the characters in a distracting way. This scene represented the microcosm of what was wrong with the game.

False advertising is a major problem. This is not a "story based adult game". It only has the patina of sex about it. The game is mostly teasing, and the sexual content available feel rather disconnected from what the game is trying to do, which is geared towards the completion of character arcs. The sex is coming of course, but in a weird contradiction, the sex almost feels like a detriment. The DeLuca women are too weird, too underdeveloped. Luna is insane, Gracie is too childish, and Isabel is still married. and so far, the plot merely exists to have the characters react to events and relate it to their past selves. The porn, the plot, and the characters have not come together yet; they do not cohere into a unified whole. Behind the scenes, there are promises of a master plan, more ‘lewd’, non-Christian content, talks of multiple seasons, and so on. However, the pacing is glacially slow, and when progress does come, The DeLuca Family is hinting at something darker (as it showed in the “My Name is Luna” section). It’s unclear whether it’s prepared to go there again. It’s been four years, and the ambiguities and uncertainties as to the direction of the game remain on the table. The pieces are in place, but will the pieces ever fit together? It’s still too early to tell; we can only hope.

Game looks great, cast of character are vast and nice, main girls are the best, but got to love them all, rendering and everything is pretty great overall aswell! story so far is interesting and can't wait to see what else happens!

The story is good, the characters are interesting and graphically appealing, but what makes the game special is Luna! And the moments when the MC shows that he can be a leader and not just a weakling

But the game also has problems.

For example, I find it difficult to build up a relationship with Grace and find her endearing. She rather disturbs me.

Furthermore, I don't think much of the Isabella storyline! All the teasing and unfaithful behavior is not my kink! Bros before hoes, and stealing your mate's wife is not a cool thing to do no matter what the problems are in the marriage. Yes, sex is optional, but such a close friendship after all the teasing and sexual behavior is more than platonic. I wish we could just tell her to fuck off and go to her husband.

And he should have let religion out. The sexy nun shit is not mine.

I'm going to do it quickly and as short as possible. The game has great graphics end of the good stuff.
simple bad things has 4 years of development and almost no erotic content and the story is a tangled and boring end of the release.

10/10

TL DR: Attention to detail, incredible writing, hot women.

There is a scene where the girls are hanging out on the sofa. The next scene they get up and you can see the indenting of where they were on the sofa. This game is full of those little details which completes the world they live in.

The only minor point I wasn't stoked about was how whiney MC became towards the end. BUT, the MC is a chad so he can get away with it, so it's a very minor complaint if that.

A very good game with great images and no incest tags. wonderful
Different and interesting characters.
I just wish the missions were more visual, I found the way to participate in the missions very tiring and boring.

I think the game is a little it overrated, way to much characters and the story is Bullshit. I like the game , but yes there are to much actors. You lose track because there are to much characters in this game. And the Mc changes her appearence wihtout any reason. Overall very confusing. Renders and animations are good, story is BS. The h-scenes need more and longer animations

Game is really good, I love the quality, renders, characters and their development, and the story. I like story but I delude myself sometimes and see from a real perspective instead of seeing this from how it is just a game. This might be because there are some things I am confused about ( Like the way Luna and somethings that are obviously not going to occur in real life. Then again this is just a game and one with a Mafia which I do not know a lot about but it does not matter since I'm playing just to enjoy this.

Basically I love the game has a good blend of story and erotic scenes, it is a good amount. Good story, yes you should play it, but do not overthink too much and just enjoy the story even if things seem confusing at times.

First time rating anything. This game may not be finished but a good bit of content and story. The only question is though if just want "Content" (sexual content out the kazoodle) or story. Me I like having a little of both and this gives both in the most satisfying way. (imo) The renders are of the best you can find on this site. The story is mind blowing. Expecially one point that I will not spoil, but will say you don't feel a mix of sadness and anger that point then you might need get you head checked. Cause you have to be heartless not feel such strong emotions at that point. It takes awhile for updates, but Hopes give updates and answers questions. So we know he aint making this game just for the money. He truly enjoys working on this game and it shows. All of the Deluca Family are thankful for Hopes hard work and the kindness he continually shows in the thread.

Tell me why?
Sometimes you watch a movie that includes a hacker doing his job, and while in some cases you see the actions he performs and even rarer they make sense, there are times leaving you with but a single thought: "Why did you even bother?" This is what this game is about. Let me elaborate it by breaking it up.

