Ren'Py - -u4ia- [Ep3.11p] [DriftyGames]

I’ve held off writing this review for quite a while because, like many others, I love the author’s earlier work and don’t want to dissuade him from making another. However, as good as some elements of the game are, they are gate-kept by some truly rage-inducing free-roam events. Events which would have been unwelcome in a harem game where most of the content can be unlocked in a single playthrough, but are truly unforgivable when there are half a dozen routes to unlock. This, coupled with a slow-to-start main plot and characters who, so far, are attractive but forgettable, it’s difficult to justify cleaning out the garbage in that goddamned trailer for the 3rd, or 4th, or umpteenth time.



This review itself is difficult to write. I’ve deleted several full paragraphs already. I want to go down the typical list, like, “So the animation is well done and the characters are unique and beautiful and rendered well and the environments are interesting and memorable.” I keep deleting them though because the faults in the game’s design overwhelm them completely. I’ve tried and tried to get back into the game. “I’ll start playthrough tomorrow after I finish the update to this other game.”



It just doesn’t happen because I know what I’m in for: The free-roam events from hell. One of the biggest benefits of Ren’py is the ability to fast forward, especially in games that promote multiple playthroughs with only minor variations. We’ve all been there. Burning through the first four chapters of a game, quickly picking the options the mod highlights in green, until you get to the choices that effect that route you haven’t tried yet. We don’t have all the time in the world to click through a tedious, and pointless, free-roam event that would have worked better as a montage than forcing me to click on individual pieces of garbage and furniture before clicking arrow keys to move to a second room to click on other pieces of furniture before clicking several other keys to leave the trailer, go to a second door into the same trailer, click over to three other rooms, and pixel hunt for the garbage in THOSE rooms that need to be cleaned up, without which the girl I’m trying to bang will note the garbage I didn’t clean up and go home early.



From a design standpoint, it makes no sense. Drifty has to have played other games before. Did he ever play one with such events and thought, “Wow, I wish there more of these!”?



Okay, enough about the free roam. A quick bit about the other elements. The update schedule is on the long side, so I honestly can’t remember any of the names of the characters or remember much about the plot, which again is a problem since I need to play the game over again and sonofabitch I’m talking about the free roam events again!



Okay. Last try. Short short version: Characters pretty. Plot mysteries have my attention but need to be shored up faster before I lose interest. Music is great and well thought-out. Adult content is pleasant. Well-written and not same-y at all. MC is a decent bloke. Not ugly but not a super model either. I like him. Stat system and attributes need to be thrown out. No one likes them, and no one wants to be gate-kept from content because their confidence/intelligence/agility/smarminess hadn’t reached lvl 6 before the scene played. Don’t give the mod-makers more to do. They got enough trouble green-lighting all the different path dialogues.



I’m playing another game right now, far superior to this one I’m sad to say, and its main point of superiority is its more annoying content includes a “would you like to skip the annoying shit?” button before it starts. Without that button, the game in question would be a 2. Instead, I gave it a 5. I’ll be doing the same here. I love ya Drifty, but please take these criticisms, echoed by many others, to heart. It’s fine if you enjoy making free-roam events, but shelve the ego and add elements for those who don’t like them to be able to skip them and still enjoy everything else your game has to offer. Maybe code it so that you have to go through them at least once. “Looks like this is your second/third/twelfth playthrough. Would you like to skip the club scene with the best route choices for VeroniFeliciaDesireeebeca?”



I really really want to play your game, but the mere thought of cleaning up that trailer again is preventing me from doing so. You have the programming knowledge. This would be an easy fix. What’s stopping you?

Maybe im a tiny bit bias since LOF is my all time favorit AVN, not saying this comes anywhere near that one but this was very good as well, but also quite annoying due to the freeroam, its annoying since your forced to play multiple times to try diffrent girls and freeroam is not that fun to replay.
You pretty much need a walkthrough as well to get with some girls, i constantly get missed chances with girls at the end of a chapter and thats with those i am truely trying to be with and thats really annoying.

I like the its not the standard harem type game where you just fuck everyone, you can fuck a quite a few girls on a single playthrough atleast, but ofc those i liked the most cant hence the annoying feeling.

Also there is alot of choices and they truely matter, a simple thing as helping with boxes at the very start or just asking for info will result in being able to be with the redhead or not in the start and going for redhead means missing out on others.

