VN - Ren'Py - Onhold - Maids and Maidens [v0.10.0] [Raybae Games]

I played v0.10.0 through in a few evenings, and found it fairly enjoyable.

The story is decent, though it starts to feel like pulp fiction after awhile: with mysterious cults, industrial espionage, secretive government agents, predatory capitalists, human traffickers, etc.

The graphics are out-of-the-box Honey Select, including many of the sex animations. If you have played HS2, this feels like it could be set in the same world. While the dev gets zero points for graphic originality, he does a better job than many at posing and lighting his scenes; so overall I give this a pass.

Character-wise, the MC is your typical white-knight sort, with an extra-magical dick to assist in panty-dropping. There are a couple of points where the player can briefly choose more dominant or sadistic paths for the MC, but the dev’s heart is clearly not in it. The LI cast is extensive and diverse: virgins, hot-babes, MILFS young and old, a pregnant girl, a lesbian who might have a change of heart, etc. Many of these relationships have yet to be fleshed out. I found it easy to avoid ones that I didn’t want to explore.

Much of it is average fare, but I added a star for the fun story.

I absolutely loved this game! It is one of my favorites for sure. The writing, story, and characters are great and I am so looking forward to updates. It stands out to me in a sea of similar games. I really hope the developer sticks with this. It deserves to be a complete and finished game.

To start off this review, I just want to say that this game is good, but not great. In my humble opinion, the story is just okay and most of the character models are mediocre. Honestly, most of the girls are decent or average-looking, and the truly attractive ones are just side characters with very little content. I'm looking at you, Bianca and Fiona. So yeah, there's not much to write home about in terms of looks. However, that doesn't mean the game is boring. It can actually be quite interesting at times. Despite these two major issues I had with the game, it's still a good experience overall. It's impressive how it brought out such strong feelings in me, so I can say the developer did a good job. I hope the updates continue to go well and I wish the developer the best of luck with this game.

Review of v0.10.0

Maids and Maidens surprised me. Before playing, its name brought to mind a happy go-fucky harem full of women with boobs bigger than their personalities. But it turns out the game is as interested in its story as in its sex.

Yes, you are the stereotypical well off mc whose luck with the ladies is unbelievable. But rather than leave it at that, Maids and Maidens, seeks to weave the mc's attributes, the girls' personalities, and everyone's backstories into the plot. A real effort is made to try to connect plot lines together; for the most part this works, though there are a few threads started and then abandoned without good reason. The girls are well realised and you grow to care for them. And the mc is really likeable (except on some ill conceived corruption routes).

Funnily enough, the main problem Maids and Maidens has is with its sex scenes. For a start, they're often just not that hot. The animations are okay, but the low quality graphics and lack of steamy writing doesn't sell them. Just as importantly, there is often hardly any build-up to them. Rather than things getting progressively spicier with lewd shots in preparation for a scene, we are flung into them straight away from an engaging story; there's no time to get horny. Even worse, after a scene is finished, we often immediately timeskip to the next story event. No cuddles


There are a few other janky features, like the opacity behind the names still being grey after turning the opacity of the textbox off, and some bizarre clipping in the animations. Nevertheless, I enjoyed Maids and Maidens a lot, and hope it continues to improve.

Review @ 0.10.0

Don't be misled by version number. This version already has tons of content. I only assume dev used 0.01... to 0.10 instead of 0.1 to 1.0 .

The total rating would actually be 3,5/5 for me, but since you can't have fractional rating, so 3/5 it is.

Story: 4/5 -- decent background story, also for many of the characters, who are memorable enough. Some suspension of belief is needed, also some sci-fi elems, but only in background so far.

Dialogues 5/5 -- good English, mostly adult conversations, believable enough as well. Not overly winded, except sometimes in background info.

Visuals: 3/5 -- character and background renders are decent: 4/5 (but the bar is very high by now); sex scenes are ... controversial. More about that below.

Maledom: 1/5 -- hey, you tag your game mdom, I am going to include this in rating (as I am only reviewing mdom games by now). So essentially we have MC corruption stat (as revealed by walkthrough), but really the maid is the only one where we can practice that. And maid content is quite decent from mdom perspective, but ends about midgame, after we got her to hj us in shower. Lactation scenes were hot (if you're not averse to that) mostly due to the power play.

