_13_ I played your game the other day and forgot to properly talk about it. Where do I think it stands?
I enjoyed it! It's shortish, but longer than some other VN's i've played. The main established cast is likeable enough. They have unique looks which I appreciate. The girl, I think Lucy, looks a bit off sometimes. She's sweet don't get me wrong, but she has weird faces. I like what you did with Maria. I don't know if she's supposed to be Mexican, for sure Latina, but I think she's captured pretty well. As a Mexican American myself I appreciated the touch
I wish there was a
bit more struggle with her then instantly forgiving MC, but maybe we can still find something engaging with Maria in the future. Still, why am I complaining, I'd rather good things happen to characters than bad things I don't remember most of the other girls, i only played it once after all, but I love that while it's not as dark as it could be, you still made it pretty realistic with abusers. Big John for example, it may be a way for people to not get SUPER triggered on this site or whatever, but having Big John
not actually touching the girls is pretty good because some sexual predators aren't into children, but they love the pain they cause in people in general. Big John might have enjoyed their pain and enjoyed watching Linda's suffering with her and her child abusing her daughters. It's dark for sure, but it could have been a
Coming Home Is Never Easy situation and have all of your characters
get raped as children
I thought the dynamic of the MC and the characters was good. Though given what happens with the MC in the story, is Maria and MC oldest? Or do the others not remember what happened? Anyway, a critique is that the sexual things between
Lucy is a little fast to be honest. Not a huge problem, especially if you intended it that way, it just felt a bit fast for me. I like the weight the story is having on the characters. I feel that characters get a sad backstory sometimes and ALL of us in the audience have to suffer it and then the author forgets that dark thread and it didn't really matter. A character got in a car crash where their legs and arms were crushed and they reconstructed a part of their face and was forced to 8 years grueling rehab? Oh well, MC said she was pretty so she's happy. Did she get abused by 3 men dressed as clowns on video in front of the whole school? The MC said he's on her side so she's gonna be fine right? In this game, these things aren't forgotten. Well, at least for the Mom. She is clearly haunted by her decisions and she should be. However, I hope the MC's journey to helping her overcome it can be a satisfying and well earned one
Good job DEV!
For the people out there that have a particular opinion on this game listen right now:
This game does have dark themes, if you are NOT into child trauma (phrased badly I admit, I doubt anyone likes that) I'll tell you what it entails and you can make your judgement call. It also includes drug addiction. Essentially, the MC and his sisters were
forced at a young age to engage in actions to satisfy the urges of Big John aka the antagonist. The actions so far revealed are making the MC spank his sisters, beat them with punches and it's hinted that he gave them oral sex. Big John would pleasure himself in the corner or whatever cause he likes sadistic shit. From MY understanding Big John HAS NOT touched any of the girls. The MC is so traumatized that he's blocked basically all of it away. Only the older girls remember it and one of them is resentful to the MC. It happened in part because of the Mom. She had a fucked up life and got addicted to drugs because of it. She allowed Big John to do these things and she is now VERY VERY VERY guilt ridden because of it. It looks like MC will be able to help her with her problems in the near future. She's ashamed
Another controversial note, it has a Love Interest, the Mom, live for years as the antagonist Big John's "partner." HOWEVER, it doesn't go beyond that in the current game. You DON'T see ANY scenes with her and him and if you wanna read on, I think I have good idea of what will happen. ALSO, SPOILERS AHEAD! I'll try to be general rather than specific unless I need to. Basically,
Mom had something bad happen, she knew someone that knew Big John and he maybe got her addicted to drugs. She needed more, he came up with this idea to use her and her kids to get money from the government. When the Mom wasn't able to pay for the drugs she needed he escalated the relationship to get what "he wanted." Now, NONE of this is shown and by the time of the main plot, it seems he's a little more "passive" if you catch my drift. He hasn't done anything sexual to Linda (Mom) in years. He's just abusive. The MC will be able to help her and NOTHING else will happen again. The Dev promises that he sees little to no reason to add it (Dev don't do it
) and regardless, if you choose to save Linda, you'll NEVER see it no matter what.
On a final note: We in the community appreciate when the Dev can just come clean about certain tags we hate. We know that it's your game. We're not trying to dictate your content, we are really not. We just want to know what direction you're going. Not the story, just the tags. There is a website online where you can find out when a certain scene appears in a film. So basically, you can filter out scenes based on what you are sensitive to. There is even a website dedicated ONLY to telling you if a dog dies. Some people can't handle it. WOAH!
You must be registered to see the links
I didn't know how big that site got! I saw this website in like 2012 and it didn't have all that. Haha, now it tells you whatever triggers. Anyway, it helps to know ahead of time, if only to steel ourselves!
Thanks for the game. Can't wait for the new update!