The story is pretty decent and has an ok twist and good backstories, i wont really get into it to much but MC was been experimented on by hes father and was saved by hes old female friend and he then runs off to an island which ofc is full of girls, some has the same background of experiments being done on them and so on.

There are some pretty fun stuff in it to, for some reason i had to laught with the hole viking stuff at the part from the keg to the catapult.
And the dude that catch MC fucking a girl in a bear suit was pretty damn fun as well.

The girls are pretty good looking, theres a bit of diversty in builds but it leans a bit to much towards the big tit fetish for my taste and not really any small tits, it was nice to see cece in this one even though you would proberly never know without the flashback thing, to bad shes not fuckable in this one.

Animations are very good.

Music is perfect, lots of music with lyrics and its good stuff.

Choices works absolutly perfectly, you can fuck and go for a relationship with pretty much whoever you want, well maybe not blind girl atleast not as a relationship i belive, but havent tested that out, nothing is forced and even simple stuff like anal is optional.

There are some 4th wall breaking as well which can be annoying, i dont really want to read about dev in a story, it kills the immersion atleast for me.

Overall a very good game!

The renders and animations are good.(not among the best but still way above avarage)
The music/vibe is great, well matched with the scenes.
Top-notch writing , the strongest part of the game. Dialogues are engaging/funny.
The story is interesting so far.
Free roam/sandbox elements are enjoyable and easy to navigate. (at least for the first playthrough, they might get tedious for 2+)
Adult scenes are mostly vanilla but pretty good .

I thoroughly recommend this AVN.

I remember someone saying on this website that the freeroam elements are for the players to feel that a game is much longer than it really is, and that’s exactly what it feels in U4iA, it’s totally useless and adds nothing to the plot, it’s just a painful navigation cross at the bottom left corner of the screen that makes you wander around aimlessly. It totally breaks the immersion into the story, you are back to playing a 90’s game (ok, ok, the first Doom in 1993 was fun to play) instead of an adult visual novel. Too bad, Leap of Faith is still in my all-time top 5 and had none of this shit, it was indeed super-immersive, breath-taking, very emotional and hilarious at the same time.

Let’s talk about the MC now. He doesn’t have the charisma of the one from LoF and has been seen in too many other AVNs by now to have his own identity. Why choose an average – totally not handsome – guy when you have much better on offer? I mean, this guy is supposed to seduce a dozen attractive girls but has a weird face and tramp clothes all the time. Why is his friend Lars muuuuch better looking than him? Oooooh sorry, the MC has a big fat d*ck, must be the reason why he is so popular, I forgot about it...

Renders are quite good, animations are ok but well, it’s 2024, we’ve seen much better ones by now. Btw, the last scene of Episode 3 with Synne is terrible, like it was not completed before the game had to be released on the market.

The story: It’s quite captivating but I’m afraid it’s going in too many directions, with too many questions and no real answer so far, and I’m afraid Drifty will get lost at some point in the process. Each of the girls has a past, a story to tell, and we’ve barely scratched the surface yet, we know almost nothing about them, we even have a total alien (Nyah) and at least one or two traitors working for someone who governs this island. The story already has too many ramifications, and it’s only the third episode, I can’t even imagine the number of unanswered questions we’ll have at the end of the game. I just hope I’m totally wrong here but even in the movie industry such mistakes happen all the time and they have crews of professionals behind them.

Sorry for the low rating Drifty, but you deserve it for implementing such a totally useless freeroam system. Just imagine your game with simple menus and how much more immersive it would be. I have 4 different playthroughs at the moment and it’s been a pain to do all the freeroam shits 4 times, thank you very much. I would have never thought that you, the creator of the wonderful Leap of Faith, would lower yourself as to copy what everyone else is doing just to fool the players into thinking that their game is 2 times longer than it really is…

It took me 3 episodes to write this review, as I wanted to be fair, but the latest episode confirms that this game is as forgetable as its name.
Pros:

• a large graphic improvement in compare with LoF, renders do look good
• animations are not great, but they aren't abd either, that's still a lot more than the LoF had to offer in this department
• free roams are enjoyable, interface is quite well thought and intuitive
• Climatic music (although not my cup of tea) is well matched with the scenes
• Some good looking LIs
• phone apps

