Recommending TonyMurray's Favourite Games and Favourite Girls

[TonyMurray]

Chasing Sunsets wasn't really on my rader before but after seeing some of those beautiful ladies (especially Mallory, Lisa and Bianca) i will definitely try this game out. Probably when it will be completely finished. So thanks for recommendation.

Really good idea with presenting girls from the games this way.

You should definitely try some of the older classics like: Acting Lessons, Sisterly Lust, Man of the House, Dreams of Desire or Parental Love.

Thanks! In Chasing Sunsets, Mallory is one of the two main girls (arguably, she is number two to Jaye though). Bianca and Lisa both have optional scenes (a couple for each), so you can spend some time with all three. Sounds like some similar taste in LIs there, perhaps!

I've played Acting Lessons and Sisterly Lust, they were among the earlier games I played before finding these forums. I have tried Parental Love but there were a few elements that were too much out of my liking, so I ditched it. Dreams of Desire is on my list - I've been enjoying the dev's other game, Midnight Paradise, so wanted to check out his other work. Man of the House is not one I've looked at, as I usually tend to skip past non Ren'Py games, to be honest.

 

[Liquid Tube Technology]

Hey there, sorry to butt in the conversation but I couldn't help it because you said:

I have tried Parental Love but there were a few elements that were too much out of my liking....

I don't know if it's for the same reasons, but I also couldn't enjoy Parental Love nearly as much as I wanted due to certain elements. Actually, in my case it was mostly the way the MC acted that just didn't sit well with me. I still finished the game but, for me, the immersive experience got ruined pretty early on, which meant from that point on, I only played it through the eyes of a spectator rather than the MC himself. I liked Sisterly Lust (romantic Bella route, never tried the humiliation route) a lot better, though.

 

[TonyMurray]

Hey there, sorry to butt in the conversation but I couldn't help it because you said:



I don't know if it's for the same reasons, but I also couldn't enjoy Parental Love nearly as much as I wanted due to certain elements. Actually, in my case it was mostly the way the MC acted that just didn't sit well with me. I still finished the game but, for me, the immersive experience got ruined pretty early on, which meant from that point on, I only played it through the eyes of a spectator rather than the MC himself. I liked Sisterly Lust (romantic Bella route, never tried the humiliation route) a lot better, though.

I was trying to remember by skimming the game thread's OP/screenshots. I think the main thing was that several of the LIs were too young for me, but I think there were some other bits later on that I'd heard of and that didn't sit well with me either. For Sisterly Lust, I can't remember how I played it/what routes. As with Acting Lessons, where they were among the first games I played, I only went through once and then left it, so I never even looked at alternative routes that may have been available.

 

[Liquid Tube Technology]

I was trying to remember by skimming the game thread's OP/screenshots. I think the main thing was that several of the LIs were too young for me, but I think there were some other bits later on that I'd heard of and that didn't sit well with me either. For Sisterly Lust, I can't remember how I played it/what routes. As with Acting Lessons, where they were among the first games I played, I only went through once and then left it, so I never even looked at alternative routes that may have been available.

I usually just end up playing these games only once. I remember playing Acting Lessons twice (I think) because the first ending I got was just okay. It had a hopeful note, but overall a bit depressing. So I played it again and made different choices, and got a much better ending the second time. There are games where I want to play again just for their story, though. Now & Then for me is a good example.

Speaking of the second time, I think I will need to play Chasing Sunsets again from toward the end, because I downloaded the v1.0 a day before they release v1.01 and I didn't know about it, lol.

 

[stenctrum]

I've played Acting Lessons and Sisterly Lust, they were among the earlier games I played before finding these forums. I have tried Parental Love but there were a few elements that were too much out of my liking, so I ditched it. Dreams of Desire is on my list - I've been enjoying the dev's other game, Midnight Paradise, so wanted to check out his other work. Man of the House is not one I've looked at, as I usually tend to skip past non Ren'Py games, to be honest.

