Ren'Py - Abandoned - The Red Room [v0.5b] [Alishia]

I just can't stand games like this. You've got these good visuals, an intriguing situation, and yet the developer insists on the player haphazardly wandering around the world until they guess which triggers advance the story.

I can't think of a more frustrating game over screen in a video game on this site. Why does a game like this even need a game over screen? To increase frustration? To make the player feel like a failure when the developer poorly communicates the next objective?

This is a good looking game with terrible game design. Honestly the moment someone comes up with a hack mod to disable the time limits I might actually play this thing. But as of now I'm not supporting this until someone else comes along and fixes the developer's mistakes.

This game is a perfect example of wasted potential. Looked very promising at the beginning, with some nice looking characters and intriguing plot, and turned into stupid grindy fest.
Don't know if author loose her spark but this new direction of the game development feels facepalmingly awful.

Review v.0.3a:

Well, this game certainly has a lot of potential.

The models look great, with some exceptions, but those were intended.
The renders also look great.

The story is in interesting mix between being highly unlikely as well as very very lewd. Still, the dev manages to have the story make sense. Which is no small feat considering the several fantastical premises.

The problem with the game however is that the gameplay is pretty shit at the moment. After the long introduction it becomes a sandbox and you end up clicking room after room after room trying to find a character, increase your stats with her, until it's maxed out. But when it is maxed out there is no end of content warning or something... If there is one game which needs a walkthrough (preferably built-in) it's this one...

Which leads to the second problem, despite being in development for almost 2 years now, the actual content is still very limited. You can spend time going from room to room but at the end there is not that much to show for it. Especially in terms of actual sex scenes.

So all in all, despite the fact that the game does show a lot of progress, I can't give it more than 3/5. I hope the dev starts moving the story forward. Given the lewd circumstances the MC finds herself in, I can't imagine that being difficult from a story perspective. If the story is progressed and if the gameplay is improved, the game could be 5/5 but as it is, 3/5 seems fair.

I used to be excited about this game since the first time it was released, the story was good, the characters had different personalities including the protagonist and the models were gorgeous, but the game just became a horrible sandbox game while you have to struggle to advance quests.

1.There's not enough info for the quests and you have to search everything in the rooms in order to find some clues, i had to go to forum to see how to advance

2.The number of days are too limited and it's not enough to complete quests since you need to skip days when needed, why there is a time limit implemented anyway? there's already a pain that is a sandbox game, adding a time limit it's even more painful.

3.You have to search for characters around the house every time when you need to talk to them, why didn't you added some icons so we can see where are the characters without wasting our time to find them or asking the maid for locations, you have to look even for the maid since she changes her location every moment of the day like the others.


I don't hate on game, the contrary, It's hard to rate this game so low since i enjoy it overall, but the mechanics simply kills it by making it harder and frustrating.

Review for v0.3a

This has SO MUCH POTENTIAL. And that does not mean what is already here is not good. This game has amazing renders, characters, story, kinks, etc. This is so close to being one of my favorite games. However there are a few current problems that barely keep it from being a 5. First is that once you reach the sandbox mode there is a point at which the game ends after seven days if you do not complete a certain quest. This is fine and I actually like this, it works well in the story. However that quest is currently not completable. It makes sense then that at this stage in development the 7 day countdown to game over should not be in place so players can continue to try to finish all content. Secondly not all the content is in the quest tab, making it hard to know what content is available and if you have completed it or not. The quest tab itself, along with the rest of the mechanics and ui is very nice, but more of the content should be there. There should also be more detailed hints in the quest tab on how to complete each quest, it is currently at times confusing on what to do next. Lastly, and this doesn't necessarily detract from the score but it would be a great feature, a gallery for all canon scenes would be very nice. Besides this the game is great and it can easily become a 5/5 as well as one of the best games on the site.

Also I want to talk about the developer. (None of this was factored into my rating of the game in any way.) Alishia is extremely talented. This shows in the game. I am in awe of what she creates. However the development pace of this game is worrying. It took over a year after v0.1 of Red Room came out for her to release v0.2. Yes v0.2 introuduced a decent amount of mechanics, all of which are great, but I just do not believe it took 13 months to do. I am 100% for quality of quantity and god damn does Alishia produce quality but I don't think she was actually working for those 13 months consistently. During this time there was a 3 month period of silence followed by a 5 month period of silence. After v0.2 it took 6 months until v0.3 came out, and the amount of content once again does not justify this time. Again, the content in v0.3 is of fantastic quality, but it is unlikely it is the product of 6 months hard work. Alisha stopped development of her first game after v0.2 because she said she was burnt out, and I really hope the same does not happen with Red Room. I could be wrong and she could be laying the groundwork, after which development time can speed up. If she can show she can produce updates consistently and keep communication alive and transparent she could become one of the best game devs on the site.