Cons

• the storyline is all over the place. It has some gaps it scares me that the dev who succesfully created a full AVN (which is rare in this World) didn't think it all through
• Conversations and dialogues are enjoyable, but shallow - they lack this something
• LIs are generic (in terms of personality). Each funny that by chapter 3 each of them had so much screen time and yet I know nothing about any of them
• Dejavu - with the mansion holidays Drifty simply tried recreating the best part of Leap of Faith - it didn't work. The entire scene seems schematic and rushed
• Slut fest - the game is basically a story about a bunch of sluts walking around and thinking how to jump on the MC's d*ick, but the mansion holiday is still taking it too far, it feels like cheap porn
• Romance pace is all f**ked up and doesn't fit the little we know about girls
• empty locations - locations are either empty or filled up with - see next point:
• LIs from another games. When Jaye entered LoF it was fun, when I saw Kindra I thought it's too much, but this game takes it to another level. Knowing straight away that the character you are seeing will not appear again in the game destoys the fun of unpredictability. I was just clicking through all not so random encounters

Well, Drifty tried. He really did, but this game and remembering how average episodes 5-8 of LoF make me thing if he jsut missed the concept or he is just an average dev who had a lot of luck creating great first 4 episodes of LoF

v3.1p

Looks like Drifty has done it yet again. A marvelous AVN with burgeoning depth and varied routes to take. The comedy segments are exquisite, the girls are interesting and varied, and at least so far it looks like several relationships are being built up as potential FFM constellations. Teagan/Sea is looking especially appealing (technically it's FFMM if you count Noomi). I am anticipating with some trepidation the emotional rollercoaster I'm sure is coming (and every time Cece shows up it gets worse). The music is great, the writing is great, and the visuals are more than good enough.

This is a s great AVN, and it will only get better. I thoroughly recommend it.

The one thing I would like is a wt for obscure extras using the camera or nüke, just like in LoF (and at least pointing out that this will be important in the beginning of the game).
Best of luck to Drifty, and I am looking forward to the day u4ia reaches the finish line.

I don't know why this game is rated so low. It's another gem from Drifty. I can see why people would complain about the free roam, but the rest of the game more than makes up for it. Great renders, an engaging story, gorgeous models, and solid animations make it a complete package. I'm looking forward to the next update.

I'm sorry, but all the free roam parts drove me crazy! I'm generally not a fan of sandbox elements, but I can usually stomach them at least if the payoff is good enough. I consider mindlessly clicking around for the purpose of completing an arbitrary to-do list as filler content, because it is neither fun to me nor does it do anything to improve the game. Here, I had to do one free roam section after the other and it was just too much! If people enjoy that, then let them, but at least offer a way to skip the free roam without (!) punishing the player and closing paths/hiding scenes.

I'm sure there is a good game behind all this "gameplay", but I got mad enough to delete it and the saves. I'll probably try again at some point, but this time for sure with the help of some mods.

Dude this is just awesome. The story, vibe, music just feels great. The characters are interesting /unique with engaging and funny dialogues. Also the animations are fantastic. The sandbox makes the replaying different paths pain but still the sandbox elements are minimum so it fine

Episode 2 Review:

Overall u4ia shows a lot of potential and maintains the balance of humour and seriousness that we saw Drifty exercise in Leap of Faith. What sets Drifty's work apart from so many other AVNs on this site is the characters. They are each unique, interesting, and the more I get to know them the more questions I have instead of answers. Same goes for the story. While simple in premise, there are so many questions, layers, twists, and turns. I simply can't wait to see where things go!

As for graphics, renders, character models, etc... it's all fantastic. Not only that, but the music and sound effects are *chefs kiss* as they were in Drifty's previous work. This one is definitely worth diving into, even if it is still quite early in development.

Despite the questionable sandbox design which compared to the initial release has been thankfully toned down and simplified, I find this game very interesting.

The writing and characters are well-written and interesting, a bit different from the dev's previous work but that's a good thing. The story is a bit odd but overall intriguing, the characters and dialogue are this game's strongest draw.

The visuals are mostly good, some of the character design seems a little bland but the writing backs it up and gives the characters life. Plenty of fun sex scenes as well, and the sound design is good too it's clear that some effort went into it.

Overall if not for the sandbox, which in itself isn't necessarily a bad thing but making it more confusing to navigate through than it has to makes playing the game a far less enjoyable experience, I think this game would be better received than it has but it's still early in development so plenty of time to improve it.

