HTML - The Monastery [v0.7.1.1] [Alcahest]

v0.7.1.1

This is a game that I often saw when browsing for something to play, but never tried it because I didn't find the cover girl attractive (spoiler: she's quite appealing, that pic doesn't do her justice).

I jumped into the game expecting the usual HTML sandbox grind. I'm rather pleased with what I found:

It's like an interactive porn version of The Name of The Rose: a mystery novel with a good dose of history mixed in. The mystery itself is interesting.

It features a very clever corruption system: instead of the usual "yay, you though about sex, you gain corruption" nonsense, this game employs a mechanic around sin, and what your character considers sinful is perfectly tied into the plot, so you can be fucking half of the nuns around without gaining corruption until you advance specific quests.

The quests are the most problematic part: after a while it gets to the point where there are so many sex scenes available that you don't know whether repeating them will make a difference or if you can just ignore them.

Other times quests will advance after some days. Days that you likely wasted clicking everywhere trying to unlock some new content.

The first time I had that problem, I ended up cheating to add an extra point of authority, because I didn't know that I had to wait some days, and as I write this, I'm stuck with that problem: I'm not really sure how to unlock more content, and there's so many areas available that it gets a bit overwhelming and tiresome.

That's my experience after enabling the "patreon eye" - I imagine that this problem is only exacerbated in the vanilla version.

That's my main complain. Another would be the temptation requirements for scenes: they make sense in context, but it's boring having to click on 2 or 3 random screens to raise your temptation before you can watch content.

The final thing that I don't like too much is the model selection, but I'm not going to blame the game for not featuring my exact type of woman. I like a few: Julia and Jana, but most aren't my type. Sara looks interesting as well, but I haven't unlocked her content.

The scene selection is good: it fits the game, and doesn't feel like a random porn gallery like most other games do. The descriptions also match the scenes nicely.

Perhaps the one problem is that there's plenty of scenes where you're supposedly taking someone's virginity, but the model looks and acts like she eats 10 cocks for breakfast every morning. But that's understandable - it's not like nun porn is some mainstream category with thousands of titles to choose from.

The UI is very good: the colors work together nicely, and for being a text-heavy game, my eyes never got tired of reading, nor got lost in the middle of a paragraph due to poor spacing.

Links that add more text autoscroll the window to the new content - this is something that all Twine games should do, but most fail to.

Same for a map - most time on Twine games is wasted clicking link after link. This game features a map that allows you to travel anywhere with a single click (or two if visiting the monks), and when an area has a single option available, pressing space will "click" it.

Besides the porn, the game features pictures and (AI?) portraits that complement it quite well.

All in all, a very good game - really close to a 5. I'm mainly leaving it as a 4 because I don't like clicking every area without nothing new happening, and not knowing how long I need to wait for new content to trigger.

Really great and adicting game. Love all of it.

Cool and unique Story.
Great videos and actresses and many of them.
Many Kinks and you can choose wich you want and wich not.

At first I wasnt that hyped cause I am not really in the kink nuns.
But this is really well made and I am exited to see what comes with the next update.

review for v0.7.1.1
A crazy good game. The art, videos, and characters always match the scene that's going on, which adds a lot to the game and is very rare for these types of Porn games.
The characters and story are all top notch. The flow and how everything processes feels really good.
My only real complaint is that without the "detective password" (AKA Patreon cheat) there a lot of excess clicking as you check around all the rooms each day that are all eliminated with the cheat. There's a lot of areas in the game, and they are all used, but not all of the time, so clicking them over and over again just for their to be nothing there, get's frustrating to say the least. The journal could also use an update that has a short list of things that need to be done, as it stands right now, it provides way too much information and getting the information you need is too difficult.
From a fappability standpoint, the game could use some help as well. As stated before, the story and characters are great, but only as a Mystery game, and not as porn game. Most of the sex scenes lack enough depth to really get the blood flowing before they are over.
Contrary to my earlier complaints, the game is still pretty amazing and is really fun to play. A little bit more depth in the sex scenes to make the player really feel the mood would go along way though.

I've always had a fetish for nuns, which is fairly niche, so finding this game was a treat. Having completed most of the content at the time of this posting, I can say it is a great porn game with a genuinely intriguing mystery plot, even if you don't have a nun fetish like I do, with some personal criticisms that doesn't detract from what I got out of it.

The main plot is interesting from the start, you are a priest from the Vatican investigating mysterious night-time attacks on nuns at a monastery, and the game does is good at setting up the mystery and general atmosphere. I won't spoil the game so far, but it does a great job of keeping you guessing if there is something supernatural going on or is it a more mundane explanation, and even if there is a supernatural explanation, is it good or evil?

In terms of gameplay style, it is bit different than a typical HTML real porn game. In your typical real porn game, you usually get some options in a list to progress your character or advance the story. In this you are given an overhead map of the main play area, a monastery, and can pick and choose where to go and who to talk to. It isn't necessarily open ended from what I have found. Some quests can be completed in different orders but the bulk have to be completed in a certain order, which is fine for this type of game considering the nature of the plot.

