VN - Ren'Py - Tribulations of a Mage [v0.36.0] [Talothral]

I saw this game so many times in the latest update page that I had to try it.
I have very mixed feelings about that game. If that would have been the devs first game I would probably rated that game 4 stars. But in my opinion it has too many flaws.
Art:
The pictures are quiet good. I like the details in some pictures and all. But you can see that the pictures got no post edit and so they lack the last touch. The pictures are good but they could be so much better.
Story:
I think everyone knows the sentence.. show and don't tell. Here it is the opposite. And that is so annoying that I end up skipping a lot of times. The story is okay and if you fill that with so many unnecessary stuff just to fill the word count.. the feeling that is left is that story is boring.
Characters:
I think that is hard to rate. I don't really like the looks of the girls but that doesn't mean they are bad. There is a good amount of variety. However I don't think they are well written.
In general I don't really understand the main point. It's a harem game which is already kinda boring but I don't understand why the girls are following MC. The game tries to sell you some bullshit why they are following you but that is so off. It's just for the purpose to have a harem but then you see how MC looks like and acts.. and then nothing makes sense anymore.

I think if you are someone who is able to enjoy a movie/game just the way it is then you going to have fun with the game.
If you are someone that can't turn off your brain you probably end up getting bored and confused.

Despite some flaws this is simply one of the best fantasy avn/games around here.There is something for anyone, in regards to chicks variety. Only complainers would be underage kids (in physical or mental sense, or both), which should avoid adult games, yet there they are...
The best thing regarding those diverse chicks and the game itself is that no chick, sex scene or anything like that is enforced upon mc. Ive seen some "top" games and very very popular ones aiming for "story and multiple paths" which werent able to provide that "simple" thing - let a player chose freely who he wants or doesnt want.
Fully recommended game,. Sadly there is no 6 stars rating so i have to go with "only" five.

Story in this game is to me personally really boring just like MC they are not interesting at all there are beautiful girls but ugly ones get piece of action more. MC could have been younger like 20 or 25 instead he looks like he is 50 years old. Sex animations are also bad. But why isn't story more interesting. It's a shame.

The plot keeps moving forward, with the MC fucking various old women and monsters.
Several female characters who you think should be important and good-looking have no roles at all.

This game should be for people who have a fetish for old ladies and monster girls, but I am not one of them, so I give it 2 stars.

This is closer to what I think a VN should be. They need better spelling and sentence structure checkers instead of just hoping for community feed back. The NSFW scenes are a little odd to get used too but decent. Many odd girls for many a different body type enjoyers. I personally think there will be a spell mishap were the panther will semi change into a humanish form just to get pounded or just starts getting pounded in full cat form. The story is oddly the best part is and is fun. With additional work, removal of 90% of the NSFW material, which many seem phoned in, a decent editor, this could be a really good book oddly. Not a series unless a lot more work is put in but one big 600ish page fantasy novel. Keep the love interest of the girl with daddy issues, Ayaka, and the flame fairy, Shani, but the MC seems super put together (responsible) and stoic while not being stand off-ish and is friendly. Hence why the other relationships seem phoned in for content. The fairy and Ayaka are people that have their own hurdles but have had affection for him for a long time.

TLDR; Other than some odd choices of bed companions at times, the story is there and is worth the play. I am always careful as a former supporter of some particular creators to tell anyone to "go support" but this one would be worth a coffee definitely. (review at v0.33.0)

TO CREATOR: if you wind up seeing this one, whomever is writing the story is doing a decent job. whoever is putting into the game is too but needs to run a spell checker over it first or something and then send it back to a third party that knows the language pretty natively or just a bit better than conversational to read it for flow (no clue if that is technical but I figure you will get it) Going back and fleshing out some scenes dialogue would be fantastic even if you don't change the actual scene any. But I understand "WHERE MUH NEX UPDATEEEE!?!?!?!?" Please don't give up or fumble.

I've tried the devs previous works, all of which i was forced to drop because the narration and the text is so bland and boring.

I can barely follow the stories in any of his works because the sheer amount of filler and irrelevant text completely numbs my mind and ends up with me just skipping through most of the text.

Characters are barely introduced, We the players/readers are expected to understand a character without the dev explaining anything about them.

I admire the author's ability to constantly turn out updates, it is something to be admired and I respect it deeply.