Well, another winner from Drifty. I'm not going to bother comparing this (or any other title) with LoF. THAT bar is too damned high. But I am enjoying this title very much.

I'm not a huge fan of "game" VN's, but I don't mind a few little detours here and there as long as they don't get too much in the way of the story. So far, so good, I say - not too bad with the detours.

I love where the story is headed. There have been a few little hints here and there as to some possible intrigue, which is tantalizing. I'm enjoying the character development, and the MC is pretty cool so far. And renders are, of course, totally up to Drifty standards.

An all-around great effort, and I look forward to the story's continuation. Good job, folks!

I am so disappointed with this game. I absolutely loved LoF, but this... this is just a hot mes.

I would imagine the story is great, but I wouldn't know because I spent the first 5 minutes of the game doing chores and paying bills. I mean, seriously? At one point, I tried to move the dresser in the hallway, but "it was too heavy for me", which just means I am going to have to waste time looking for some idiot to help me move it. Then, after cleaning the trailer, I wander out to the dock but can't move forward until I pay the rent. So fine... I pay the rent, exit out of the phone and nothing. The MC is standing there with his dick in his hand staring at a sunset, but unable to move. Nothing happened. It all locked up.

So I started over, got to the dock and the same thing happened. I finally figured out how to get past it... sort of... and very soon I found myself in another freeroam. My first task was to get a drink... I mean... ffs... just tell the freaking story.

I don't want to wander aimlessly. I don't want to have to pick up garbage. I want to move through the story. I am not even sure what the story is about because I spent way to much time trying to figure out the fucking interface.

I don't mind some gamification, and I don't mind the occasional free roam. I like finding hidden images and I can even handle a mini game or two, but when they dominate the game, when it takes you out of the story and forces you to do things that really do not advance the story, then what's the point?

Part of this is my fault. I normally filter out sandbox games, but I was wondering if Drifty ever made another game after LoF and I found this. I do try some of them, especially if they are rated high and there are some games where the dev has learned how to balance the gamification out with the story. So, it's not that I hate all sandbox AVNs, but I do find most of them to not add anything to the story or the game. Unfortunately, this is the case with this one.

I may eventually trudge my way through this mess but for right now I am moving on. Good luck to an extremely talented developer and I hope it continues to do well.

Call me when you decide to get back to your roots and tell a story.

Longtime lurker here having my first ever post be a review.

So, I have played plenty of these games, including Driftys classic IMHO LoF, and I gotta say the potential is here for this to be another great one. I only give it a 4 star due to the fact we are still fairly early on and it seems premature to say "All-time great" over something where we have just a few chapters thus far.

The positives: A large amount of characters and not only that but I care about basically all of them and want to know more about them. The MC is hilarious, plenty of funny bits (much like his previous work) and I love the little Easter eggs referring to his prior work as well as other creators work, really helps make those of us who have played a decent amount of these feel like it's truly a small world after all/all in the same universe and makes one dream about potential crossovers The renders are diverse enough that there is something for everyone in terms of what attracts you, it's not just 'All females have tits the size of small cars' which is a pet peeve of mine. The minimal (in comparison to most) amount of sex scenes are not even noticed due to how the amount of dialogue and world-building is entertaining and engrossing, in some games that can feel like a grind but I would spend a few hours on this and there would be 1-2 sex/nude scenes and it wasn't an issue at all. At the end of the game so far, I just found myself going "Oh man, I need to know what's next". Grammar and spelling is spot-on, the dialogue comes off very natural and human. Sound effects are great, and the music is varied enough that I don't feel the need to just mute the music, as in most games I find myself playing on mute.

The negatives: The MC, while he is as entertaining and relatively harmless as the MC in LoF, does look a lot older than he should, but that's a minor quibble. As is the fact that we see a few features on the phone which even 2 chapters in don't seem accessible at all, but this game is still early on in the process, I just wish there wouldn't be anything shown which you can't do anything with til it actually is a playable part. For as many contacts as you have. there are VERY FEW texts and calls, you look in all but like 2 people and it's always "So sad, no messages"; that is maybe the biggest negative for me thus far as I do like the communication aspect of these genre of games, having lots of chatting really further engrosses you into the world and the shoes of your character and how it is so far does hurt the immersion aspect, I've barely used the phone except to check on tasks as it seems everything else on it might as well have an 'under construction' sign for how little you have any use of it (from wallpaper to the social media site to aforementioned texts and . The perks and stats also seem pointless at this stage, but like other issues it could just be that we aren't far enough into the game yet for it to make actual differences.

