Ren'Py - The Null Hypothesis [v0.8b1] [Ron Chon]

This is easily the game I'm most excited about on the site currently. Here's why.

ART:
It's very good with lots of details. Here and there some parts are a little sub-par or seem mismatched with the other art, but from what I can tell the devs are planning to gradually revamp a lot of it, and what's already here is way better than most other games, both in terms of sheer quality and including things like facial expressions, arm positioning, etc. where most games do the bare minimum.

STORY:
Unlike That Other Game, this one has a story. This is potentially a mixed bag. Story's not a huge priority to me for porn, and it does get in the way of the sandbox elements a bit. In That Other Game, you could get very dirty with the girls very quickly if you played it right, but here the relationships have to evolve gradually alongside the story. It does feel more realistic this way, but it takes some of the fun out of it. OTOH, the girls' personalities do come through more strongly with more stuff for them to do outside of just fucking and going to class, which makes them more fun to romance, and more distinct from eachother. In general, That Other Game had a charming, cartoonish sandboxiness that this one has replaced with a more grounded, story-having approach. Both are good, legit ways of doing things IMO, but it's worth pointing out how they relate for people who played the other one and are wondering what to expect here.

GAMEPLAY:
The gameplay is pretty basic. You make dialogue choices, do stuff to get money and stats, etc. It's in the sweet spot of being simple enough that you don't need to think a lot about it, but complex enough to feel like you're not just mindlessly clicking whatever: it's not fun in the way an action game is fun, but it's a great delivery vehicle for story and porn, and otherwise doesn't get in the way. The dialogue choices feel meaningful without feeling so crucial that you have to savescum.


SEX SCENES:
The sex scenes are very interactive. I've played ones with more options, but most of them are games consisting entirely of the sex scenes and nothing else, and this is early days yet. To me this is a huge, huge selling point. This has always seemed like kind of the point of porn games to me. If I just want a porn scene, I can watch a video. If I want good gameplay, almost any decent non-porn game will beat almost any porn game (and I can play it even when other people are around). If I want a good story, I can watch TV or read a book. Yet so many porn games end up feeling like generic games or stories with generic porn taped on to them. There's a little extra immersion from general interactivity, but it still sucks to be in control of the MC all the way up until the part I actually want to do. It's like an action game where you can control your character almost everywhere, except the fights are cutscenes with maybe a couple quicktime events thrown in, if you're lucky. This game is one of the very few that doesn't do that, and it's like finding a Zelda in a sea of walking simulators.

THE FUTURE:
I'm really encouraged by the detailed planning that seems to be going on with this. It looks like they're actually making a solid game engine before racing off to continue the story, which is the right call, as impatient as I am to put my dick in Storm. They're actually thinking about things like gameplay loops, which I don't think I've ever even seen another porn game dev mention, much less devote time to reworking. Even in its current, early state, I'd consider it a much better porn game than most of the stuff that shows up on here, and I'm excited to see where it goes from here if everything stays on track.

amazing and in-depth, good gameplay, good system, great art and good inspiration from the original game. I am suprised how well this game turned out. Still waiting for more content to be added but what the game has so far is pretty great. Overall 9.5/10

Great story and animation, and considering this is still an early beta, it is generally very good. So far, the dialogue and side activities seem to be lacking in variety. The Live2D animation looks amazing. It would be a shame if updates were not released as frequently as we would prefer.

A technically really well made game. Very pretty and well crafted characters with lots of work put into them to make them each different. Writing is solid and the setting is interesting. My main issue is that the sex scenes just kinda suck.. Its sort of a like a sandbox sex scene like you would find in the Koikatsu games and its just not my cup of tea. I think most people will really enjoy this if you can put up with the awkward sex scenes.

one of my favourite games I've played on this site, imagine rouge-like evolution but more polished and modern, with better art and a slight focus on plot and staying true to the X-men comics. thoroughly enjoyed the 4 or so hours i put in. only real critic is that i wish it had the same amount of focus on all the girls and their outfit options and that it had more content in total.