His writing style is very much tell not show for the most part, which isn't a good thing, he loves having his characters be established badasses at the start of stories, he's not one for character growth at all, the MC is more or less the same guy the entire time and the characters are as well. It's kind of interesting to see the MC's life unfold and learn more about him as the game goes on, but I'd like for the author to try and have us pilot the journey a little more instead of just reading the journey, if you know what I mean,

Models are average, the story is alright, I just don't think this game is very good because there is nothing to attach yourself to. There is no hero's journey, you're just Mage McBadass who's been doing magic for years. Not a fan of that choice, it would be 2 stars if it weren't for the author's dedication.

sooo

i am done with actual content

as in my first post here - can it beat Sorcerer ?

it does with flying colors

the story is well written and compelling

the renders are great

the lewd animations could profit from more variation , but we dont play Talothral games for this , no?

thank you so much for this game @Talothral

Talothral's stories (in its best sense, btw) take us from far outer space to alternate magic realities right down to fantasy armageddon, updating his creations bi-weekly like clockwork. For that alone kudos galore, man.

Most of their fans are not along for the adult scenes, I'm sure, but those are just topping anyway. Tal's wide cast of well rounded LI's, the sheer scope of narration and background as well as his pacing of relations make his works highly enjoyable.

Played author's work before, and this is more of the same. They are less of fetish collection and more of a story with wholesome sex and relationships sprinkled in heavily. Perhaps a bit of a pokemon, gotta fuck em all, if you want. It's not forced on you, at least the sex part.

Personally, it's my jam.
Author being regular & consistent with updates is a big plus.
Oh! I think this game's combat scenes are only second to Projekt: Passion !

I really tried to like this one. I dont know.. its just off.

It was originally ok, but its long since been introducing the weirdest, (also the ugliest) girls to the game, and this mage has no problem diving right in to the most disgusting muff ive seen in games in a long time. Yes, you have the option to not have sex with any girl, but lets all be real its the whole reason we are here in the first place.

The sex is boring, although the art itself isnt that bad.

I dunno, just... not feeling it.

I'd love to give this game a 4/5, but the way it currently stands is that it'd be a 3,5 at best and since I can't give half points here I've decided to go with 3.
The story is decent, not bad but also not great, the characters are good, it has good diversity and also seems to paint the different characters and races with different traits with good diversity, but the sex is an absolute chore in my opinion. It overall feels way too stiff, every scene is basically the same with the same positions and the dialogue during these scenes is cold and impersonal, like the weird voice acting of games like Resident Evil 1 back in the days of its release kinda bad. Also and I can't believe I'd say that, but the sex scenes seem way too long.
Other than that I've enjoyed it so far although the writing could use some more polish as it seems like they make all these rather elaborate plans to deal with something and then it's over in 5 minutes or less.

Story is pretty bland and boring, alot of it can be blamed on the MC being submissive 99% of the time so everyone treats him like garbage and he shows 0 emotions, never gets pissed, in other words an emotionless robot which is really boring to play, the small fairy has more balls then MC....

As for the story its pretty much pure kinetic as well, all you ever controle is fuck a girl yes/no and thats pretty much it, all the other choices changes a little dialog but nothing story related change.

Also you keep getting more and more people in your group, why they want to follow MC i have no clue, apprently no one has a life of their own and just follow MC around to risk their lives for no reason what so ever?......i would kick everyone of them the fuck out of the party first chance i got...orc, fat girl, witch bitch....so playing on for story when you dont even want to hear or look at them is tuff and story wise its weird and stupid as well since MC dosent trust them, like the first orc girl that "joins" the party, yet MC allows it? why?
and the girls reasons to join is idiotic, one wants to kill necromancers, another wants to find a new orc tribe....so why follow an MC that is just trying to save him self, it wouldent help any of the girls so why would they stay....

Then theres all the nude people, ive always found it idiotic when devs make people walk around all nude, it dosent fit the story or the scene or anything and they arent even pretty to look at, they are damn ugly like Maevra or the black girl with her tits out, save that shit for people that are on their route and for sex scenes....

Girls are bland and mostly big tittet bimbos or monsters, even some gilfs and none of them are even remotly cute or hot in any way, they all feel as emotionless as the MC and diversity in builds are very poor its all bimbo builds.

Sex scenes are some of the most boring scenes ive seen as well, i had the sex dialogs set to ON but MC says nothing? MC feels like a statue and the girls dialogs are just plain bad and MCs face is like frozen its absolutly without any emotions which makes a really poor sex scene.

The lack of animations really hurt as well, its the crapy picture to picture stuff where you have to click a million times doing a sex scene, its more annoying then anything else, so the chance are that you will turn down every sex scene to avoid it and thats just no good for an adult game.