Honestly, i'm not even sure whats a difference between Unity game and Ren'Py from a player standpoint. I played a few games on Unity and i literally couldn't really see any difference compared to Ren'Py games. Maybe i'm a bit biased about Man of the House cuz it was one of the first porn games i've played, and the first one i bought on Steam but this is my favorite game alongside Sisterly Lust. People say its very grindy etc. but i didn't mind that at all. I played far more grindy games than MotH. It's pretty slow burn, have rather generic setting but i was definelly pretty enjoyable experience. It is somewhat similar to Midnight Paradise and for me MotH is a better sandbox experience.

I have to say, one of the reasons i've mentioned Sisterly Lust is that i was hoping for a nice card presentation of all girls. I guess its pretty similar to My Dorm, being a pretty wholesome harem, where you can end up with 22 babies

Yeah, Parental Love is definitely not for everyone, especially if someone is not into underage girls. I'm definitely not into that, i prefer older women but honestly i really liked PL, and my favorite LI in that game was a 15 yo friend of MCs 12 yo daughter. That game is pretty weird and can do weird things with you

 

[TonyMurray]

Tried a couple of new games out recently as I look to find that elusive one that will complete my current top ten.

Summer Crush by Wet n' Juicy Games

Summer Crush is a game that looked like it could hit all the right spots, but it missed the mark for me in some pretty big ways. I felt the graphics were a bit inconsistent, with the quality of the girls varying quite a bit in terms of how detailed they were, but it was the writing that really didn’t work for me.

I felt the story was missing a few parts that would have set things up better, because it seemed to just jump straight into multiple sex scenes, leaving me just tagging along for the ride. The dialogue wasn’t great, and then some odd story choices started to come into it, which took the game in a whole other direction – one I’m not sure the devs are equipped to pull off. It’s brave to go into something like this and look to subvert expectations, but that’s only really going to work if you get the basics right, from both a game and a storytelling perspective.

This is one I’ve decided not to continue with as I was not even close to getting invested in the story, and I didn’t feel there was any form of relationship with any of the LIs – the one exception possibly being the childhood friend who has a history with the MC that we’re told about, but nothing that we’re really shown.

My status @ Episode 7: Not continuing.


Alice: A Hard Life by Caylake

This was a bit of an odd one for me, because if I went into playing the game blind, I would have been completely lost. It starts out as a very different story to what’s in the overview in the game thread, and there’s no initial explanation of what’s going on. Outside of that specific example, I felt this one suffered from poor writing, with stilted dialogue, and scenes (whether lewd or otherwise) just jumping up out of nowhere, rather than flowing in a coherent manner. I also felt that I couldn’t easily immerse myself in the story as the perspective shifted on a couple occasions to show scenes where the POV MC was not present.

There is an adequate number of lewds in the gallery for the size of the current update, but they were largely unfulfilling, with most being simple nude scenes (although there are a couple of additional nude scenes not in the gallery), and a couple of the actual sex scenes being interrupted before they really got going.

The general principle of the game is interesting and the screenshots suggest a good-looking, fun game, but I don’t think it was very well executed here, and although it’s still early in the development cycle, I saw enough to decide this wasn’t going to be a game for me.

My status @ Episode 1 – 1.5: Not continuing.

 

[TonyMurray]

Hillside by DarkBlue

This is one of those games that’s just a little bit different, and I think you need to know that going in, or you may find yourself very disappointed. It is, in part, a very sexy game, but it’s not a sex game – it’s not a game full of scenes with your chosen love interest, it’s very much a slow burn, but one that I think is done very well.

Hillside focuses on the relationships, and regardless of the path you choose, the relationships in question remain the same, it’s just to what level they might progress – purely professional, familial, or (potentially) sexual. The female lead is Charlotte, who I think is modelled perfectly to represent a supermodel at the end of her career. She is beautiful from a distance, and up close, while still beautiful, you can see the graceful aging as well as tiny reminders of a terrible past that will be unveiled as the game progresses.

While there are a couple of side girls you can chase – you can enter into a full relationship with Charlotte’s sister, for instance – that’s not part of the main story, so you won’t see much (at the moment) on those paths. The main story revolves around protecting Charlotte and Emma (her daughter), and becoming closer to them as a result. That’s not to say that your only options in terms of LIs are Charlotte (at present) and Emma (presumably upcoming), but this is not the sort of game where the main objective is to get the girl. So even on Lucy’s path, for instance, most of the time will be spent with Charlotte and/or Emma, and scenes with Lucy will be minimal. These side girls do allow a couple of sex scenes, however, for those who crave a bit of pixel-on-pixel contact.