But afterwards while there is a big warning about dominance path on one character, and we get MC to do some corrupted stuff in a couple of places, there is practically no mdom sexual scenes and some light spanking with one character is the best you can get.

All in all, something that could work great for mdom lovers, if that part of content was developed. Maid path shows there is a good promise for that.


Other than that, with the rest of girls, it seems you can ONLY do +love path if you want any content with them. Even with those who are dependant on you already.

In general, there have been a large number of LIs introduced, but, perhaps due to that, sex scenes look too similar and they grow simpler with time. The dialogues on top of scenes are also not adding to the experience. There are some attempts of spicing things up, but otherwise whatever the girl it is eat pussy, fuck in pussy (no anal as far as I noticed), cum. Yeah, sometimes there's bj's and hj's, but that's far from given. Rather little amount of tension, girls start to throw themselves at MC sometime in the first half of the content and continue to do so. Mostly it makes for a feeling that sex scenes DON'T MATTER.

To sum it up. Good start on some content. Too many LIs for too little story/content (there's plenty of total content, it's just that each LI gets only a small fraction of that). Good potential for mdom, if the dev feels like it. Something to keep track of.

Game's graphics is good for a Honey Select game. Decent environment (though it's the same asset that's used by other Honey Select VNs), good lighting and shader work, though the character models are hit or miss.

Writing is good as well as the characters. I like the fact that the two choices are actually distinct and not misleading, so the player can actually choose the route he wants. The romance route has better writing as usual for any choice-based VNs.

The biggest drawback on this game is the sex animations. Like holy hell, it looks worse than the default HS animation! Like it's so janky as fuck! The looping is janky, the thrust animation is janky and awkward, the camera work is all over the place. Also made worse by some of the most boring sex dialogues I've ever read. Like the dialogue literally lacks any form of spice to it. It just tells you what the people involved are doing, with no dirty or passion talks at all.

Overall, decent game held back by shitty sex! I could rate this game 3.5/5, but I can't tolerate the garbage sex (which is important for porn games), so it's 3/5.

Damn, I really like the story so far. It has great characters, so I am going to play it till the end. The character designs are good. I like the scenes so far. It's great that all of the characters have different emotions. Every character has a unique story to tell. Humor and story is very good in it .

Story:

You play in the shoes of a young executive, who is on the path to becoming CEO of the company he works for. He moves to a new house, meets a neighbor who introduces him to a new maid, and the story unfolds.

The story is one of the best I’ve read on the site, mainly because it tackles subjects you’ll rarely find on h-games. Illegal immigration, human trafficking and corporate espionage are some of the themes that you will find here. Most of the LIs are going through some kind of struggle, and the game gives you the freedom to be a true White Knight for them, or take advantage of their situation, if that’s your thing. The fact most girls have a defined backstory and set of goals also help elevate their characters beyond just being a pussy for the MC to fuck.

Design:

It’s a choice driven VN but kept simple enough to not overwhelm the player with choices you can’t possibly know the consequences of. Theres only 1 “relationship” score to keep track of, and you can check each girl’s current score at any point and see how they’re reacting to your choices. You will still miss scenes tied to each major path you can take (romance vs blackmail, for example), but aside from that, you should be able to get the scenes you want to see without the need for guides or mods.

Visuals:

Fairly standard visuals for HS, nothing too groundbreaking but they get the job done. Animations are a mix between the standard HS ones and custom-made. The custom animations can be a little stiff, but having customs at all will always be a plus for me. The character designs are varied, with different ages, body types and ethnicities. One thing I personally really enjoy is the focus on lactation content for a couple of the girls, though you can turn it off if you don’t like it. One nitpick that I have is that the game’s Gallery seems to omit the lactation scenes even when I have them on. So if you want to rewatch them, you need a save prior.

Conclusion:

This game quickly rose to be one of my favorites on the site. A great story, well realized characters, and choices that are meaningful without being overwhelming or unpredictable. Visuals and animations are not quite up there with the best, but still good enough to leave you satisfied. Overall, a very easy recommendation from me, try this game out.

As it stands, this is a pretty decent game. The girls are pretty, the plot is coherent, the English is legible, plenty of choices in how to shape your character, some great kinks; the ingredients are all there for a perfectly passable experience.

