VN - Ren'Py - Abandoned - Writer's Block [v0.1] [Exels]

pretty good game definitely going to watch for updates. the story is good but the words could be given a little more detail. maybe translator issues. but I'm happy with the first version and can't wait for the second one. hopefully, it comes with the same amount of story and not a 10 min update.

Hm, let me put it like this.
I see potential in this game.

Like Zippity wrote in his review, the writing is a mess and the story somewhat verves from interesting to strange to just the same old.

I think what we are supposed to see here is a capricious character a bit in the vein of Julia from Thinking about You, but it´s still very rough, very unfocused.

The writing needs to be edited, might also be a translation issue, but I believe that given time and effort and somebody helping with the aforementioned writing/translating/editing, this could become a good game.

Edited to add: While three stars might seem a bit much, just for the potential to become better, it´s not quite like that.
There are some nice renders for sex scenes and despite the limitations in regards to render quality the sisters are both stunning redheads and for a change they are also relatively normal proportioned.

I mean, I´m a boobs guy, but it doesn´t always have to be humongous breasts bigger than the heads of the characters.

The following review is based off my personal experience with playing this Game/Visual Novel... I try to be as brutally honest and detailed as I can, and these are my own opinions and thoughts, from one or more play throughs... The version this review is based on is v0.1...

This visual novel is both hard to read, jumps all over the place, and has a lot of melodrama...

The visuals of the characters are alright... The backdrops are a mix of familiar ones and unique ones... The visuals for when the protagonist is writing his book are a nice touch...

The script is long, but has a mix match of broken English, the occasional spelling error, lots of grammar errors, and failed attempts to sound intelligent... The plot revolves around a male protagonist who is an author trying to write a detective novel... He rents out one of his rooms to a woman and her sister (just the younger sister actually stays there most of the time), who are travelling under assumed names although he knows them from back in High School... At first the plot starts off simple, he gets distracted a lot by the younger sister, who seems to like taunting him, and this delays and interferes with his writing... But then the whole story starts jumping all over the place and adding a lot of melodrama and story twists, that just feel thrown in for no good reason, beyond just adding more melodrama...

This is not in any particular order, but lets just break down some of the stuff that just starts to happen... The sisters both have over the top attitudes one minute and friendly attitudes another, and this keeps flip flopping through the story... There is some sort of mysterious reason the older sister has the younger sister staying at the protagonists home... At one point you are introduced to the protagonists police officer friend, who is a major pervert, and asks for nude pictures of the sisters in exchange for doing a background check on them... In another instance you meet a young female in a park who has a brief talk with the protagonist, while actually dropping off a phone with a message from a killer saying that woman had to drop the phone off to a stranger, with a vid of someone getting murdered, and it needed to be passed around or something might happen to the current holder of the phone (or at least that is how the story text made it sound)...

You also find out that even though the older sister is very commanding and demanding most of the time, she actually is having sex with the younger sister, and it's the younger sister who takes charge of her older sister in bed... Then we get the younger sister giving the protagonist a BJ, recorded it, and blackmails the protagonist, making him her newest slave... Which just comes out of nowhere... Then you find out the protagonists Publisher is actually blackmailing the protagonist with regard to the home he lives in, because he broke up with her sister... And there is just a ton more of stuff like all this, just coming at you, as the reader, in confusing waves... So extremely over the top and melodramatic, and not really told in a way that always makes total sense...

This whole visual novel is a very wordy over the top mess, that just throws stuff at you... You get this feeling the author is trying to tell this huge dramatic story using lots of words and sayings, that don't always make sense or feel necessary or feel like they belong in the moment... And instead of a nice even pace, it has this up and down feeling, and just as you think it's about to even out, more twists and melodrama that don't feel natural or like they fit right, in their presentation... Like how the younger sister asks him to dance with her, which makes you feel like perhaps a spark is forming between the two, but the older sister shows and kicks him for daring to dance with her... But the next minute she's nice to him again... If they are lovers, and the older sister is just jealous, then why be nice to him at all? It's just so darn confusing... And apparently the older sister has a possible boyfriend... Anyways...

Overall, at first, even though the writing is very hard to read sometimes, the story had me slightly hooked, wondering what was going on... But as it went on, you just feel bogged down by the hard read, mixed with characters changing mood and attitude on a dime, along with melodramatic story twists, and so on... I started to feel sorry for the protagonist one moment, and hated him for his stupidity the next... There are a very limited number of choices through out the story... And sometimes I felt like just skipping through some of the text, as it was getting so tiring re-reading it, due to all it's issues... And I really do not think fixing the broken English will make the story any better...

The game is tagged with NTR, and seeing the sisters getting it on, when you as the reader thought perhaps the younger sister was beginning to like the protagonist... Then yes, the lesbian scene with the sisters could be considered NTR... But when you find out the younger sister is just a manipulator and blackmail artist, that possible feeling of cuckoldery just vanishes, for feelings of anger regarding the blackmail...

Now, I never finished all of the current content... Because once I got past finding out he was being also blackmailed by the Publisher, I had enough of all the non-sense at that point... I understand that this is a early production VN/Game, and it's gonna have some issues... But the there is already so much story text, I don't see it getting better any time soon... It can correct it's text errors, but the story just jumps around too much for me... Feels a bit scatter-brained... Will I revisit this one? Most likely not... I wish the developers the best of luck...