The graphics here are good, the game mechanics work well, and although some might feel the relationships with some of the potential LIs move too slowly, I personally feel the pacing is nicely done for the type of game this is. I’ve really enjoyed the story in the first part of Hillside, and I’m looking forward to seeing what comes next as the first arc comes to a close. Sadly, the game is currently “on hold” as the dev has suffered a personal tragedy, and I wish nothing but the best for him and his family.

 

[TonyMurray]

The Headmaster by Altos and Herdone

This is one of the “odd one out” games in my ongoing list, but as it was one of the first games I started playing, I’m continuing it out of nostalgia, if nothing else. One main difference is the visuals – I don’t tend to play games with Honey Select (or in this case PlayHome) models, because I don’t like the way they look nearly as much.

This is a sandbox game (another rarity for me) with a bunch of quests with various different steps as you look to progress punishment levels with students, increase influence with teachers, and make changes to the school rules – all with the ultimate goal of (from the player’s perspective) getting the students (and some of the teachers) naked, spanked, and titillated. The story behind this, and the ongoing explanations for various activities, is bizarre to the point of being laughable, but if you don’t try to make sense of it in a real-world sense, it serves its purpose well.

The girls are plentiful, and there is ample opportunity to get them in front of the headmaster in either the classroom or his office for punishment, although it might take a while before you can do much with some of the students. It should be noted that the initial rules do not allow you to punish the girls yourself/alone and so a female teacher is involved for the majority of the early events. The update cycle tends to focus on a couple of individual story elements at a time, so some girls will progress to the point of you being able to masturbate them, have them masturbate you, or potentially have sex with them, while others are still waiting to be taken past the first level of punishment.

This can make for a slightly disjointed story when the next update comes along with scenes that, in a chronological sense, would usually have been played earlier than some elements of the previous update. Overall though, the sandbox and quest nature of the game means that doesn’t tend to be a problem. The game can get a bit repetitive as you start to run out of quest steps to complete, with school patrols, spying on the girls’ rooms at night, teaching class/coaching sports all having a finite number of different events, and some of them do play out for a number of scenes, to the point that I sometimes find myself scrolling back and then skipping the period to avoid replaying the event.

This is a fun game though, and I enjoy the quest element of it – it makes it easy to play without needing my full attention like a more story-based game would. The visual and gameplay sides of it mean it’s never going to trouble my favourites for a spot in my top ten, but it’s one that I’ll continue checking out as new updates drop.

 

[Mareeeeta]

Interesting, I like how you made "cards" for girls.
Did you take captures for images or did you find them somewhere ?
They feel like real cards, not random screenshot in the way you make them, it's great.
What are you even using a template or a website dedicated to cards ?

Also the fact that you do not forget any of them means that you've just played them or did the game again just for them, wow.
Like I've played probably 500+ games so I forgot most of the girls except my favs.



We clearly don't have the same taste (at least as favorites, we don't like the same type I think) , but it makes it even funnier to read.


Kind of reminds me my topic even though it wasn't descriptive about the games themselves (I did make another one for it)
Top 150 Favorite Girls


I also have to make a top for HS games one day...

 

[TonyMurray]

Interesting, I like how you made "cards" for girls.
Did you take captures for images or did you find them somewhere ?
They feel like real cards, not random screenshot in the way you make them, it's great.
What are you even using a template or a website dedicated to cards ?

Also the fact that you do not forget any of them means that you've just played them or did the game again just for them, wow.
Like I've played probably 500+ games so I forgot most of the girls except my favs.



We clearly don't have the same taste (at least as favorites, we don't like the same type I think) , but it makes it even funnier to read.


Kind of reminds me my topic even though it wasn't descriptive about the games themselves (I did make another one for it)
Top 150 Favorite Girls


I also have to make a top for HS games one day...

Thanks - I actually checked out your list the other day and added a couple of games from it to my "to try" list (many of them were already on there, as I have played far fewer than your 500+!)

