This review is directed towards v1.1.1, which is the latest version posted on the site.
To be honest, this game disappointed me a little as I was expecting a certain type of gameplay and came across something completely different.
The premise of the game being a CYOA and such was pretty cool, and that was what led me to expect that you'd be meeting different people along the different layers of the Abyss, even in the city itself before parting... but once you start playing this game and get to experience it a little, this is not happening in the slightest.
Interactions thus far seem very very limited.. you can't trigger an interaction with your party member if you wish to, interactions only happen as you find certain relics or go through different layers which isn't bad but in a general sense it just feels very lacking.
I understand that there are characters which are more of a priority than others, what I mean by this is that there are characters who play a more important role on the story you're trying to create than others.. but thus far, except for your party members.. none of the other characters from the amount of time I spent on the game have a background so to speak.
Writing isn't bad, but I would suggest spending some time into deciding which characters are going to play an important role on the story and which ones aren't... and giving them a story to them that you can get to know if you interact enough with them
Furthermore, it would enhance the CYOA aspect greatly if the choices your character makes influences their personality. Perhaps, if the character has a certain personality, it could have more of an affinity with Reeds which seems like a suspicious guy or others.. and your party members could react to the path you're taking, even choosing to leave you if they don't want to follow you on your journey anymore, which could lead to different endings besides dying or just deciding to stay on the surface or a specific layer
I like the fact that interactions seem to be based on how much affection you have with said person.. and it's realistic, as you would have to spend a moderate amount of time with someone so they trust you with their more personal things, so that's good.
The world itself, each layer, feels lackluster and boring. Nothing really happens besides you searching for relics, which have certain benefits, some of those could even help your party members.. you applying curses to yourself to be able to ascend back onto the surface layer if you wish to
Things to improve this would be to add dynamic events that could happen as you are exploring the layer, finding X threat at some point which you could engage on, sneak by if you don't have the means to fight them and continue onwards with your journey.. chances for that to fail and backfire you
Things like those could help give this game some life and make it more interesting and engaging to play. As the game stands though, it gets boring pretty quickly when everything you're ever doing is pretty much finding relics and surviving.
I saw that there are some events which involve you getting specific relics to be able to successfully get your objective, like Reed's mission, or Emily's fetch quest, which are cool.. but those characters could be a lot more meaningful to the story and impactful if given a bit of TLC (refer to my statement above about interactions)
Artwork seems pretty good thus far, for relics, background, etc. This is the strongest point of the game I'd say, it shows that a lot of effort has been put into it
I have to say, I was thinking that we would have longer sex scenes with artwork resembling them.. but the sex scenes are so few and far between that you honestly don't even bother about them until they happen (the only sex scene I experienced was Maru's one because I cheated the Sex Demon curse and his affection, which is why I can say they're not really all that descriptive.)
Also, about the gameplay loop, I didn't like how simply by gathering up relics or doing certain tasks your character underwent physical changes. In the original source material that this game took inspiration from, the "Curse" takes the form of you experiencing certain things like hallucinations or even worse things if you try to climb back up through the layers.
The relics themselves have certain powers that differ from relic to relic, but picking them up never really changed the person which seems like it does in this game. Hell, some relics are not even capable of being used unless you have a White Whistle which isn't a mechanic present in the game
So, perhaps one way to solve this would be that when you pick up relics, you don't instantly suffer bodily changes but you only suffer changes to your body when you pick the curses from the list. This could enhance even more the CYOA aspect if say, you were only capable of choosing a select couple of curses depending on how you want your character to be like
I saw that there is a submissive curse if you want your character to be more submissive and your party members to be more assertive, there were curses like the elfish ears which I liked, curses about being extremely sensitive and having no refractory period, etc.
Maybe the food itself can or can not be poisonous and can have transformative effects, if you want to play with that, in the source material not every animal that the characters eat are poisonous or have changing effects.. you see that the food or water they consume is mostly pretty safe, and cooked.
The game has potential really and I appreciate the effort put into making it, but a few aspects of the game could use improvements.
