VN - Ren'Py - Where the Heart Is [S1 v2024-09-06 BETA] [CheekyGimp]

I decided to give this game a 5 star. Its a bit generous but I want to encourage others to try it and to encourage dev to continue producing great games
I`m speaking as another dev...
Game is great. Story is easy/cheesy but its fine... I like that, its my preferred choice. Don`t expect some Skyrim story Its very hot game, with decent rendering but later on it gets better and better!!!(really nice animations later on!!!).It felt no more then 3 star game first half and hour or so but it really improves later on and its much better game...
I love frequent choices! Again, congrats to dev for implementing that! I love it! Its so much more involving and sexier to have choices even the obvious ones! That`s why I gave this game a 5 star despite not being AAA title...

Once again, support the developer if you like his work! Its very important and it motivates him to improve and keep delivering even better game. Its very hard work!(trust me, I know)

Variety, frequent choices, easy story, romance driven is a major plus for this game!

I love this VN, I liked the plot, the girls are very charismatic and the protagonist is not the typical idiot who fuck every woman he sees.

I definitely give him 5 stars and I hope to see more games from his dev in the future.

See, this is how you do an adult game. Not only are the character models gorgeous, but they are incredibly deep and all have their own (likable) personality. Especially, Monica.
Plus, when the developer releases an episode, there is a ton of content to go through.

One of the best games I've ever played if it wasn't the best already.
I like a lot of things about it:
1- Large content: The story is big and interesting, it made me spend a week till finishing it.
2- Hot NPCs: All the girls in the game without any exception are beautiful and hot. Every single one of them has her own charm.
3- A lot of sexual content: The story as I said is long but the good thing that the developer didn't forget about adding a lot of sexual content and not focusing only on building up the characters.
4- Cool story: I like the story and the gameplay and I like the idea that I don't have to repeat scenes to trigger sex scenes, everything was put in perfect order, you'll get laid at the end don't worry.
5- Descent animation: Except for the first two episodes, the animation is more than perfect, I liked it pretty much.
The only thing I didn't really like was focusing on POV without showing the MC's body or hands or face when kissing or groping but that was fixed later and I liked that the developer noticed it and improved it.

Definitely one of the best VN's out there. The renders fall a bit short when compared to top tier VN's but I think the game makes up for it in the story. It is an interesting concept and the anticipation of the mystery inheritance towards the later episodes is palpable.

I think the relationships are done very well. At least some of them; personally, I loved seeing Katie grow as a person in my playthrough and all of the parts with her and her friends were very enjoyable. Honestly the party and the beach were some of my favorite moments in a VN.

Jenna also grows a ton with the MC around and it is cool to feel like more than a walking cock. The MC is a pretty funny guy, not a creep like in some other games, and apparently is pretty attractive. The lives of those around you change for the better partly because of you and even in just a story, that feels good. This allows the game to feel really natural and is just an all around awesome experience. The banter and dialogue is enjoyable for the most part as well. The date with Katie at the French restaurant was really funny because of the little prank with the waiter. Seeing his reactions was pretty hilarious.

Hopefully this level of quality continues, the latest episode was done very well. It will be tough to close out the story because the whole mystery inheritance will have to be done tastefully and I am curious to see where the devs go with this. Easily in my top 5 and I totally recommend playing it.

Great job to the devs.

This game has a lot of hot girls and also a pretty good plot which kept me interested. Monica and her daughters are also likeable and pretty believable as characters. The animations are really well done, it's clear that a lot of work went into them. The banter and jokes are also good, sometimes fantastic (I've laughed out lout more than I would expect in an adult game).
Another testament to the quality of the game is that I had a reaaaaly hard time deciding what my pain route/path was, I kept weighing this as I went to sleep or on my way to work Btw I played without the incest patch, I didn't feel it was required here.
As criticism right now I can only say this: too many big/huge boobs. It makes you desensitized and makes everything slightly less believable.
Anyway I want to thank the team behind this game for many wonderful moments and I hope they can deal well with the branching and decisions.

Was decent and kept me engaged until the grey girl appearance. It's distracting (the character is supposed to be a white human that just spends way too much time inside).