For my cards, I like having something like this to occupy my time, it's one of the things I do to wind down after work, for instance. I made a template in Photoshop and I take screenshots of the girls as I play the game (or go back and get screenshots from the scene gallery if available and applicable). I'm only doing it for games I play enough to make it worthwhile though, hence a single montage earlier for a couple of games that I've dropped.

 

[MiltonPowers]

Dreamland by Dokiden

Dreamland is a bit of a weird one to review, as I do like it, but I don’t really know why – other than the great visuals. The story is a little odd, there are lots of things that don’t really make sense (yet?), and I don’t really know what type of story I’m going to end up with. Although I say the visuals are great, this is a game that just won’t stay still. Pretty much every frame involves movement, so even if it’s a static render, you’re still panning or zooming. You get a lot of little scenes as well where the group is in a car, for instance, and you see the scenery rushing past through a window, and a pair of boobs bouncing slightly as the car moves. While these animations may look good, you have to wonder if they are necessary, especially with the long development times between updates for these games.

Onto the good though, and the girls are definitely a high point. I don’t really have a favourite in terms of love interests yet, as I haven’t had the opportunity to get to know them, but of the six we’ve been introduced to so far, four have had lewd scenes with the MC and a fifth a solo lewd scene, so we’re reasonably well served there, for the size of the game so far. In my opinion though, these lewds haven’t been the best. The typical way they play out is that you’ll go through the scene, then get the options, which are to repeat the positions you’ve just had, or cum (or fuck, for a couple of the not-already-fucking scenes). A good number of them are cut short as well, so there’s plenty of blue-balling going on. I’d also prefer to see more of the girls in these scenes, rather than just focusing on body shots (and that would certainly make it easier for me to find good images for my character cards too!).

In terms of characters, I think we have a mixed bag here. The MC is largely forgettable (other than the fact it’s your POV, of course), and his best friend doesn’t really seem like much of a friend (plus there are rather sinister elements there later on – although this does make him a bit interesting, at least). Mei’s story is similarly strange, or at least how it ends the current update is strange, and I have literally no idea why Katherine is an actual character and not just someone on the MC’s computer. At least two of the girls want you to commit to them pretty much from the off (including one who has literally just met you) but for me, it’s way too early to know who I would want to go for, and I don’t really want to be running a save for literally every girl just yet.

Needless to say, we are still early in the game, so all of these points should be addressed in time. I just personally feel that the story should have given us a bit more to go on rather than just throwing out a bunch of mysteries in the first day. Maybe once we get to Dreamland things will start to become a little clearer…

(I'll also definitely be looking at reviewing my character rankings here, as I see more of the girls – and potentiall see more girls introduced...)
View attachment 3982955

We often match up with LIs, and obviously have very similar tastes in women, but for the first time I can think of we are opposite here. Summer, Lea, Alice (in that order) would be my top 3. Then Katherine, Danielle, Mei.

 

[TonyMurray]

We often match up with LIs, and obviously have very similar tastes in women, but for the first time I can think of we are opposite here. Summer, Lea, Alice (in that order) would be my top 3. Then Katherine, Danielle, Mei.

I'll obviously allow it! This one was a bit difficult, I have to admit. Usually, I have a pretty good idea where the girls are going to land, but I am often tempted to shift the tiers a little as I'm putting the cards together, so based on the image used. For Summer, Lea, and Alice, I just don't think I could find any images that really did them justice, there's just something not quite there in each of their images for me – if I went for "regular" images, rather than specifically trying to get topless/underwear/bikini ones, I might have ended up with slightly different placement. Mei is, I think, just classically beautiful, and as only real "clothed" option, was maybe being judged on a slightly different scale.

I aim to revisit all of these as I play upcoming updates for their respective game, so maybe that will open up some changes in the order here, maybe not!

 

[TonyMurray]

Midnight Paradise by Lewdlab

This is a game that I enjoy more when I don’t think about it than when I do. If I compare it against what I look for in a game, it doesn’t score that favourably, yet somehow it still works for me, and I don’t really know why, if I’m honest.