Unfortunately, it suffers heavily from a lack of involved writing. Everything feels very barebones and narrative-driven, like someone's telling you the story rather than you actually seeing it through the MC's eyes. Only things that are important to the plot or the relationships are mentioned, and always without any details that actually make the world or characters come alive. This is especially egregious in sex scenes, since they're just descriptions of what's happening without being evocative or erotic. It makes for, somewhat paradoxically, a lack of intimacy in the sex--it's almost like someone's doing a report about the intercourse itself: the penis went in, there was thrusting, change to doggy-style, more thrusting, change to cowgirl, more thrusting, etc... You get the picture.

I understand wanting to tell a story and prioritizing the overarching plot, but if there's no time allotted for characterization then we won't really care about any of the characters within the story itself. This might read as me saying "The game just isn't boring enough!" and maybe that's kind of what I'm getting at. Life isn't always exciting, so skipping all the little boring or quiet bits makes this game seem kind of... lifeless.

Still worth a read though, if nothing else it's definitely not boring.

Good overall. Fairly good story and decent character variation, with quite a few choices to make about how you want to play the main character.

The character models and animations are honey select, with the positives and negatives of that decision. If you're into them then it's fine, I personally find the animations in particular very odd. As the character models go, some are pretty good, others less so in my view.

This is not very good.
The GFX are subpar, even for HS standards. The first sex scene with an LI is of course a dream sequence. And this is about as lame as writing in some lewd content gets. Just shoehorn it in there somehow. As long as these idiots get to see some fucking it's all good, right?
There is some Engrish, not a lot, but enough to get enjoying after a while.
The story is kind of boring and failed to hook me in order to keep going.

I bailed around day 8 or 9. Just wasn't getting into it and felt like I was wasting my time. A mediocre experience overall.

Cons: Much lighter on the maid fetish than expected given the title. A bit sad since I like the power dynamic of the maids thing.

The best part:

• Much better story than I expected. Writer really knows what he's doing in terms of the cadence of the mystery, building characters, and making them attractive despite all their realistic flaws. The main character is quite realistic too, which you don't really see in a lot of other VNs.
• The writing is super important to me and this writer has nailed it. Did a great job!

Other minor pros:

• Great production values, UI design, gallery.
• Real meaningful choices, awesome.

I am not sure how this one flew under the radar so long.

I have mixed feelings about this one but overall excellent, its art is very good HS. The start is kind of slow but the setup is basically worth the wait. There are several types if girl for you to chase or not. There are several ways to treat these girls. After things get warmed up it starts looking like a magic dick game, but it isn't as you get farther in it does have a solid rationale for what is going on. There are several intertwined plot lines that make it more interesting than just here is a girl , do the girl, find another girl...

The game is good enough that when the walkthrough mod ended in v.7 I redownloaded a fresh copy so I could complete v.8 ( using the .7 walkthrough doesn't allow you to go on past .7 even if installed in .8)

Is it a good game? in my eyes yes, will I d/l next ep defionately would I say its worth the d/l? YES its a few hours long with multiple good characters and good plot I don't think you can go wrong with this one.

Version Played: 0.8.0
Time Played: 5 hours, reached end of content. Missed a few scenes.

As a fan of the ladies HS can be used to create, I really liked the characters that I saw in the title image and screenshots. (It's also nice to see characters with some melanin.) Frankly, the story didn't sound all that compelling when I read the synopsis since it emphasizes the harem aspects, but surprisingly, it's turned out to be my favorite part of the game as it is compelling with ample mystery and intrigue and a great cast of characters.

Positives
+ Well-thought out and planned story (English usage is overall excellent, but every now and again there will be a small error or odd turn of phrase)
+ Really hot ladies with interesting backstories and personalities
+ Ample sex scenes that are well-integrated into the plot (for the most part...)

Neutral
= Very linear (basically a kinetic novel), with a few choices that change relationship values (I'll take this over a grindy, empty sandbox any day of the week though.)
= Some dark themes on display (human trafficking, spousal neglect), but they're generally handled well and not played for sadistic cheap thrills. Just be aware of this if you prefer everything bright and cheerful.