Might give it a try in the future and see if it has improved.
Cheers
To be honest, this game disappointed me a little as I was expecting a certain type of gameplay and came across something completely different.
The premise of the game being a CYOA and such was pretty cool, and that was what led me to expect that you'd be meeting different people along the different layers of the Abyss, even in the city itself before parting... but once you start playing this game and get to experience it a little, this is not happening in the slightest.
Interactions thus far seem very very limited.. you can't trigger an interaction with your party member if you wish to, interactions only happen as you find certain relics or go through different layers which isn't bad but in a general sense it just feels very lacking.
I understand that there are characters which are more of a priority than others, what I mean by this is that there are characters who play a more important role on the story you're trying to create than others.. but thus far, except for your party members.. none of the other characters from the amount of time I spent on the game have a background so to speak.
Writing isn't bad, but I would suggest spending some time into deciding which characters are going to play an important role on the story and which ones aren't... and giving them a story to them that you can get to know if you interact enough with them
Furthermore, it would enhance the CYOA aspect greatly if the choices your character makes influences their personality. Perhaps, if the character has a certain personality, it could have more of an affinity with Reeds which seems like a suspicious guy or others.. and your party members could react to the path you're taking, even choosing to leave you if they don't want to follow you on your journey anymore, which could lead to different endings besides dying or just deciding to stay on the surface or a specific layer
I like the fact that interactions seem to be based on how much affection you have with said person.. and it's realistic, as you would have to spend a moderate amount of time with someone so they trust you with their more personal things, so that's good.
The world itself, each layer, feels lackluster and boring. Nothing really happens besides you searching for relics, which have certain benefits, some of those could even help your party members.. you applying curses to yourself to be able to ascend back onto the surface layer if you wish to
Things to improve this would be to add dynamic events that could happen as you are exploring the layer, finding X threat at some point which you could engage on, sneak by if you don't have the means to fight them and continue onwards with your journey.. chances for that to fail and backfire you
Things like those could help give this game some life and make it more interesting and engaging to play. As the game stands though, it gets boring pretty quickly when everything you're ever doing is pretty much finding relics and surviving.
I saw that there are some events which involve you getting specific relics to be able to successfully get your objective, like Reed's mission, or Emily's fetch quest, which are cool.. but those characters could be a lot more meaningful to the story and impactful if given a bit of TLC (refer to my statement above about interactions)
Artwork seems pretty good thus far, for relics, background, etc. This is the strongest point of the game I'd say, it shows that a lot of effort has been put into it
I have to say, I was thinking that we would have longer sex scenes with artwork resembling them.. but the sex scenes are so few and far between that you honestly don't even bother about them until they happen (the only sex scene I experienced was Maru's one because I cheated the Sex Demon curse and his affection, which is why I can say they're not really all that descriptive.)
Also, about the gameplay loop, I didn't like how simply by gathering up relics or doing certain tasks your character underwent physical changes. In the original source material that this game took inspiration from, the "Curse" takes the form of you experiencing certain things like hallucinations or even worse things if you try to climb back up through the layers.
The relics themselves have certain powers that differ from relic to relic, but picking them up never really changed the person which seems like it does in this game. Hell, some relics are not even capable of being used unless you have a White Whistle which isn't a mechanic present in the game
So, perhaps one way to solve this would be that when you pick up relics, you don't instantly suffer bodily changes but you only suffer changes to your body when you pick the curses from the list. This could enhance even more the CYOA aspect if say, you were only capable of choosing a select couple of curses depending on how you want your character to be like
I saw that there is a submissive curse if you want your character to be more submissive and your party members to be more assertive, there were curses like the elfish ears which I liked, curses about being extremely sensitive and having no refractory period, etc.
Maybe the food itself can or can not be poisonous and can have transformative effects, if you want to play with that, in the source material not every animal that the characters eat are poisonous or have changing effects.. you see that the food or water they consume is mostly pretty safe, and cooked.
The game has potential really and I appreciate the effort put into making it, but a few aspects of the game could use improvements.
Might give it a try in the future and see if it has improved.
Cheers