The setting.
So yeah, the game is about mafia, right? Ok, cool, which mafia are we talking about? Judging by the names, the italian or spanish mafia. Is the game realistic? "Hell yes it is, look at all this goddamn art, look at those events." - you would be first to shout, but after careful thinking you slowly realise it is not how things actually work together.

To shorten it up, this is not anywhere close to any possible mafia of any possible culture and timeframe.
Is it absolutely ridiculously bizarre setting, unnecessarily overromantising mafia and organised crime in general? Yes, it is.
Is it acceptable in just any unbound universe from the infinite possibilities you may imagine where you could set up your game? Yes, it is.
Is it acceptable in even remotely realistic setting mimicing a world resembling ours, in a modern timeframe of likely 21st century? No, it is not.

The setting the author pursues to fulfill, none of the events look even remotely fitting in. Every new action, scene, every line of dialogue, every character has you questioning either your sanity or the author's.

Let me introduce you to the remarkable example of such immesurable stupidity: a young fellow by the name Gottardo. This man appears to be one of the most valuable members of the Family, his skills and experience are not to be taken lightly. Despite all this, he personally shows up to lead an elite squad of operatives to rescue the protagonist and the main characters. After arriving at the location, he himself along with several of the elite squad members quickly dispose of the enemy forces, during which process lots of gunshots and screams were heard by the protagonist. After which the door is opened and the protagonist lays his eyes on Gottardo himself.
Now, with all this story aside, how would the reader expect such character to look like? What would dear protagonist see? Take a moment to think about it.

Now what the game presents you with: a barefooted man in 30s wearing nothing but suit jacket and pants (jacket is worn on bare torso), having lots of tatoos all over his body, and..... a double-headed oversized flail. You heard right. A flail. In the setting in 21st century where everyone uses SMGs to shred through anything unarmored. Where tripwires, broken glass, bullet casings, frag shrapnel and barbed wire litter the ground. Where noone is wearing any armor for the flail to be remotely useful against (flail is a blunt armor-piercing weapon designed to combat knights in full plate armor - an excource in history).

Now, why would this guy even consider using it? Why even consider showing up on the battlefield without any armor or even shoes? The game does not have answers. Nothing will satisfy your urge for logic as there is none.

The main story aka the plot
This game is written in RenPy engine, so what you would expect of it has to be present. The plot is presented by the form of separate mini-events, each of which takes from 5 minutes to 15 when carefully reading all the lines. Combined, the plot would last no more than 2 hours.

The plot emerges from nowhere - a strangely "noone" gets bound by "contract" to serve the mafia family - that is what you read from the description of the game. What exactly do these 2 hours of plot add to it? Not much. Nothing more, nothing less. Does this explain anything? No, it doesn't. So, it would be wise to discard the plot entirely as completely non-existand and irrelevant and thus all the main story events along with it.

Girl arcs
This is probably what most of us come to this game for. The actual interaction with the main heroes (heroines, to be precise) of the game. Of which there are... three. Yes, you heard me right. Only three. So, well, to what extent these events go, what is currently the final point of the developement, you ask, is it even worth spending your time on?
Let us further divide this category into 3 subcategories, one for each of the heroines:
Luna
Luna is the young blonde girl being the daughter of the Family boss. Her arc tells about her excentric nature and a terrible story from her childhood featuring blood, gore, child abuse and related NSFL content, heavily resembling the characteristic of Jinx and probably based on which. What would a reward for that be? The best the protagonist gets from her is ... kisses.

Gracie
Gracie is another daughter of the Family boss with darker hair. She posesses stereotypical for such games individuality as a complete unawareness of any ways of human interaction, which, of course, is severely exploited by the protagonist. Gracie is the character who can be the same time incredibly intelligent and inpenetrably stupid, as strange as it might sound. If the reader is familiar with the character of Starfire, that would be the case for the current character. However, with Starfire in each and every game she is present in the protagonist tends to go all the way the easiest. Here though, the best the protagonist currently is able to achieve is groping.

Isabel
Isabel is the wife of the brother to the previously described girls. She is suffering an unhappy marriage, to which the protagonist happily lends his hand and other parts of his body. There are 2 routes available for this person, one of which only blocking out part of the current content and existing only to annoy the unintelligent players by presenting the clearly wrong choice and afterwards punishing the ones who have made it. The only worthy scene with this person is an unrepeatable blowjob.