First of all, it’s a sandbox game, which I don’t mind so long as they’re done well, and with a couple of exceptions, I think this one is done quite well. You get a calendar which tells you when you can interact with five of the game’s girls, with either new scenes that allow you to progress with them, or repeat scenes that may allow different choices to be made, but ultimately score points as you “level up” the relationship. Some of these come into play with the main story as well, so you have a bit of interaction between what I think of as the “game” and the “sandbox” elements. This can also be a drawback though, as you can easily get the two elements out of sync – the main story has you progressing with a girl, but then in a sandbox scene she won’t even talk to you because you “need to get her to like you more first.”

Then there’s the girls. Generally, when people talk about the LIs in this game, it’s all about Joyce, and I’ve seen plenty of people talking about her being the ultimate MILF, or even the best LI in any game. As you can see from my character cards, I don’t see it personally, but of course, we all have different tastes. But then even my favourite of the LIs is lucky to get into tier 2 of my rankings, and most of them are only tier 4, because I don’t find them to be anything special. In fact, I could probably bump everyone down a tier and not feel too bad about it. Fortunately, a number of the interactions within the game do help with liking the girls, as I think, for the most part, the relationships are pretty well handled, and if you want it, there’s a reasonable (but still mild) corruption element available which can help to “spice things up”.

I understand from the dev’s progress notes that the game is coming to an end in the next couple of updates, and this does potentially worry me in terms of the story. It feels like the actual story has been forgotten a bit in order to progress relationships, and I’m not sure it can be brought to a satisfying conclusion swiftly. The dev also seems to have forgotten that my MC has a girlfriend, because I’ve not seen her for a fair amount of time! There are a number of elements that are a bit up in the air at the moment, so it will be interesting to see if everything can be tied up neatly or if this game will feel unfinished or rushed by the time the final update comes.

 

[TonyMurray]

Family Matters by Perv2k16

I tried this one out because I liked the look of some of the previews, but the game was just so-so for me. Firstly, there isn’t a vast amount of content yet, so of course there’s plenty of time for things to change, but there are only a few LIs/potential LIs and a storyline that offered nothing new.

The girls look okay, with the sister being particularly cute, but also sharing styles a little too closely with her girlfriend – I’d have preferred a bit more variation there (in the montage below, the sister is second and her girlfriend third). Some of the scenes felt a little rushed and the story just wasn’t able to make up for it in my opinion. I felt like I didn’t really know what was going on, with things seeming to happen around me, rather than happening to me or because of me.

One thing that I did enjoy was being busted getting a blowjob by the sister’s girlfriend, and the sister comes out of the bathroom with mascara running down her face only for it to turn out that she has had a make-up accident. Her eyes are tightly shut because of the pain, meaning she didn’t actually see anything. It was a nice little subversion that didn’t cost anything, but at least was a bit different.

My status @ Episodes 1-12: Not continuing.

 

[TonyMurray]

The Entrepreneur by MisterMaya

I thought this one was mostly pretty decent. It looks good, with some great girls (and most of the others above average) and some good little animations throughout. Things like blinking and head swishes do well, but the animations during lewds weren’t as good for me as they lacked a bit of fluidity. There were also numerous shots panning up a girl’s body to her face, which I personally don’t like so much as it takes me out of the game a bit. In outdoor scenes, there always seemed to be something going on in the background as well, which is good when it happens once or twice, but here it quickly progressed beyond that and came off as “trying too hard” instead.

The story was pretty good overall, but I confess I started to get a bit bored with it towards the end, and the introduction of a crime syndicate to bring conflict is a bit overdone in this type of game. I would say the game was an undisciplined slow burn – the main girls take some time to get close to, which works well for the story, but it’s as if the dev felt the game had to have some lewd scenes before then, so a bunch of one-time affairs were thrown in. These felt a bit out of place to me, especially one where the MC meets a girl in the street, manages to get her number, and when he messages her, his immediate thought is to send a dickpic as literally his first message. This is just weird anyway, but the response is a full nude pic back, and an address to go fuck the girl. As well as feeling like just a sudden sex scene for the sake of getting some nudity in, it was completely out of character for the MC, too.