I don't comment on games often, but I like to show my support on the few that I think deserve it. This game has a lot of great qualities and you should definitely give it a try. To the developer: I love the game and can't wait for more <3.

ok , ive played my share of porn games , but ive never seen a more perfect character design in a game before ..( goddamn u jessica ;( ) 1000/10 for the chr design , gameplay is smooth too .. graphics are top notch overall ... if this game was straight and not futa and shiit , would easily be my favorite game of all time , just imagine ... a guy in the lead ... jesus this game wouda been perfect <3 ... hope it continues tho <3
4.8/5

I love this game. It's so pretty and my curiosity for where it is going is strong! Plus, Sasha has GOT to lighten up...right? Plus, I hope that that crazy looking Manager somehow either gets what is coming to her or somehow looks less insane.

Big dick, thicc chicks and incest impregnation sprinkled with juicy NTR .

Well, I know this is only the beggining, but I hope developer actually finishes this game and all tags get full coverage. There is potential for very juice sex scenes and only imagination is the limit. I'm already fantasizing for a finished game with a sandbox mode and all possible partner combos....

My sex compass was really turned 180 degrees here.

I'm not into futa, but girls here (Kendra, Jessica and MC) are so beautiful, that I don't really care that they are packing big D's.

On the other hand MC's mother (that is usually my favorite character in these types of games) scared (scarred ) the crap out of me. Until the game menu 100% confirmed that Mother is actually a "she", I thought that "Mom" was actually Dad dressed in drag .

As for the game itself so far there is not much here except the visual novelesque part of the game. I will be keeping an eye on this one.

Game has evolved from something slightly promising (one year ago...) at least for including good renders and unused renpy futa theme, to something vulgar, ugly and pointless with a terrible "sandbox" gameplay, terrible dialogues and new nasty characters.

Tentatively 5 stars.

First up, I've been critical of Alishia in the past, especially given the delays in updates & releases. That hasn't changed, and some of those criticisms still remain. But this review is purely about the quality of the game, while recognizing that it's a work in progress.

The fact that the game got updated at all is somewhat of a Milestone. I'm pretty sure everyone expected the game to be dead, me included. As for the quality, the writing is - for the most part - good, although there are some noticable grammer and spelling errors I've chosen to ignore because this is a work in progress after all. It's probably a good idea to get someone to proofread the text.

What's the most oustanding is the impressive visuals, both in the scenary and in the characters. There's a lot of care and a great attention to detail put into every shot and the lighting is phenomal.

The gameplay is still somewhat rough, mostly due to a lack of content, but you can see that a lot of work went into the underlying systems, from inventory, character overviews to the day & night system. I can imagine them taking quite a bit of time to hammer out.

Overall, Red Room v0.2a is a content-lacking but (aside from some minor writing errors) highly polished and very promising game.

The three biggest detractors are A. the current lack of content, leaving pretty much everything inconclusive and making it difficult to know whether there is any content you may have missed or still exists in this version, B. the somewhat grindy nature of some gameplay elements, making it hard to know whether your time in the day/night cycle is well-spent and C. the enormous amount of time this update took to release.
Some of the new content (like the game mechanics) explain why it would take a lot of time to finish the game, but even then, it's a bit on the shallow side.

Right now, the game is, for what it is, a very promising title that could be great. It absolutely has the potential to be one of the best dating/VNV simulator games, especially in the futa niche.

But it remains to be seen whether Alishia manages to stick to the current update plan for the next update in May, and whether the game, unburdened by the now present gameplay mechanics, can progress faster and provide a more fulfilling amount of content that allows players to actually follow an arc to a satisfying conlucion of that arc. (Currently none of the quests can be finished, it seems)

There's a lot of promise here, some of the best visuals I've seen in 3D VN's/dating games, let's hope Alishia can use the next patch to bring the game to where it's less of a showcase of what's implemented, and more of a game with its first minor story-arcs concluded.

This is a unique character set and all women (so far). The graphics renderings are very high quality. Navigation was a little tricky as I didn't realize how many rooms there are within rooms. Took a while to get used to. I really hope to see this get more and more frequent updates.

Nice renders, like the not normal setting. Nothing to complain about. Can't really say anything bad. Maybe in one way that is not always easy to figure out where to go next. One of my favourite games here on this site.

