itch.io

hey, is the twinkle twinkle little star from the dead space trailer from way back? 

Burnout is a thing. If you need a day or a week or a month or whatever to put yourself together then I, at least, would vastly prefer you take the time you need then forcing yourself to push through. 

Thanks for the update.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/326557336762318848/739055323079376956/unknown.png

this image had me rolling on floor

There's a short story in the Dresden Files universe from the perspective of Karrin Murphy, a woman who was a department head in the Chicago Police which is a very male dominated work environment. In the story she talks about a language she calls Martian, after the boys come from Mars and girls come from Venus jingle, it's the various grunts and not-quite-words that men can use to convey, when you start to notice it, a fairly staggering amount of information. 

After I read the story I started paying attention to how I used 'Martian' in everyday communication. I realized I have specific grunts for "yes, I acknowledge that you have spoken, please continue with your thought," or "I see where you might be coming from but I am not sure that that is really the best idea right at this moment."

I can't remember the name of the short story but it's the last story in the book Side Jobs by Jim Butcher if you want to give it a read. 

I thought you might find this interesting. 

thanks for the update

v0.11.1 is free on the author's patreon, it just isn't updated on this site yet.  

So first of all I enjoyed this game a lot, enough to create an account in order to make this comment. 

The writing is good, the dialogue sounds like actual human beings talking, which is a serious step up from some of the visual novels I've played on this site. 

That said, the tone is a little jarring, right at the start, since there are all these warnings about gore and violence and nudity and then the game drops you into the house of what we are told is a massive crime family but most of the people that live there appear at first glance to be fairly humorous caricatures of mob stereotypes; the spoiled princess who actually just has no social skills, the unflappable right-hand man who actually can't be bothered to take any of this seriously anymore (unless something actually serious is going on), and the stoic don who is actually just a top quality introvert. With the ambitious firstborn son seeming to be the only member of the family who takes this whole mafia thing seriously but only serves to heighten the humor by becoming exasperated when the other members of the family only take him as seriously as they take themselves. 

Now, all this this is actually in service to the excellent character development that happens later but it comes across as a little tonally inconsistent when the game starts with all these warnings that 'this is a serious game for serious people, please take it seriously' and then starts with some old guy driving 20 mph under the limit to the horrified exasperation of the player character. 

I don't really have any recommendations biased on this as the warnings need to be there at the start even if people playing are aware this a lewd game because the violence, when it shows up, is right in the player's face and graphic, but I also like getting to know and grow into my understanding of the characters around the PC. Gracie in particular grew on me.

In terms of game play this visual novel can be broken down into three separate sections; the main quest-line (the meat and potatoes of the story in this game), the individual character quest-lines (the romance and dating-sim sections), and the missions (you need to do these to some degree in order to get the money to do certain quests) 

After the third or so main mission they all three sections grow very disconnected from each other. They sort of feel like a tree with one set of roots but for some reason has three trunks. I would feel better if the three main sections of the game were tied a little closer together. I understand this is not as easy as just saying poof and the game magically reorganizing itself to fit my preferences, plus it seems like allowing the player to choose what they do or do not do in one section of the game, such as for example, choosing not to attempt both of the daughters in the romance section, might have an impact on the main quest later on. 

On the subject of the missions, I think they are too grind-y, especially considering there are no time constants so there is no actual management aspect to the grind, it is just pressing more buttons for the sake of pressing more buttons. Also, the user interface of the missions menu needs some work, for example being able to switch to a different type of mission without having to go back two screens or having the option to leave the mission menu from any screen within the menu would both have alleviated a significant amount of annoyance while dealing with the grind. 

Also, some additional clarification on which stats actually help with what mission would be nice. Some of the stats are obvious, like stealth helps with the stealth missions but which missions does threat actually make it more likely for me to succeed on?

That's about it for the non-spoiler stuff. I hope the devs take this as the constructive criticism it is meant as. I really enjoy this game and want it to be the best that it can be.  

*SPOILERS*

For most of my playtime Gracie was my least favorite character. Not that I disliked her, I just found her kind of boring and uninteresting. That is, I did until her part in Isabel's story. Absolutely completely changed my mind on the character. When she went all quiet and and threatened to hurt the PC I got chills. I really like the actual threat, too, hurt not kill, which from a meta-narrative perspective she cannot do. So it is a threat she can actually make good on and I am very much looking forward so seeing where that particular plot thread leads. If it goes nowhere and is just dropped I swear I'll riot. I'm really looking forward to seeing consequences in general for attempting to romance the three most unattainable women ever all at one time. And not just from the Head Mamma or hubby, I don't see any of those three women just accepting being relegated to a harem. 

You guys established some real stakes here, don't let them go to waste, please!