The sex scenes with the main girls were probably not numerous enough, with one only having a single scene, and the others just two or three. I figure if you’re doing a slow burn, you have to do it well, and a small number of scenes becomes acceptable, but when you’re having the number of lewds we have here (which admittedly still isn’t a big number, for the size of the game), I feel you need to have a bit more focus on the main girls. It just felt to me like this game was caught in the middle and not really knowing what it wanted to be.

One other thing I wasn’t a fan of was a storytelling technique which cropped up a few times, but wasn’t used in the right way, for me. Every so often, something would happen, and then there would be a scene of a single render or two, and it’s the MC narrating the story from the future, sometimes giving foreshadowing, but other times just making a comment (like “I really hated that cat”). Despite all this, I did enjoy the game overall, and I did like the individual storylines for the relationships with the main girls.

I could be wrong, but I think this was the dev’s first release, and in places it maybe shows. I’m also enjoying Law School so far (the dev’s new game), which is still early in the production cycle but already shows signs of the learning the dev has taken from having a completed game under his belt, and I hope it continues to go well.

 

[MiltonPowers]

The Entrepreneur by MisterMaya

I thought this one was mostly pretty decent. It looks good, with some great girls (and most of the others above average) and some good little animations throughout. Things like blinking and head swishes do well, but the animations during lewds weren’t as good for me as they lacked a bit of fluidity. There were also numerous shots panning up a girl’s body to her face, which I personally don’t like so much as it takes me out of the game a bit. In outdoor scenes, there always seemed to be something going on in the background as well, which is good when it happens once or twice, but here it quickly progressed beyond that and came off as “trying too hard” instead.

The story was pretty good overall, but I confess I started to get a bit bored with it towards the end, and the introduction of a crime syndicate to bring conflict is a bit overdone in this type of game. I would say the game was an undisciplined slow burn – the main girls take some time to get close to, which works well for the story, but it’s as if the dev felt the game had to have some lewd scenes before then, so a bunch of one-time affairs were thrown in. These felt a bit out of place to me, especially one where the MC meets a girl in the street, manages to get her number, and when he messages her, his immediate thought is to send a dickpic as literally his first message. This is just weird anyway, but the response is a full nude pic back, and an address to go fuck the girl. As well as feeling like just a sudden sex scene for the sake of getting some nudity in, it was completely out of character for the MC, too.

The sex scenes with the main girls were probably not numerous enough, with one only having a single scene, and the others just two or three. I figure if you’re doing a slow burn, you have to do it well, and a small number of scenes becomes acceptable, but when you’re having the number of lewds we have here (which admittedly still isn’t a big number, for the size of the game), I feel you need to have a bit more focus on the main girls. It just felt to me like this game was caught in the middle and not really knowing what it wanted to be.

One other thing I wasn’t a fan of was a storytelling technique which cropped up a few times, but wasn’t used in the right way, for me. Every so often, something would happen, and then there would be a scene of a single render or two, and it’s the MC narrating the story from the future, sometimes giving foreshadowing, but other times just making a comment (like “I really hated that cat”). Despite all this, I did enjoy the game overall, and I did like the individual storylines for the relationships with the main girls.

I could be wrong, but I think this was the dev’s first release, and in places it maybe shows. I’m also enjoying Law School so far (the dev’s new game), which is still early in the production cycle but already shows signs of the learning the dev has taken from having a completed game under his belt, and I hope it continues to go well.
View attachment 4009633

Phew. Back to normal, with us agreeing on the best LIs in an AVN.

 

[TonyMurray]

Phew. Back to normal, with us agreeing on the best LIs in an AVN.

I had Lucy in tier 1 for a while as well. Working on another of the bigger games at the moment with plenty of LIs, so we'll see how that one goes... I'm hopeful this one might fill that vacancy in my top ten, but we'll see - I don't like to call it early and then be disappointed.

 

[BrNexon]

Why do some models in VN-3DCG using black lip colour? Any reason behind it?

 

[BrNexon]

Midnight Paradise by Lewdlab

This is a game that I enjoy more when I don’t think about it than when I do. If I compare it against what I look for in a game, it doesn’t score that favourably, yet somehow it still works for me, and I don’t really know why, if I’m honest.