Art is great
Writing is good
Content is where it lacks has tons of content but there is no as much freedom as i would like and some events and scenes are forced to the player and I'm not talking about story events but sub events and sex scenes

I will return to give more stars when these issues are fixed

Has a lot of potential, could become one of the best games on here.

There is a lot unimplemented, but it's done in a way that doesn't get in the way.

The art is super fucked. Pretty early on there is a scene with Rouge crossing her arms, and she just doesn't have any hands. Storm looks super low res, like almost ms-paint. There are certainly a few select images that are great, but a lot of them look really poorly done. Makes me worry since it's so inconsistent.

- 2 stars cause when the art is bad, it's really bad.

When I first booted up this game, I thought to myself: "The art is way too good, the outfits system is too ambitious, it's overall way too high-quality - so this is deffo another one of those 'front-end great content and then milk the fans' projects.

But I delved deeper and, no, this is the real deal.

Only at 0.3 so far, but it already has enough content to warrant 5 stars, imo:
-A legit interesting story with clear reverence to the source material that promises to develop and one day end (Unlike the game that inspired this one)
-Beautiful art and fitting music
-Neat animations (Idle and sex ones) that are soon to improve even more
-Really good presentation and relationships that develop at a realistic rate (Seriously)

I don't know how far this project will make it, but it's honestly amazing that they've made it this far already.

It's really the cat's pyjamas. Maybe a bit of a slow burn at first, but so worth it in the long run.

Without a doubt, this is a 5 star game. But I believe it is very important to understand why it is so and what to expect from it.

To give context, this game never compelled me to masturbate while I played it. It has some sexual scenes for sure, and the body art of the women along with most of the art are very well drawn and extremely good, but I was more preoccupied with trying to spend time with the women rather than just dick them.

This leads me to the writing. This game has excellent writing, and the women are extremely well written. One unique thing I've found in this game (and I've played a lot of erotic games) is how women behave. They take the lead, they do things you would expect a man to do in relationships. They want to protect you. I cannot stress how good it makes you feel while playing the game, and I prefer to be the dominant person in relationships. That's how good it is.

Another good part is how consent plays into it. They may do these things, but you always have the choice to tell them not to do it. They ask for consent, and your character can also ask for consent. It isn't forced, it is just there as a choice. This is top notch stuff.

Another great thing the game does is differentiate the women. All of the women feel different, they have different characters and behave in different ways. Again, top notch, more of the same please!

This game feels like a real game as opposed to just an excuse to masturbate. You have classes, training, and you can work to earn money. The more you do these things, the more xp you gain. Get enough xp and you gain a level, which unlocks new features for your character. Again, writing it here is one thing, but playing it feels really good and fun, trust me on this.

There are systems in place to change the clothes of the women. There is a rudimentary system where you can gift them stuff they can put in their room. If these were fleshed out more (I hope it will) it will be that much better.

I only have 2 complaints, but this is nitpicking at this point. First, I wish there were more corruption options for the player to choose. I understand the setting, but I wish the main character could become evil or perverted and corrupt the women. Not 'destroy the institute and then the world' type, or 'make them fail their classes' type, but just sluttier in general, stuff like making them friends, then making them kiss each other, then threesomes/foursomes type. Being able to influence them in those ways seems very hot, I don't know.

Secondly, I understand how much of a major role the setting plays into it, but I wish this wasn't the setting chosen for this game. I fear that at some point, this game will be hit with a lawsuit, because it is clear that it will become a major hit in the next few months a la 'Being a Dik'. A unique setting from these devs would be incredibly fun, and also open the road to official releases (like Steam). After Nitrolith, this is another dev team that should be supported in my opinion.

So after a thorough playthrough, I feel like i compiled enough info to make a fair review of this game. First of all I would like to put in here that if you are looking for a quick fap, this is not the game for you. However, if you are looking for quality, beautiful graphics with intriguing story, then I recommend you check this out, you will not be dissapointed. On to the review.

First of all, the graphics are stunning. The attention to detail is impressive and I love it, 10/10.