Now with this out of the way, it is up to the reader to decide whether or not to put themselves into several hours of boring dialogues and shocking content for such reward. It is a story, yes. But the story which can only be good when finished, and which obviously cannot yet be.

The contracts:
The contracts is a severely overcomplicated system for some reason existing in the game as such, totally disconnected from every other content aside from a handful of flags changing a handful of respective dialogues here and there.
I do not wish to know to what extremes have the developers pushed RenPy engine to come out with such system. Custom UI (partially bugged and broken), custom map (primitive and representing nothing), pokemon-like battle system (which makes absolutely no sense and only matters in a single optional event), lots of stats and weird checks, dozens of options depending on the stats, ratings, equipment, and finally, an incredible ammount of unbreakable text which tends to roll over the unsuspecting player like tsunami. The text, where somewhere in the thousands of those lines there lies a clue to the next choice the player has make. But let me tell you this one secret: skipping the entirety of the text and brute-forcing every option is at least tenfold faster, and nothing can be lost doing these events the described way.
There is one good story, labeled as "The painter" contract, but it is so distant from the main game and so unfitting in the game's setting that it is better to be skipped to not to raise any hope which will only ruin the mood for the generic content to come.

The summary:
The game feels like it is being concurrently developed by at least three independant teams, each doing own content and disregarding everything else. The setting of the game is also so conflictingly unbelievable that it feels like it was at least a few people who designed certain parts of the storyline, each failing miserably to consult with everyone else. The girl arcs lead to nothing except disgust of NSFL content and pity for lost time, while the story begins and ends in nothing, leaving the player conflicted and clueless. Finally, contracts posess nothing other than one good story to be extracted from, in no whay do they affect the other parts of the game, and exist merely to act as a time sink and to break the player from doing the arcs by having to go and earn money.

I do not believe a single part of this so called mafia story. I do see not a single, but several pathes this game is taking, and none of which can possibly lead to anything plausible and worthy of the time and effort put into.

I do understand that the game has good moments, but to experience which the player has to actively seek for them, play the game in a certain way and try not to focus too much on the story, skip the text and wait for the next render to unvail. But for this I would rather just extract the assets and scroll them as a gallery.

I have rated the game as poor (2/5) because it is really poor in anything which the games should consist of, and the only thing carrying the game is the assets, the renders are actually not bad, but they are worthless without context.

Thank you for reading, and, if you still wish to play the game, I would not recommend chosing full experience mode, as it would not be a pleasant experience.

I sure hoped the author by the name HopesGaming would make less of a hopeless creation.

v0.07.2

A VN about a young man who joins the mafia. The writing is just really rough. The story is strange, hard to both believe and follow, a bunch of characters who are really out of place in a mafia story, and the mafia story itself is pretty loosely based on the mafia. The renders are pretty good and the sound is decent, but the writing is a major let down.

A fast-paced, dramatic masterpiece with a plot that is such a breath of fresh air in the adult VN world.

I loved the writing and the pacing of the overall story. It really feels like actively participating in a good mafia movie.

The characters are well-written. Especially Luna whom, in a genre full of hopeless , powerless, Jane Does, is actually portrayed to be willing and capable while also being beautiful and even vulnerable at times.

I hope that, if the game does go for a harem route, it also includes singular routes for the girls, because Luna is the only one for me.

The aesthetic of the game fits so well, everything from the UI to the menu text options. This VN feels like the devs love letter to the mafia movie genre and it is an excellent one.

5*

Das Spiel ist noch in der Entwicklung, etwas wenig Content gerade was Sex angeht. ABER eines der besten Spiele die Ich je gespielt habe!!! Es ist die komplette Geschichte/Story. Manches Game andere Genre könnten sich hier ne Scheibe abschneiden. Großartig!
Das Spiel hab ich direkt so durchgesuchtet!

Die Charaktere sind gut eingebracht und mit genialer Stoy-Line.
Noch steht das Spiel am Anfang und es fehlen paar Updates. Mehr Missionen, weitere Aufstiegsmöglichkeiten, mehr Ausrüstung. Vielleicht Training für Stärke, Agilität, etc und natürlich die Story weiter! Aber das Spiel hat so potenzial.
Runterladen und ausprobieren, Ihr bereut keine Minute.

Und durch "Keks" und seiner Translations-Mod auch für Spieler geeignet die nur Deutsch können.



The game is still in development, a little little content just in terms of sex. BUT one of the best games I've ever played!!! It is the complete story/story. Some other genre games could take a leaf out of this book. Great!
I played the game straight through!