First of all, it’s a sandbox game, which I don’t mind so long as they’re done well, and with a couple of exceptions, I think this one is done quite well. You get a calendar which tells you when you can interact with five of the game’s girls, with either new scenes that allow you to progress with them, or repeat scenes that may allow different choices to be made, but ultimately score points as you “level up” the relationship. Some of these come into play with the main story as well, so you have a bit of interaction between what I think of as the “game” and the “sandbox” elements. This can also be a drawback though, as you can easily get the two elements out of sync – the main story has you progressing with a girl, but then in a sandbox scene she won’t even talk to you because you “need to get her to like you more first.”

Then there’s the girls. Generally, when people talk about the LIs in this game, it’s all about Joyce, and I’ve seen plenty of people talking about her being the ultimate MILF, or even the best LI in any game. As you can see from my character cards, I don’t see it personally, but of course, we all have different tastes. But then even my favourite of the LIs is lucky to get into tier 2 of my rankings, and most of them are only tier 4, because I don’t find them to be anything special. In fact, I could probably bump everyone down a tier and not feel too bad about it. Fortunately, a number of the interactions within the game do help with liking the girls, as I think, for the most part, the relationships are pretty well handled, and if you want it, there’s a reasonable (but still mild) corruption element available which can help to “spice things up”.

I understand from the dev’s progress notes that the game is coming to an end in the next couple of updates, and this does potentially worry me in terms of the story. It feels like the actual story has been forgotten a bit in order to progress relationships, and I’m not sure it can be brought to a satisfying conclusion swiftly. The dev also seems to have forgotten that my MC has a girlfriend, because I’ve not seen her for a fair amount of time! There are a number of elements that are a bit up in the air at the moment, so it will be interesting to see if everything can be tied up neatly or if this game will feel unfinished or rushed by the time the final update comes.
View attachment 3997127

Natsuki+Eliana

 

[TonyMurray]

Intertwined by Nyx Valeria

I’ve finally found a game worthy of claiming the final spot in my top ten, and not only that, but if I was ranking those games, Intertwined would sit quite high in the list. I really enjoyed my first playthrough and am looking forward to experiencing more of the game by playing individual paths while I wait for the next update.

This is definitely one of those games that you need to play several times in order to appreciate it fully. I love that, because I want to spend a lot of time in a game that I enjoy, and if it is set up with multiple pathways, that are exclusive of each other, you can do just that. I recommend playing “blind” first of all – with no expectations or targets, just making the choices you want to make in the moment. That way, I think you’ll get the best of all the little twists and reveals as they hit you for the first time. I did it that way and had a few little gut punches as my choices came back to bite my ass, and it’s great when a game can make me feel that way.

In any other game, those myriad twists and revelations would be coincidental to the point of absurdity, but it’s pretty much literally the name of the game here. I don’t mind it at all because it’s deliberate and clever without trying too hard to be clever. None of the twists are really that convoluted – most of them can be spotted well in advance of them being sprung – but they still work well and I love the way the story has been interwoven like this.

I also love the way the choices really do have an impact. A wrong move can not only lock you out of a particular love interest, but others will avoid you as well, as they show solidarity with a friend you’ve hurt. I don’t think enough games show that side of relationships, as they usually only focus on the impact on the person immediately effected.

The only thing that could stop this game doing well for me then, was the girls, and I am plenty happy with the selection I was offered. The LIs and side girls here presented me with a tasting menu of all the things I look for in a woman. Not only are there a good number of girls you can interact with, but they would probably end up with the best average ranking in my tier list. I haven’t given out three tier-one places to a single game before this one, but on another day Intertwined could perhaps have more than that.

The actual characters are really nice as well, with a good variety of personalities, and the main girls mostly have a good bit of story too, rather than just showing up as eye candy and potential lewd-scene partners. My one complaint is the same one I often find in these games, and that is regarding the range of skin tones used. There are a couple of characters (it might just be Alexis and MC, actually, and I'll note that Alexis looks fine in my character card below!) who look a bit out of place as everyone else looks vibrant and healthy, but those two are practically grey. I’m not sure why this comes up quite a bit, or if it’s just me, but it definitely looks a bit odd, and in Alexis’s case, maybe makes the difference between a tier-two and tier-three placement.