Negatives
- Generally endemic to harem games, but the protagonist isn't really all that likable and some sex scenes in particular make him seem like a sociopath.
As a general rule, I don't care for harem games, so I feel that I can be overly critical due to my distaste for them, but the weakest link here is easily the protagonist. The game does do far better than most in trying to give him a compelling backstory, show him as a capable individual and give a (fairly contrived) reason for his desirability beyond being rich, hot and hung, but thankfully everything outside of him is really good, so if you're like me and generally roll your eyes at the protags in these games, be assured there's a lot more here.

Overall, I greatly enjoyed my time with this game both from the story and sexual angles. It's extremely high-quality and I'm very excited to see where it leads.

Note to Devs: Outstanding work! Thank you for the lovely game and best of luck with future development!

This one totally deserves more attention. This is a hidden gem. Yeah it's a harem game you have to catch them all. But unlike many other harem games this one gives more importance to the story. Humor the main content of many HS games but there's no humor elements here. This one takes story seriously and it stay close to the real life scenarios. Some of the girls are already in a relationship or many had relationships. But don't worry there is no NTR. Girl's models are polished. There are many sexy to cute girls. Writing is good

The pacing of the game is good it's not slow nor fast. It's going on a perfect pace. Each girls have their own stories and problems to tell. Linear game with a good story line and nice romancable girls. This one truly deserves more attention. Looking forward to next updates keep up the good work dev

+ Story
+ Models
+ Writing
+ Pacing

I'm actually surprised that this game doesn't receive the attention it deserves. For me Maids and Maidens is one of the top-tier Honey Select AVNs, with amazing characters and interesting stories to enjoy.
The character models are certainly a bit different, if not weird, compared to other games that use Honey Select models, such as the character Laura and Sam. But each character's backstory certainly amends that and I'm quickly drawn by how well-written it gets. Also, the choice of putting a young maid who just delivered a baby a few months ago and your pregnant subordinate whose relationship with her husband becomes strained as main girls is very new for me, since in Honey Select games we usually are given tons of naive virgins. You also gets to know (and fuck) some girls who only want to fuck around instead of building serious relationship with you and it's quite refreshing to see.
The story itself is very engaging. Currently we're dealing the conspiracy against you by the means of hacking and blackmailing, the development of facial AI for government use, the shady business of human trafficking, and the secret cult/society that is connected with some of the acquaintance you know. The relationship buildup between MC and girls is great but the stories and events are more fun to watch.
My only worry though will be the slow pacing with girls, but I have good faith with the dev. Looking forward to the next update!

I’ve played quite a lot of games here, this is my first review, just because this gem should be seen by more people. very nice writing and story.

And the work ethic of the creator is out of this world. Set schedule and follow it, doesn’t charge people if failing to meet said schedule.

Top tier game for sure, plenty of girls, good H scenes, a rare case of interesting MC, another rarity in plenty of choices that impact the story, and a plot good enough that you get invested into it, I legit sarted caring for the girls mid playthrough.
That said, there's a few critics I can make, like how the game still did not develop too much of any particular girl due to there being a lot of them, so if you want to focus on one too bad, but overall 8/10 and am exscited for its future.

This game made me invested in all of the characters various stories and really care for them. On top of that the writing and dialogue is well above par. The scenes themselves are nothing special but the characters make up for that, also has optional lactation content which is a big plus for me!

One thing that sets this game apart is the pacing, I generally like slower paced games because I don't like games where every girl just falls on your dick, but here the build up and circumstances are reasonable enough to suspend your disbelief, while maintaining a brisk pace. Most healthy balance between sex scenes and story that I've seen in recent memory.

It helps that most of the characters are not the innocent virginal types you see in many other games (and those that are are executed well), most are experienced with sex and have a casual attitude about it, which is refreshing to see.

Well the storyline is pretty standard, our protagonist is an orphan that has climbed to the top of the corporate world and now someone wants to destroy his life, nothing groundbreaking or anything but still the intrigue and mystery plot are relatively well done.
Renders aren't rop notch but get the job done.
Girls are cute and with different personalities. The game is a harem, which I always say is a plus for me, but there are some details that concern me, especially that some girls have mentioned or at least hinted that their relationship with the protagonist is temporary and that's could be a huge disappointment because as I said all girls are lovely.
By the way I absolutely love how lactation is introduced in the game and I hope we get more scene.
Even if the problem with the girls worries me I still absolutely recommend this game.