If I have one minor criticism here, it is that it was sometimes difficult to know whether I reached a stopping point of a quest because another quest had to be completed first, or I hadn't clicked on the right room and talked to the right person.

The porn content itself here is really good and there is quite a lot of it, especially like I said if you have a nun fetish, and it all works seamlessly with the plot. The slow burn or pacing with the different characters is well done, and didn't seem to fast or slow in my view. Like the dev's previous game, they go to lengths to make sure the porn scene makes sense in context of the game, rather than a series of disconnected scenes, which must be difficult to do considering how many real porn games don't go to that effort. The only downside I see is considering how niche nuns are in porn, there probably isn't a lot of content to work with. Already in real porn games you are limited by the scenes filmed but here I think the limitation is even greater. This isn't the fault of the dev, but if you take a particular liking to a certain nun, you probably won't get more content beyond their individual scene. Poor Clara.

I generally don't like more direct corruption of girls games, so I think my only larger issue with the game is how the player character is characterized. He is written to be a very devout religious man, so the turn to corrupting the nuns is a little too abrupt for me and what he does in corrupting the girls is pretty extreme, even with the justifications he tells himself. I think making him more of a blank slate or alternative paths with girls (although that would be a lot of work). Or giving more of an explicit sense of the main character themselves being corrupted first by some entity or other outside factor, would be better for me in why the main character starts making the decisions he does. Or make it so whatever is happening is affecting the entire monastery, so everyone is more pliable to corruption. Again this is just my personal preference, but the routes with most of the girls is very direct corruption, i.e. literally drugging them then pretending it the work of God, is something that I'm not really a fan of.

There is sometimes a choice between acting "loving" vs "punishing", but that seems to be more about how certain scenes play out rather than taking an actual loving path that lets the nuns sincerely submit themselves to the player.

I think it would have been better for my tastes to have him really struggle over what is necessary to finish the investigation vs staying chaste or have some more direct sense of everyone being corrupted.

But as I said at the start, having a nun fetish means we have slim pickings, and this game is well done enough, in terms of plot, content, fapability etc, that it deserves 5 stars, my personal caveats aside.

PS would love more urination content if at all possible!

This is undoubtedly the first porn game in history to include a paragraph biography on Jan Hus.

This game is a fairly slow-burn corruption game. If you want to see a naughty priest slowly corrupting a bunch of innocent nuns into sluts, this is the game for you. If you want to see several paragraphs elaborating on a fictional Christian doctrine that equates blowing your load on a nun's face with the holy sacrament because you are an ordained priest and thus have the power of transubstantiation, then this is also your game.

There are some minor annoyances that others have mentioned, in particular about lack of guidance. It's not at all difficult, it is just kind of tedious sometimes. On the other hand, I am genuinely intrigued to solve the underlying mystery plot.

Ultimately, while I think the porn in the game is fairly mainstream, the overall theme and surrounding setting are very niche, for the sort of person that likes a period piece. I am absolutely part of that niche, even though the porn has otherwise been a little bit bland in my opinion.

Lost of story, lots of nice videos, demanding af rewarding game play. The self corruption system is nice and you need to think and plan to progress. I like that the story is surprisingly comphrehensive with lost of text and information. Some of the horror videos are actually scary. Clearly recommended for patient gamers who like the challenge.

v0.7

I love and hate this game.

The story is pretty good and full of content. I tend to gloss over the more detailed parts as I don't have interest in the deeper lore, but its there.

The characters are well made and fun to corrupt.

The investigative aspect of this game is both great and terrible.
Great in the sense that the story aspect is entertaining and feels like being an investigator.

However, the lack of direction sometimes makes the game come to a complete stand still.
The fix? Clicking a million different areas in a sandbox to find the thing you need to click.

This happened a few times, and made me quit due to the lack of clear direction. Not even murky direction, just... no direction.

Obviously this is still in development but this game seriously needs a mode to just go to the exclamation points and read the story.
Having to find the story IS NOT investigative work or gameplay. It's annoying frustration.
And fyi, the veteran detective mode doesn't help like 90% of the time.
Even the few times it does help, its just a hint or might tell you who to talk to if you're lucky.

Story: 5/5
Characters: 5/5
Sex: 5/5
Kinks: 4/5 (a few kinks on repeat)
Corruption: 5/5
Gameplay: 2/5
UI: 2/5

Lost 2 stars from the lack of guidance to the player.
Frustration levels rose higher than the enjoyment, so I quit.

Otherwise it's great.

nice game may the scences coudl be altered and fast tract some scenes
story flow s nicely and great work developer

improve hints

One if not the best html games, it's incredibly well made in every aspect of it. Story and writing are great, UI is really well made, scenes are great and coherent, and progression is really nice. Definitely worth playing!

impossible to progress. Garbage. Horrible quest hints and all of the content is locked so you spend all of your time randomly clicking on places and not progressing at all. Play anything else, you'll have much more fun

This game is a real gem.

for obvious reasons I am always reluctant to play HTML games, often very rough, weak and poor represented sex scenes, grid to the point of not return.

But this game is different, top quality user experience and game mechanics.
Interesting plot, mild grind, decent sex sceners.