Overall, I'm pretty hooked on this game. If it's anything like the developers previous one I'm expecting to go on an emotional roller coaster and want to legitimately have the endgame with any number of the ladies. I hope that it keeps all options open with the women and doesn't fall into that trope of you did one thing wrong and you are permanently screwed in terms of ever having any sexy times with them. Can't wait to see the next chapter, it's always a good sign when you have a million questions and ideas about what is coming next.

What a dissapointement. I loved leap of faith, but this new sandbox game kills all the fun for me.
Renders, animations, writing all top notch but this vn kills everything with the imo stupid sandbox elements, why Drifty why?.....

An S-tier game in the making, thanks to the top-notch writing. There are multiple aspects of the game that I'm not too fond of to be honest (the main story, the MC, most of the LI's), but it's written so well that it grows on you and keeps you interested. It has meaningful choices. It has some sandbox elements which are not too grindy. It just nails the fine balance between realistic, fun and sexy. If I want to play a pr0n gaem, this is the main ingredient I'm looking for.

It's a fascinating game which ironically seems to work better when not trying to tell a story. A game of two halves.

I found the game to be very engaging; the graphics are stellar, there's a little bit of gameplay in allowing you to free roam but not too much to drive you insane going from empty room to empty room and on more than one occasion I found myself actually laughing. Normally which AVNs are funny they tend to lean into it and it's more slapstick than anything else but really the dialogue writing is first rate.

My issue is... there's obvious a super serious plot going on that we, as players, are being drip fed and it feels a bit grim, which puts it at odd with the low level character interactions.

The game's fascinating as you interact with characters, but once you start interacting with the overarching plot it becomes a bit hmm. Maybe this is just because it's early doors but it feels a bit too soap opera-y. Everyone seems to have some secret or other, lot of things not being said and that's FINE.... but if it continues then it may become frustrating. Not to mention the setup seems to be such that with such a large cast, we may find releases not touching upon characters you enjoy, and then it becomes a game you forget and then hope lasts long enough for you to pick it up in 3 years. Certainly a game I'd buy on Steam then forget about until it was cooked.

Really cool new game from one of the best authors we have! After delivering on a first masterpiece and finishing it, U4IA is a new challenge that goes above his older work - which wasn't a given, knowing the quality of said work.
Something I really like in this game as well as in his previous one is that the MC is really a cool dude; you'd like to be his bro.
This aside, the usual. Cool chicks, various cast, interesting story, nice choices. Really a good one! Try it.

For now the game have a nice story and very good renders, also the music is perfect.
(Maybe the MC can use a remake tho).

i really liked this game so far, can also become greater in my opinion in futures updates.
The developer of the game is really good in making emotional VN, so give it a try.

WOW...just...wow

I am really at a loss for words when it comes to this vn.
First off if you want a quick skim and fap then this isn't for you because this game has quite a bit of dialogue. I will say i do not say this to belittle this game at all because....its worth the play.

I went into this game wanting to just get to the juicy bits and then wait for the next update if i enjoy it...but that turned out to be a failure on my part because this entire game is the juicy bit. All of the characters are pretty interesting just to talk to and i really mean it. okay okay...the MC..most of his dialogue is gold. He's funny, caring, quick witted, and can be a goofball. I cannot overstate the amount of times I've laughed OUT LOUD at something dumb or funny he said. His interaction with most of the cast only increase how interesting his dialogue is. Of the cast, I have but only a few that I don't enjoy or have an issue with (believe me that is saying something). The characters are so well written that even the guy who you work with is fun to interact with,

CONS: the only real issues i with this game is that i wish the models were more detailed although they still get the job done(Ava seems to be the most detailed model here). I will admit it sucks that it takes so long to get to sex as well as there being so little sex. Lastly it sucks that there is a buff mommy in this game (of which there are so few of in general) and she is sorta made into a joke (which is done far too much in games and anime), although she is still sweet, lovable, and pretty badass.

Long story short. if you want well written characters, good dialogue, and a plot then you should play this.