The characters are well introduced and have an ingenious stoy line.
The game is still at the beginning and there are a few updates missing. More missions, more advancement opportunities, more equipment. Maybe training for strength, agility, etc and of course the story further! But the game has so much potential.
Download and try, you will not regret a minute.

The characters are well brought in and with brilliant stoy line.



And through "Keks" and his translation mod also suitable for players who only know German.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

You 've seen all the 5star reviews going on an on about the great writing, the marvelous story ?

Now let's state a. simple fact.
The story is ridiculous. Thinking anything less is not a lack of suspension of disbelief but about being high on something or having the IQ of a small snail.
It isn't that the story is 'simple' but rather that it's illogical and does all kinds of things that clearly shows that the one writing hasn't got a clue.

Look at the picture on top of the thread. Can you point out who the mother is? Yeah, I guess when you're running a mafia family you don't age. That a mafia family would be run by a woman is one thing, that it would be run by someone that looks like she's barely out of her teens is just silly.

Start the game and read the very first line of text. That should tell you all you need to know about the true quality of writing.

The good : The renders aren't bad.
The bad : everything else. Be it the story, the characters, the sex (or rather lack there of) , the lack of QC...

Now if this was a second update or so I would be lenient but this 'game' was started back in '18. 3 years of an 'adult' game with all kinds of 'adult' tags but hardly anything of that nature in there? Nothing wrong with a slow burn but how many years of updates are you prepared to wait, and how much lousy storytelling willing to endure, before it gets into bow-chicky-wow-wow action ?

I downloaded this game 5 months ago that's when I started playing adult games. At that time I'm looking for more of the sexual scenes. And played with full game experience mode. Well you know what happens next I instantly dropped the game. Then after playing many other games I become tired of games where characters have no personality, where girls are cock worshipping sluts, and story line games. So now I'm looking for story line games.

So i played this game again. This time choose story and free roam mode. I got instantly hooked with this. I like all characters in this game. This is without a doubt one of the best games in this site and the best mafia game. I liked the power hierarchy . The four serpeants , mysterious six, this game truly give you a mafia vibe. Liked the bgm and soundtracks. I really liked their costumes very much. In other mafia games they only suits and a tie. But this game is different.

My fav girl is Luna. First she don't care about love, what others think, lady- like at all. But due to interaction with the MC everything changed. I'm currently at story event 6. So there is more to explore for me but I'm writing this review because I really loved this game.

Gracie is also nice she always crack some humor. Humor is the other important thing in the game. This one is really worth playing

Updated for 0.9.6.

Score lowered to 2/5 because nothing of value happened, except forced relationship with one of the girls and kinetic storytelling continues.
Story is the same as 2 years ago.
Actually that's a lie, 5 minutes of playtime have been added to main story.
MC still exists to...no idea honestly, probably to have a protagonist. No other use for him otherwise.

******
Character models are beautiful, story is very interesting to follow, but there are quite a few problems I'm having with it.

Cut the MC out of the story, you can still have 90% of it. Nothing important would change.
Girls are not very interesting. Out of them 3 only one have some semblance of character arc.
Which leads to third issue, that same character arc is mandatory for main story progression. You can't progress if you don't do her missions. There's no reason not to do them, but still.

Choices are pointless. I say this often, but at current version, 0.07.2, if you take every single choice away, not a single beat of the story would change. I've actually tested this by playing main mission quests only and mini side-game, not communicating with girls whatsoever.
No changes to story beats, no different conversation, everything plays the same.
You can't alienate girls or make them dislike you. You will miss erotic scenes, but nothing else will be different.

Looking forwards to seeing what future updates will bring. Perhaps all choices will finally amount to something. If not, well, there's always story which, again, is really good.

Love this game but man does it seem like you're milking your patreons/out of idea. The update in this game is so disappointing, it feels like the game is going nowhere with its tiny adjustment update every 9 months or so. I believe you can gain so much more patreon if the updates are more frequent or bigger if its gonna update once a year. Hopefully you dont become the next Icstor.

Story 5/5:
Good writting, fleshed out characters and an interesting story.
Especially the character development stands out!

Art 4.5/5:
The renders (especially in the latest updates) are really good. You can tell that the developer is improving his skills over time.

Music 5/5:
The ost fits the 'mafia' theme. The music supports the action.

Conclusion:
The Deluca Family is fantastic game. The only drawback are the (really) long pauses between the updates.