Story is around a 7/10 simply because through all the available content, it seems as if there is not really any character growth with your heroines. They all have the same problems they started with, and regardless of your help, they dont seem to get any closer to solving them. They just keep repeating their frustration at not being able to figure out how they tick and that's pretty much the running theme. (except for Laura who knows exactly who she is and has a 100% grasp on her own powers).

Interface and UI are professional and nice looking. The map is not too clunky and it offers the ability to register up to 3 locaions as "quickspots" where you can go directly there without opening the maps at all.

The Heroines all have their own unique characters and back stories and its done well.

The only drawback that i can see at all is the BALANCE of the mechanics system. For every interaction or choice that you make you recieve "love" and/or "trust" points. These points are required to "level up" your relationship with the heroines, and while the game does not punish you for dating more than one at a time, (in fact you can establish a polyamorous relationship in the beggining), The grind gets exponentially larger as the game goes on. For example, part 1 is fairly quick to max gir's stats, part 2 is double that, and part 3 is just... painful. This definitely needs to be addressed by the developers to make it a more comfortable and playable game.

The other Complaint i had off the bat is that if the stat grind wasnt tedious enough, the actual "sexy time" interaction mechanics are clunky and also unbalanced. Also confusing. As you progess your relationships with the girls, they will open up more sexual options to you, but the positions and actions combinations as well as the tedius "next" click... It might be better if it was simplified quite a lot. Also, you if you are wondering when you actually get any serious action its not gonna be until around the 2nd half of the current content so expect maybe 4-5 hours before anything really interesting.

My advice would be to use the console to edit the stats to minimize the current grind.

Overall i would definitely recommend this game, I absolutely love it and hope the dev comes out with frequent updates. Its rare to find a game this good, especially on this site.

I've been playing various offerings here for like 3 years?

This is the first time I've felt compelled to rate a game.

I understand the inspiration from RE but this game is distinct and more my style in all ways.

Positives:
-Cool setting
-Cool plot
-Cool characters (including the protag)
-Great art
-Great UI
-Great scenes
-Great interactivity
-Great character progression
-Great writing

Negatives:
-Could do with being less grindy and being able to get around to events with less clicking through menus.

Things I hope to see as the game develops:
-Expand on the character progression options of the player
-Complete the story
-Expand the side quests and ability to interact with non-LI's or friend-zoneable LI's outside of the hot content
-Expanded stable of LI's (even if that means some become mutually exclusive or if some characters are more like flings that can only develop so much)
-Expand on the dialogues and interactions available

Already a great game, interested to see what actually comes of it by the end of development!

Tedious game (as of 0.3b) with little to offer other than excellent graphics.

• Graphics are pretty good. There is no point to argue about it. It is the only reason it is getting the second star.
• Gameplay is boring. There is not much to do other than train, go to class, and try to shag a girl after some progression in the story. Even the shagging is pretty boring. This game needs a QoL improvement over anything else.
• Story is well.... Unoriginal? What can you say when at the start of the game the development team says that "it is heavily inspired by..." . I am not gonna enter in the discussion of which one is better, but it has been done before. Even the original story the game has borrowed is not such a great premise, so all in all there is not much to go on storywise.

If you want some Xmen porn, there are better places to look for it. When I play porn games I like the game part WITH the porn... if the Game is painful, I have better ways to find the "fun" part

Truly a fantastic game. The story you are telling is interesting and evocative. The art is great and the premise if fantastic. You even made me care about a non-sexual relationship. Nightcrawler is my brudder from another mutter. lol

Keep the story tight.. Have a ending planed. And this will stay and be a 10/10 experience.

Game is incredibly tedious. Navigating the mansion and the menus feels like it takes several steps more than it should. The art and the music are absolutely incredible but I don't want to actually play the game bc it isn't fluid.

Solve the navigation issues and make the user experience better and this game is unbeatable, until then it will just frustrate you quickly

I really don't understand all the 5 star reviews for this game... Including from people who manage to list more cons than pros in their reviews but will still give it a perfect score...

