I'm currently playing through Thamar, which I had downloaded here before the lockout. I'm about 1/2 way through chapter 2, so am reviewing only up to that point.
Basic plot without too many spoilers:
The story takes place in Spain, early 2000's. Daniel meets his long lost mother and his sister he didn't know he had and immediately falls in love especially with the sister, Thamar. They are attending a wedding and there are two main paths depending on who Daniel and Thamar go home with after the wedding. In either case, the story follows Daniels romance with Thamar, his other female family members, and basically every other woman he interacts with, all of whom are either already in love with him or about to be.
The game has several unusual elements:
* You play in 3rd person, mostly directing Daniel but sometimes directing the other characters. This is unexpected because at the beginning you are prompted to give your name, but it is only used when Thamar is narrating to you as the player off screen.
* Whenever a choice point is about to come up, the scene flashes to Thamar in the narration room where she warns you of the choice and its outcomes.
* Very wide age range, including the main characters. Many of the sex scenes shown are memories of the different characters, often much younger than in the current story, and the love interests (so far) range from early puberty to grandmothers who actually look like grandmothers.
* The game feels very Spanish in the way the characters are portrayed and how they speak and interact, and you pick up interesting elements of Spanish culture and legal system. For instance, you can legally have sex with a 13 year old family member but getting a divorce is difficult and you have to go to England if you need an abortion.
* Most of the family romances are already established before the game starts. You are informed of some of them in the intro, and find out about others through storytelling as the game progresses.
Strengths:
* A wide variety of distinctive character models who are well rendered and who I don't recognize from other games. It's not the best renders I've ever seen but well above the middle of the pack.
* Lots of nudity that makes sense in the story
* Good character writing. Every character has a unique personality, back story, and motives that make sense, and the characters and their relationships seem to develop naturally.
* Good posing and walk animations
* Stays away from many of the overused tropes of the genre -- this is a huge one for me
Weaknesses:
* The characters spend too much time posing and telling each other how pretty they look relative to the time spent actually touching each other
* The romance and sex dialogs are very repetitious
* Many of the sex scenes are also repetitious -- it looks like a lot of re-use of poses and animations
* Most of the sex animations are mediocre. Not bad, just not up to the level of the rest of the game. There are a few good ones though, where they clearly took the time to get it right.
* A lot of unused potential with some of the characters that are introduced. For example, Lola and Raquel appear late in chapter one, Daniel and Lola agree to have a date, but then early in Chapter 2 we find out that they've moved to another city and the date will probably never happen. I think the devs are putting potential love interests onscreen to see which ones their supporters like and then yanking off the ones who don't make the cut, but the story suffers for it.
* The story itself seems scattered. Some threads are developed really well, such as the changing relationship between Daniel's parents and his role in their lives, while others get delayed longer than makes sense, like the romance between Daniel and Thamar.
Recommendations to the creators:
* Make viewing the GILF scenes optional. It's wonderful that the game actually allows realistic looking grandmothers to be sexual, but a lot of viewers will prefer to have that happen offscreen.
* Less posing and more action, whether that action be sexual or otherwise. Every frame should progress the story.
* Introduce fewer new love interests and commit more to following through with those we have already met onscreen or had significant buildup. The danger of harem games with more than ~5 love interests is that the individual characters don't get developed enough to be interesting, so they become shallow re-skins of other characters. One of the great strengths of the game so far is the unique character personalities, so the challenge is to bring each of them into Daniel's life in a way that makes sense for them to stay there, or else move on in a satisfying fashion.
* Make each sex scene unique, with animations tailored to the individual characters so the way they move actually shows their personality. And do the same with their dialog - one girl might say romantic things while another likes to talk dirty and another might only make cute little squeeking noises.
Overall I recommend the game highly, for its uniqueness as much as it's overall quality. I wouldn't put it in my top five but in my top 20% for sure. Just be prepared for it to be more of a slow burn than it appears, and enjoy getting to know the unique characters.
Basic plot without too many spoilers:
The story takes place in Spain, early 2000's. Daniel meets his long lost mother and his sister he didn't know he had and immediately falls in love especially with the sister, Thamar. They are attending a wedding and there are two main paths depending on who Daniel and Thamar go home with after the wedding. In either case, the story follows Daniels romance with Thamar, his other female family members, and basically every other woman he interacts with, all of whom are either already in love with him or about to be.
The game has several unusual elements:
* You play in 3rd person, mostly directing Daniel but sometimes directing the other characters. This is unexpected because at the beginning you are prompted to give your name, but it is only used when Thamar is narrating to you as the player off screen.
* Whenever a choice point is about to come up, the scene flashes to Thamar in the narration room where she warns you of the choice and its outcomes.
* Very wide age range, including the main characters. Many of the sex scenes shown are memories of the different characters, often much younger than in the current story, and the love interests (so far) range from early puberty to grandmothers who actually look like grandmothers.
* The game feels very Spanish in the way the characters are portrayed and how they speak and interact, and you pick up interesting elements of Spanish culture and legal system. For instance, you can legally have sex with a 13 year old family member but getting a divorce is difficult and you have to go to England if you need an abortion.
* Most of the family romances are already established before the game starts. You are informed of some of them in the intro, and find out about others through storytelling as the game progresses.
Strengths:
* A wide variety of distinctive character models who are well rendered and who I don't recognize from other games. It's not the best renders I've ever seen but well above the middle of the pack.
* Lots of nudity that makes sense in the story
* Good character writing. Every character has a unique personality, back story, and motives that make sense, and the characters and their relationships seem to develop naturally.
* Good posing and walk animations
* Stays away from many of the overused tropes of the genre -- this is a huge one for me
Weaknesses:
* The characters spend too much time posing and telling each other how pretty they look relative to the time spent actually touching each other
* The romance and sex dialogs are very repetitious
* Many of the sex scenes are also repetitious -- it looks like a lot of re-use of poses and animations
* Most of the sex animations are mediocre. Not bad, just not up to the level of the rest of the game. There are a few good ones though, where they clearly took the time to get it right.
* A lot of unused potential with some of the characters that are introduced. For example, Lola and Raquel appear late in chapter one, Daniel and Lola agree to have a date, but then early in Chapter 2 we find out that they've moved to another city and the date will probably never happen. I think the devs are putting potential love interests onscreen to see which ones their supporters like and then yanking off the ones who don't make the cut, but the story suffers for it.
* The story itself seems scattered. Some threads are developed really well, such as the changing relationship between Daniel's parents and his role in their lives, while others get delayed longer than makes sense, like the romance between Daniel and Thamar.
Recommendations to the creators:
* Make viewing the GILF scenes optional. It's wonderful that the game actually allows realistic looking grandmothers to be sexual, but a lot of viewers will prefer to have that happen offscreen.
* Less posing and more action, whether that action be sexual or otherwise. Every frame should progress the story.
* Introduce fewer new love interests and commit more to following through with those we have already met onscreen or had significant buildup. The danger of harem games with more than ~5 love interests is that the individual characters don't get developed enough to be interesting, so they become shallow re-skins of other characters. One of the great strengths of the game so far is the unique character personalities, so the challenge is to bring each of them into Daniel's life in a way that makes sense for them to stay there, or else move on in a satisfying fashion.
* Make each sex scene unique, with animations tailored to the individual characters so the way they move actually shows their personality. And do the same with their dialog - one girl might say romantic things while another likes to talk dirty and another might only make cute little squeeking noises.
Overall I recommend the game highly, for its uniqueness as much as it's overall quality. I wouldn't put it in my top five but in my top 20% for sure. Just be prepared for it to be more of a slow burn than it appears, and enjoy getting to know the unique characters.