Projekt: Passion - Season 1 (2022)

This is the first non-anime styled adult visual novel I've experienced. I was extremely skeptical due to its lack of animation and thought the art style would end up creepy due to the Barbie-doll nature of it all. Surprisingly I found myself fully immersed and was so sad when the credits rolled and I couldn't play anymore.

Let's talk about the art style. Most of the visuals are still images with text overlay for the dialogue. There are a handful of animated scenes, most of them being the "passion" cutscenes, and there are a few voice acted scenes.

The still images were immersive regardless of their lack of movement and it was easy to forget they were not animated. When there was animation during the passion cutscenes, it was usually a repeating loop of a certain position that gave the player time to either read through the dialogue or pause to enjoy the scene without dialogue on the screen. There were still a variety of positions in these scenes so they didn't get stale but they did lack passion from how stiff they felt sometimes.

The voice work was...not great. It broke my immersion pretty badly and I kind of wished they didn't include it at all.

The story and characters were the highlight, ironic considering I would not have purchased this game for its story alone but it ended up being what I enjoyed the most. The relationships felt good. The comedy was startlingly hilarious. The sound effects felt on-point (though some were repeated a bit more often than others). Each love interest had their own identity and their approach to being intimate with the MC felt believable.

I look forward to the next season and will be preordering Season 2.

I recommend this game to those who enjoy found family, healthy intimate relationships, and who need something to read on their Steam Deck before bed.