I used to play RLE for a while but eventually stopped because it just became so repetitive with no real meaningful content added to it. I am fully aware this is not meant to be a remake of RLE but a completely separate game, but the basic premise and so much of the base gameplay are so similar at this point that the devs cannot blame the players for wanting to compare the two.

There's no discussion that the strongest point of the game is it's art, characters are beautiful and I really appreciate the variety of pubic hair that can be selected even if it doesn't seem completely implemented into the sex scenes at this stage. I just wish we had a little bit more variety in the character's body shapes.
The art also works a lot better in the sex minigame than in RLE.

But the gameplay quickly becomes extremely painful after a while. The menus and the map are horrible to navigate, we end up spending most of our time clicking several times to get to a different location, or to trigger an action or a dialogue, including in the sex minigame.
And of course you have to endlessly rince and repeat just in order to get a handful of points or cash. Even using the console to cheat the stats and money it feels like the game takes ages to make any meaningful progress.

The story pacing feels excruciatingly slow, this update added more character events in order to flesh out the character stories but they seem to trigger completely randomly (some took several days to appear for me and I did keep an eye for them on the map) but in the end they just add to the grind and are not that interesting to me... If at least they included some degree of lewd events to show some kind of progression in the relationships. I'm all for slow burn games, many VNs execute it well but here it's just a drag.

The outfit system has a lot of potential, but at the moment it's just terribly implemented, hard to understand how to properly save outfits, half the time the shame stat doesn't appear (EDIT : finally figured it shows on the top left corner...), and there's a lot of nonsense with the different clothes stat values. I know they had to remove some of the outfits for this particular update, hopefully once they are re implemented the outfit system will also get a rework to make it easier to use and understand).

It seems that the characters won't be as keen for nudity or lewd activities in public, compared to RLE. While I appreciate that the devs wanted to be a bit more realistic and didn't want to turn the LIs into addicted sex slaves, I also find it slightly disappointing because I think a middle ground could be found in that aspect that would not be as extreme as in RLE, but still have a degree of exhibitionism which was still one aspect I appreciated from the original game.

At the end of the day this game is no better or worse than RLE, it does have more story than the original but most of it doesn't really add much to the game and feels like a way to artificially boost the game content and it just ends up adding a lot of grind. It still gets super repetitive and the sex content ends up being just the same scene we have to replay over and over again with the same characters.

I had only played the previous version of this game and I feel like I had enjoyed it more, probably because it was my first time playing it. Now that I had to replay it all from the start it just felt like a massive pain and a massive grind to complete this update and it just became as repetitive and boring as the original...

It seems there is a lot of potential here and the devs seem to be quite ambitious judging from their posts on the thread, but I also fear they might just be over promising features and future content, especially if they already had to go back and "flesh out" the game and having to temporarily remove some content and features...
I'll be curious about the next update but I really hope we won't have to replay the whole thing from the start again because I don't think I'll want to bother.

Version: [v0.3a]

Beautiful art that suffers greatly from a not great sandbox execution.
This is gonna be short as there's not much to delve too deep into.

The art is really really nice, 2d art that is done well is a pretty rare find and it was the reason I lasted as long as I did with this one.
The writing is okay, nothing special if I'm being honest but definitely servicable.

As a game it is pretty bad.
The game is very laggy, the menus are honestly annoying and moving around the mansion takes too long and feels too bad (a way to move to a specific character instead of a location, 1 click move from the maps instead of changing floors etc, would be really nice), the phone should not exist as it does right now.
The text appearing in the corner of the screen as it does in comics is pretty pleasing thematically and visually, but is kind of uncomfortable in practice.

The gameplay is, as usual with sandbox games, bad. you spam boring interactions to build up stats and wait for events to trigger, even if they wouldn't take an eternity to trigger (randomly, of course), the mansion feels too empty, large, and pointless to justify the sandbox aspects.
Changing the cloths the LI's wear, as is often the case with 'Null Hypothesis', unintuitive, cumbersome and finicky. I gave up on it after a few minutes.
Well, after a couple of hours I saved and closed the game. when I came back I found out I lost around 20 minutes of gameplay, which consists of befriending X-23, and other seemingly random events proccing, and at that point I had to wonder, why do I even bother? so I closed the game and deleted it.