The game is unremarkable (not terrible or awesome in any way for the small part I've seen), it just broke all immersion for me because one major character is totally desaturated. This is the key aspect that is bad. I don't believe I've seen enough of the game to judge it on story or originality.

I would consider playing a patch that replace any picture she's in with a black screen.

The nature of choice based Visual Novels is such that the story progresses based on the selection of the player. However, so many times the player is basically forced or railroaded onto a path and this ultimately causes a disconnect with the player. Where The Heart Is has to be perhaps one of the very rare choice based Visual Novels where you, the player is in complete control of your actions. Not once are you forced to romance or sleep with someone who you don't like or hate. Another HUGE pet peeve of mine where harem/dating VN's start with MC in a relationship with a girl or wife that the player won't have a bonding with which utterly pisses me off. This is essentially the VN manipulating the player into having feelings that should never be the case.

What you see is exactly what you get here. The MC goes to live with the friends of his mother who has two daughters with whom he bonded many years ago. At this point the plot sounds cliche but this is where things start getting interesting. Various plots like the MC's dad leaving an inheritance and an email sent by a mysterious person form an interesting overarching mythology arc which tether together the episodes. There are various events peppered throughout that give an adequate amount of screentime to mostly all the characters. The dialogue exchange in particular between the MC and a few of the girls with a funny bone is hilarious.

There are numerous girls and ladies available for the MC to romance with points allocated based on love/lust but choose the wrong one and you can make most of them hate you. Almost all carry with them a certain secret or something that should make you suspicious of them that further adds to the intrigue so there are no archetypes but more of people with mixed qualities that make each of them unique. The dialogue options also reflect this clearly and you more or less know where you stand with the ladies. A helpful stat screen at the end of each episode is present for the meta gamers who'd like to min/max their standing. Thus you are free to be friends with all girls and not romance a single one of them or be committed to just one or try sleeping with all and suffer the consequences. What's spoiled me for future VN's is how WTHI gives the players chances to back out many times so that you don't fall victim to being in an unintended situation with someone.

The few weaknesses WTHI has is lies with the less amount of renders and somewhat static poses. For people like me who value story, this doesn't matter but when you have a high quality VN like this then you wish that the entire package was well rounded up. A few times some verbal tics are shared by a few characters which comes off a little odd but can be largely ignored. For all the amount of choices given I wish one was given in a certain party where MC could leave after attending the first half. Keeping it vague, you can succeed in the first half and purposely fail the second half to exit unscathed.

For me, this is the gold standard of choice-based dating VN's and similar future game developers (current ones as well) should learn from WTHI and take notes on how not to strong-arm the player into doing things they don't want and get detached from them in the end. After all, the medium is all about player choice and WTHI perfectly encapsulates it.

Pros
♦ Good rendering;
♦ A lot of female characters;
♦ Progressive storyline;
♦ Diverse outfits;
♦ Choices matter;
♦ Long story, gives you some hours of gameplay;
♦ Constantly updated.
________________________________

Cons
♣ Correct choices all revolve around being nice and follow the same pattern for every single character, thus making their personalities all the same;
♣ Odd onomatopeias* that may turn a little irritating (like 'MMM' and 'MWAH!' every single time there is a kiss)
→ None of these actually affect the game on a large scale, and are more related to personal pet peeves.

* - Onomatopoeia is the process of creating a word that phonetically imitates, resembles, or suggests the sound that it describes

It is a lovely game, the story line is captivating and hours and hours of hot girls, and ladies. MC seems to be getting in a bit of a mess with all the commitments but i am sure he is going to make out of it safe and sound and with a big harem, is there any source of corruption round the corner? So looking forward to more, keep it coming @CheekyGimp

The amount of content in this game is impressive, played this game for a number of days, and just started to skip characters I wasn't interested in and there was still a lengthy amount of content for characters I did enjoy.

The renders and characters are good and while some are not that impressive overall the visuals are quite well done, and the writing is simple but surprisingly enjoyable except the minefield I had to endure at the start of the game to avoid characters that I didn't want to pursue, but after playing further it got better and you eventually get dialogue choices to completely stop any forced intimate interactions with them. The characters are numerous, with different, simple but distinct personalities and needs, and plenty of intimate and sex scenes.

Overall it was a rough start, but once I got further I genuinely enjoyed the game and the amount of content and the character variety it has.