Warning: though this game have ntr avoidable tag is not avoidable as you may think, for starters the game force you to do a lot of shit and a lot of fetishes with no way to avoid them, for example at first when the game start you have a gf and go with her to some strip club, here a police appears and get u both arrested with no way to avoid it, she lets you both go away but force you or ur gf to take a picture with her dick... Possible forced blackmail shit in the future, also if u pay choose to listen while in jail you see the police talking she is fucking a milf, that milf ends up being the mcs mom so ntr not so avoidable since you cant avoid that, also there is a ntr counter that keeo getting points no matter what, i choose to save the gf and took the photo with the futa police and yet i did get 2 ntr points for no fucking reason.
At the first of the game you are also forced to choose one of 3 fetishes for the mc to masturbate and none of those may be to everyone tastes gangbang, rape and cuckquean....
As someone who like vanilla, harem games or where my mc is the only one to fuck the heroines in the game is certainly a game to avoid since there is no way to avoid a lot fetishes....
I downloaded this because did see ntr avoidable, but it is not.

The theme/story is quite unique and the renders are beyond beautiful and even if the game is abandoned I am truly grateful for what was given to us here. And who knows, one day, just one day... the project might be continued. Miracles do happen after all (sometimes)...

So far i'm enjoying this game, the story is nice and can't wait to see more of the plot behind the characters and the futa,
The main character is a blonde which is not a big issue with me and her sister is a alternative like chick who yet again is a rebel or at least she thinks she is, have to wait and see why she is like that.
I enjoyed the scenes and how they looked, with all the layouts and i only had one scene that was not really up my alley.
Can't wait to see what all happens in future updates.
just hope it does not get abandoned.

Story. 8.5/10
characters. 8/10
sex.5.5/10
art/renders. 9/10

Red Room has solid looking renders/art, mostly, a fair bit of inspiration to it and absolutely faceplants the writing element of the VN. Outside of just having broken non-sense English that clearly didn't have proof reading from time to time, there are also a lot of outright cringey, awkward scenes in it that don't make any sense at all. Heck, to paraphrase a conversation from two characters, we have "She doesn't shave her armpits because she's a feminist" and "these laces are are antifa" which just is a bunch of nonsequitor buzzwords added in, which really establishes the script of the rest of the game too.

It's a pity, as a "futa" protag is pretty rare.

This game is well done. It gives a realistic vibe due to the 3D models with very very good rendering plus the young sweet "innocent" girl vibe we know off attaching us quickly to the MC. Alishia's skills are versatile in producing good spots (i.e rooms and objects) in addition to good lightning and shading. However apart from probably S-tier art the story features an interactive mode, currently its somewhat interactive. You get to choose your behaviour and the way of responding but due to being in the 0.1 version this doesn't always lead to different "ends". I'd like to say that right now in the game which could be classed as intro got 80% which is nice since we need to follow the main plot somehow. Either way the fetishes are placed in the tags and there's not much to say about that. My ratings would be 9.87 out of 10 and the missing 0.13 is just the waiting.


tl;dr
Hits you deep dark fantasy and you want to play more of it. Good art and plot with fetishes we like but its in an early stage so you got to wait some time for a new update.


Don't know if there's a word limit?

Zhelander said:

"Goes to a game with quality renders and somewhat popular, disappointed that there are a lot of[...]"

Click to expand...

This is me, but in my case, it's the extreme amounts of blackmail and humiliation (yes, I know, it's tagged) in just the intro. LOVE the graphics, love the MC, love futas, and I've played some games with blackmail and humiliation, but this was too much. IF the MC is ever going to become strong enough to stop what's happening to her (if the player takes her down that path), the setup in the intro makes that seem like a distant future.

I'm not here to say the game is bad or that some people won't enjoy it, but I read the description and a lot of the comments and then ended up being unpleasantly surprised. I'd like to spare others that surprise, whether it's a pleasant or unpleasant one to you.

[Rev .1LE]
~Plot writing is a bit trite and forced.
+Moment-to-moment writing is good.
-Some early scene changes / continuity jumps are jarring.

-Sister's character is annoying. Less "wanna slip you the D" and more "wanna slip you your meds".

+Art is good and enjoyable.
+Really like the mom's model.

~I'm a fan of futa, but not of the You Fail Biology Forever level on The Cop.
-From an NTR fan standpoint the setup with The Cop is too railroady and sudden.
~Not a big fan of the extra hair in places, but not a dealbreaker.

TLDR: Yeah. I'll keep an eye on this one, has potential.