To sum it up - great art, serviceable writing, awful sandbox execution.
I'll be honest and say that my experience felt more like a 2/5 than a 3/5, but as I dropped the game without finishing all the available content, I'll round up.
Might check back in the future as it seems from the change log there are plenty of things that are changing and the dev is still figuring things out, but as of right now there's a lot of work that needs to be done.

I went into this game with low expectations, but it truly took me by surprise, exceeding what I had anticipated. The overall quality of the game is remarkable, especially considering its early development stage. The comic-book theme, the captivating setting, and the impressive environmental artwork contribute to a refreshing gaming experience.

Despite being in its early stages, the storyline remains engaging, and each heroine possesses distinct and charming qualities. The developers have introduced a character progression system involving classes, training, and studying, which I find particularly enjoyable. Although the mutant power system is still evolving, I'm eagerly looking forward to seeing its development.

There is a lot of potential here, and the game seems to be heading in an exciting direction. If you're hesitant about trying it out, I highly recommend giving it a chance. There's much to look forward to, and the game already demonstrates promising elements that make it worth exploring.

There are some bugs...and some issues with repetitiveness and grinding so far but it's not intolerable.

*As of V0.3a
Pros:

• Great animated 2D art, which is a pretty rare find outside Japanese games iMO
• Not much story yet, but the characters are written pretty well, and they do feel pretty alive, which helps cut the grindiness that some players have an issue with
• Sex minigame is decent imo, reminds me of the 2000-2015 Japanese trainer games.
• Enough mechanics and flavor to not feel like a copy paste VN
• Some people say it gets laggy, but I've reached the end of the content for this version, and never got any while running on a M1 macbook air.

Cons:

• Quite a few bugs as of this version, at least in the Mac download, but nothing game breaking.
• Can get repetitive, especially since the story isn't far along yet.
• Can be grindy to some players, but not as bad as many Twine games
• Some optional goals/events are hard to trigger.
• Can use more body movements, especially in standing art and facial expressions (makeout and orgasm reaction, etc)

Additional Notes
The game has great potential, and hopefully production runs well, since that is a bane of many of these games, and please don't resort to AI art...

This is to me the peak of what Adult Games can be. It blends the story of a typical Visual Novel with more interactive features, its characterisation of fan favourites from its chosen franchise work perfectly and the art is beautiful. One of the few games I've played that truly feels like a passion project.

A skip button would be nice and obviously the content is far from complete (albeit plentiful in its current state) but it's the only true 10/10 I've ever found on this site. Amazing job guys I can't wait to see more.

Longtime lurker, I've seen games come and go. I've seen the memes, the shitty games, the god tier ones too. I've seen devs do nothing and soak in money, I've seen them working their asses off to get updates regularly. I always figured didn't really need to put in much input because someone else does it for me.

This game changed that.

Every character if fun and with the new update we get to see more of them besides the normal dates and few lines of repeating dialogue. Each one of them actually feels different which was always one of my few complaints about rouge like.

Also the MC actually feels like a person instead of just a blank slate to insert yourself in, adding with the archetype feature I feel like I can actually immersive myself into this version of the x-men.

I'm extremely looking forward to the potential of going on missions and learning more about Null's powers and seeing where the plot goes. Farouk being a major antagonist makes me wonder how Storm will come into play.

The artstyle itself is some of the best 2D art I've seen on the site, like ever. Like the artist makes each girl feel different. Like I don't see a single different sameface.

The only complaint I can think off is the sex minigame can be a bit tedious but its not even the worst one I've seen on the site.

I want this game to be big, it deserves every bit of praise it gets.

This game is gonna be up there with some of the all time greats or I will eat my entire x-men collection mark my words.