Amber's Quest [Demo]

I went in expecting, I dunno, some basic yaoi bait with a jungle backdrop. What I got was Amber having a full on crisis of identity while his buddy Gabriel watches him with these eyes that say way more than the dialogue. The game looks deliberately rough around the edges, like someone's sketchbook came to life, and honestly that makes the whole thing feel more intimate. Like finding someone's private drawings. The Colorado River sequence dragged. Too much paddling talk, not enough of what I was actually there for. But then there's this moment in the tent where Mateo, who I thought was just the muscle, starts talking about the constellations and suddenly his hand is on Amber's thigh and I realized I'd been holding my breath. The CGs aren't polished. They're messy and hot in a way that feels almost too personal. One scene with Gabriel against some ruins had this rough pencil quality that somehow made everything more intense than any hyper rendered 3D thing I've seen. The achievements pop up at the weirdest times too. Got one called "First Contact" and nearly choked on my drink. Wish there was more voice acting, or any really. The silence during the explicit scenes is strange at first but then you start filling in the sounds yourself and maybe that's worse. Or better. I can't decide. The 75k words thing sounds impressive but some of it is definitely padding about archaeology that I clicked through. Though weirdly I started caring about whether they'd find the stupid city. The bara elements are there if you squint, Mateo especially, but it's more about the tension between these three men who are supposedly just colleagues. Dare to play it alone, or invite company?

• visual novel
• hentai
• yaoi
• gay
• lgbt