With the poor LI selection and lack of diversity in builds and no animations and a subpar story where alot dosent make sense, emotionless sex and characters, theres just no real point in playing it.

I really tried to play this game, again and and again.

But this just impossible. Yes there story, but MC is just dull and empty, also has no balls, he gets pushed by anyone, no-one respects him, he is so much unlikable .....

Story - 2/5
Characters - 2/5
Graphics - 5/5
Sex scenes - 1/5

also there no choices to be more manly or be polite, or there not many I'd say.

the sex scenes are boring, MC is like a corpse, and no-one enjoying it, the sex talk is horrible, especially from MC side.
I'd say only thing I like is graphics , cause even story is dumb, he suppose to be covered agent of emperor, and he shows his emperor seal to every villager. every time he comes somewhere he treated like shit on shoe, and he never pushed back.
Dwarf and Ayaka are so unlikable I'd kill them myself if I could.
and what is that with his pencil dick.... with all those weird girls his dick looks like a joke, well pretty much like MC himself.

V.0.26.1
SUMMARY: I really tried to enjoy and keep at this game but its lost me...

PROS:

1. Good story, lore rich
2. Very well written and structured
3. Interesting story.
4. Many characters and love interests.

CONS:

1. Long winded, too much attempt at intrigue, political plots and random encounters end up making me feel like the story never goes back to the main agenda and plot. These only detract from the greater story which hardly gets airtime. Waste.
2. Lack of animation and models are boring and plain, not built to the standard we have become use to, thus looks dated.
3. No kinks or anything other than vanilla sex scenes, which are very boring and dull, its actually so bad already that you could almost remove those scenes completely and focus purely on the story...not kidding...
4. Characters and dialogue feel robotic and completely unemotional, its one thing to have the MC act this way, he only has half a soul so...but everyone else also feels like they are paper characters that are reading from a script. This is compounded by poor art work and little effort with regards to the scenes or any real way to convey emotion.

TLDR: Interesting world, lore and plot, but thats it, rest is dull and boring and not worth even calling an adult VN.

Always love Talothral's work, and here's another banger!

The girls are gorgeous in this, particularly the non human/magical ones. I get very fond flashbacks from Sorcerer when playing it.

Also, I adore our dear feline Familiar. She's epic!

After playing Sorcerer as well as TRS1 & 2 my expectations for this game were quite high. And for me, Talothral delivered again. Story and writing are really good - no feeling of incoherency or awkward dialogues/monologues. Characters are likeable to me and the interactions are fun and not, which is important, cringe.

I like Talothrals rather pragmatic outlook on world and character building - there's no over-arching attempt of moral virtue-signing where certain actions are always "bad" and others always "good". It's more constructed in a realistic way of "rarely everything is black and white" but rather a lot of grey.

Visuals are well made with quite some care for details and composition. Are the sex scenes the best ones on this site? I wouldn't say so. But to me this is not a deciding factor since i would still play this game even without them. Although some spiciness is still good and adds to how the interpersonal relationships between characters are perceived.

Overall a very good story-focused game like the ones before and I'd recommend to give it a shot.

The game is well-paced, in my opinion, and I felt like I was seeing scenes at a good pace the whole way through. The art and dialogue are very good. It's easily one of the best games on this site. There is a large amount of content and a nice selection of actors. The game is quite addicting; I spent many hours on it. I would recommend this game to anyone. The game is updated regularly.

As of 0.19.0 I find the overarching story interesting albeit rushed and due to that rushed nature I don't find the love interests very interesting because they've had no time to develop.

The story jumps ahead days to weeks at a time with minimal onscreen interaction with said love interests and as such I don't find myself giving a damn about them. A major shift after the Dev's previous game, Sorcerer.

I think RandomHornyDude hits the nail on the head for this game but given the general quality of the stories I've encountered here over the years I have to bump the rating up one more star to four instead of his three because of the overall quality of the story and its presentation in general.
If the sex animations were up to the modern standard with greater range and types of motion then this would be a shoe-in for 5 stars.
I turned off the sex dialogue after watching a few scenes because it made the boring and uninteresting sex scenes take longer because you had to acknowledge each line of dialogue. When turned off you still have to wait for the scenes to complete and they are profoundly uninteresting. With the next update I may turn the sex scenes completely off as the story is interesting enough without them. In fact. I really think they are only there because this site expects a story to have them. In that sense they are clearly gratuitous rather than essential plot elements.
Anyway - I really enjoy the story as it develops and I hope the authorship team completes this without losing interest.
This is one of the stories here that I think would make a good movie.