To be honest is the first HTML game, I personally played, that feel solid.
Pity for the real porn, this kind of plot will happily support a good artist and its drawings.

Well done dev.

Really good game.

It looked like one of the many quick HTML/real-porn-toss-together-games. But it's very well written, has a good story, nice pacing, the clips are fitted nicely into the story. It's clear that a lot of sin and dedication has gone into the creation of this game.

I was convinced by the many good reviews. You should do that too!

Excellent story very well thougt out, with seemingly many threads coming togheter to make the story,
The game mechanics are good, there has been put effort into reducing amount of clicks per action.
The porn is good too, lots of it and it is very consistent with staying with the particular characters.

This game is doing a pretty good job of telling a mystery story. The game isn't based on grinding but based on Quest gating.

You have to do certain quests to a given level before other quests or event trigger that allow further progression. There is a corruption mechanic that can be deceptive in that you think you have to target that specific stat to progress the game but that isn't the case at all. Events will trigger to raise your corruption when quests are completed/advanced. It is by doing the quests that you get an event that will raise your corruption.

If you focus on trying to raise your corruption you will be frustrated but if you focus on just doing quests you'll progress easily. Focus on all the quests as they are interconnected so advancing quest A further might require quest D be completed or advanced.

The sex clips are kind of small and i wish developer would make 1080p clips because when you play on higher resolutions html games can get small and magnification only works so well. i know that increases size but 1080p is really old tech and 2k and 4k are becoming more mainstream.

All in all I am enjoying the game.

I have finished the 0.5 content available and gotta say this is pretty good. Maybe it would be more popular in renpy but twine works just fine. The story is engaging and interesting plus the gameplay is not bad. Real porn is a hit or miss but at least this dev uses the same models through the different scenes.

Probably the best porn HTML game I've played, this thing is a work of art. It's so good it almost feels like a shame its porn, because the story, ambience and suspense of the mystery is absolutely enthralling. The level of knowledge and detail displayed about alchemy, historical events and the church setting is brilliant as well.

Also, the porn is very good. The creator has made excellent use of what nun porn they could find, managing to create a real feeling of increasing perversion as the game goes on by using GIFs very well. I don't want to give away too much, but definitely play this if it sounds like your thing.

Finally, pay no attention to the "urination" tag, it's not a thing in the actual sex scenes.

Excellent game!
Good stories and greats videos, good walkthrough, which is not useless and doesn't make it too easy.
For version 0.5 it will be 4~5 hours of gameplay
Excited for the next releases
thanks for the credits, makes life a lot easier

I expected this to be similar to most of the twine/sugarcube games in that you could speedread and play fast.

The author however seems to have devoted themselves to narrative here in a great way. Excellent use of heresy and religious source material. The main character keeps a consistent worldview even as they slide into corruption in a way that I think is rare in games posted to this site. There is obviously still a lot of porn, but it is well integrated into the narrative and you will care about that narrative.

The only criticisms I have are that it can be a bit grindy at times, and even with Veteran Detective mode active, as you get deeper into the story there will be a few segments that become very careful calculations of lust and temptation management which feel at odds with the rest of the narrative.

Pretty easily the best HTML game I've come across. Does a pretty excellent job of doing the premise both staying true to it while also getting creative with it/not making it stale or repetitive content-wise. It is however kinda repetitive grind wise and can sometimes feel like I'm not sure if I'm stuck or not sure how to progress but once you get a sense of the game it's quite good. I kinda wish it was RENPY both because while the dialogue is mostly pretty good, sometimes there are moments that get kinda bro-speak-y or just not very believable to the premise but 85% of it does a better job than most of making it feel like the premise. So I wish it was RENPY just so I could customize/edit/finetune the dialogue some and don't really know how to for an HTML game. Something I think the developer does really well is getting a sense of what more specific character premise fits the look of this or that character and orchestrating the various events with how they are paced to each other. Like it doesn't do the mistake of introducing each character in a very similar/same way where it feels repetitive/predictable then they all have sex at the same point in the game but instead have interlaying arcs over each other where there's pretty much always something good going on thru out the game.

I feel I have a divine mission to review this game ! It is an amazing piece of work and dedication. It really deserves a 5 for the quality. However I will only go to 4 because it is rather poor on the porn side... Too vanilla and repetitive (limited by the paucity of good available religious porn videos, I know). And it is not a true sandbox, it tries to convey the impression of free choice but you are railroaded into a grinding strategy (for instance I would have liked to act as a true sadistic inquisitor with Jana...). Further most nuns are not that interesting (pornwise...) more dull and no spice...
However I can only pour praise on the author for the quality of his knowledge of christian heresy and western occult tradition (I have academic expertise on these topics). It means that the detective game is more interesting than the porn. So I highly recommend this game even it is not "fap-friendly".
Take note that despite my positive appreciation I think the investigation is becoming too long (we have in fact no more clue than in the beginning) with too many red herrings (which could not be red finally).
Finally the writing is excellent and the humor is INTENSE (a priest thanking God for sodomizing teen nuns...), this is the best in this game. It reminds me of the Enlightenment libertine tradition of trashing the Church...