Very good game with lots of excellent writing. Katie is the reason I would never put this game down, but there is so much more to it than that. I just can't wait to see where the story goes, Cheeky has improved so much since the start, but the writing has always been there. One of the funniest VN's on here by far. You can tell he cares about his game a lot.

Best plot ever. new scenes new characters and new experience is what you always get in every new update. Girls are nasty if you want them be like that. Milfs are superhot. Katie is amazing! Love this game and wish you all the best!

This is one of the few releases that I consistently look forward to with each new release. The assets used are fairly well textured (except one of the daughters who looks a bit too much like a vampire with how pale she is) and it has an enjoyable story, so far.

I have to say I see very many fans of this game here on forum and developer seems to look after them by delivering updates regularly. Game itself is coherent and follows pretty much standard - incest game formula from any other game here. However the "landlady" model and her friend are so unbearably ugly that I really can't feel the hype of this game. I mean - I understand they're suppose to be older ladies in their forties but damn I just cringe when I see that mom face. Some of her grimaces are insta boner killers. It might have been ok if that were some side characters but unfortunatelly the story revolves around the models which are at the same time ugliest in game.

Excellent game! Story is best game, visual is outstanding and characters are fun and realistic!
Game is quite long and your choices will affect your game a lot.
One of the best games around!
Nice job! Hurry up with more episodes
I need more and More!!

Review as of EP14

It's a difficult game to rate.

The renders are average and even subpar at times, especially if compared to the top adult games right now. There's no sound or music whatsoever. The writing is all over the place, with a lot of cliches implemented. Actually the writing is my main gripe with the game. It has a tendency to stretch out mundane scenes and conversations. It irritated the shit out of me on numerous occassions. The characters repeat and overexplain themselves over and over, and over again. Not to mention once again the protagonist is a (potentially) rich kid with a horse cock, who apparently is the only desirable male for all the women he encounters.

With that said, there are things this vn does right. There's A LOT of content as of EP14. It starts out slow, but with the story progressing, it opens up more sexual interactions between the protagonist and the different female characters. It's a very consistent game, so if you enjoy the initial stages, you most likely will continue to enjoy it until the end. Actually I found out the later episodes to be a lot more interesting than the earlier ones, as the story gradually opens up. A lot of the characters seem cliche, but there's certain charm to them. I thought some of the side characters were more interesting than the lead ones, especially one introduced rather late in the story, but they are well-written and there's a sense of progression after interacting with them. They do feel like distinct personalities rather than different avatars of the writer.

Another thing worth mentioning is the fact the game is honest with it's important decisions. It doesn't try to trick or bait the player into making a choice that is unexpected. Everything is optional and there's no need of a walkthrough or multiple playthroughs to unlock all of the sexual content so far.

It's a solid 4/5 for me. The negatives are mostly minor complaints, while the positives are defining qualities.

Excellent game! Story is great, visual is outstanding and characters are fun and realistic!
Game is quite long and your choices will affect your game a lot.
One of the best games around!
Nice job! Hurry up with more episodes

Art is ugly. Besides the terrible models there's something seriously off about the lighting here. Need better ray tracing or skin materials or something!

My main problem with this game is that even if these women hit on me in real life I wouldn't want to sleep with them. There's really nothing seductive about their personalities or alluring about their circumstances. Anybody can go to their local walmart and pick up some lower middle class and undersexed housewife. It's really missing that aspirational quality of sleeping with a woman that's excellent in some way.

That being said I'm only part way through this game, maybe it gets better. But I'm not sure if I can bring myself to finish this. I'll edit if I do.

This review is being wrtten as of Chapter 14.

TBH I'd love to give this a 4.5 instead of the 5, but here's a free .5.

The renders are good, the girls are pretty, and the dialogue is solid.

It starts out a little bit slow which is absolutely fine and then picks up a real nice pace by about Chapter 9 or 10 IMO. The story in the early chapters felt just a tad vanilla but as I said it picks up.

Towards the later chapters the animations take a bit of a step up which is cool, whether the creator is getting additional resources or is learning how to create even better content as the game is being created is definitely a good sign.

All in all, it's a good play and definitely recommended with plenty of content as of right now with several hours available.