VN - Ren'Py - Where Is Love? [v0.1] [Totally Pure Games]

I hope the dev stays on his vision. Too often i see ppl discussing or rating the game who dont even like these types. So they get told to get "less edgy" or this character is "unlikeable" and the result is a game that is nothing.. forgetable.

The tone is right the feeling is established and i hope i can come back to replay and recommend it to friends. Not that the project got influenced by the wrong people who will try anything to make it a noir disney love story. Stay brave you develop your vision.

Review for [v0.1]
This is possibly the perfect example of a creator, unfortunately, misunderstanding the genre they're trying to write in.

First and foremost, the visual skill is there. Lighting, posing, staging, the models themselves. Are they AMAZING? No, but I don't expect it to be, and it's better than I actually expected. This also means that skill will improve over time, which is undoubtedly a positive. However, the big issues lie with the writing, on all fronts: dialogue, story, world-building, and character.

The world-building is just "how can we make this world as dark as possible", which makes it boring. There's no reason for us to care about this world because it's so dark, and the only thing we REALLY know is "people are rich arseholes". That's it. On the flipside, the story is already somehow more convoluted than is justifiable. I mean think about the fact that 0.1 has FIVE "endings". How are you going to be able to adjust for all these variables? Either you're going to have to majorly slim down the game, or the choices will end up having to be similar, because there's no logical way a dev will be able to create THIS many unique branches without the development time becoming exponentially longer. Flavour dialogue can work like that, but entire branches is nuts. But why would anyone want to explore these branches when every turn is just something both dark and simultaneously awkwardly written?

The dialogue, much like the world itself, is overly edgy and gives an air of self-importance, failing to understand that "show, don't tell" still applies to AVNs. None of it is natural, and it instantly pulls you out of the story. That is, if you aren't immediately repulsed by the characters. I have no clue how anyone could find the characters engaging, the MC is a douchebag, but the step-sister literally deliberately having some poor girl raped is fucking insane. This is your FIRST RELEASE, and you genuinely think people will want to engage with her after that? Making redeemable characters genuinely isn't that hard.

I appreciate the dev's confidence, but this is absolutely a situation of the eyes being bigger than the stomach. Also, the overly dark story just isn't going to end with a good story, it immediately hampers your writing ability when you are confining yourself to being moody and edgy. Not to mention, who's gonna wanna jerk off to that? I mean where is the base for that? The talent is there, writing can be shored up easier than the modelling, but this just isn't worth reading at this point.

Positives:
+ The game is made in a noir style - sex, drugs, violence. One of my favorite genres.
+ Beautiful models.
+ Different paths/branching. I like trying different routes. Though I admit - so far all decisions lead to the same end, just in a different ways. I only hope that Dev won't burn out making all these branches.

Negatives:
- Characters are unlikable.
Stepsister for example - so far looks like a horrible human being, and she is a LI. I really hope Dev prepared some backstory for her to make her more appealing as a LI.
MC is not a saint either. Even though it's a dark style VN, I am not keen to play with a total jerk. Though we can avoid some stuff like rape etc depending on choices.
- I would like to see some relation-building between characters before they start fucking like monkeys.

Giving it 5 starts cause it's one of my favorite genres and it's really not that bad for a 1st update. We shall see where it goes

well... this is dark. like really DARK. this game reminded me of the 90's movie "natural-born killers" with Woody Harrelson and Juliet Lewis. because Lily is clearly getting off of hurting people in the most cruel way (drugging and setting up gang rape of a nerd girl who had a crush over MC), offing a dealer with lead pipe (you have to be a deviant to be able to kill someone like that in cold blood). MC can be somewhat compassionate (if you choose certain options) or pure evil, choking random girl to death with his dick during back-alley bj.
i mean, i get it that they both are heavily affected by violent father, but all this is too dark and opressive even if it is a good read. my point is that AVN should be about enterainment and not about some dark evil staff - there is plenty of this in real life.
the visual part of the game is good, though i didn't quite like MC's face. multiple choices leading to various endings is fun, but they are probably too many or even too often - such excessive diversity confuses player and even can discourage from further play because you have to make too many replays in order to choose what you like the most.
so, to conclude my review: the game is definitely interesting, but one should be very careful when choosing to play it.
for the dev: imho - try not to abuse the use of multiple choices or it'll become too difficult to follow through. good luck

It seems like a great start to me with many possibilities. The characters are dark and very emotionally wounded, and although it doesn't make your day, you don't stop wanting to read and advance further in the story. The graphics and features are excellent, although the protagonist, as often happens, has too much of a child's face, even a well-bred young man, in my opinion, he does not give the profile of a problematic young man. The other negative point is that it is short, I already want to see more... Congratulations to the artist.