Again!? The Circus of Sinful Secrets, apparently this has happened before?

Again!? The Circus of Sinful Secrets and every other video linked to it can be seen on our Patreon, and if you’re wanting to know what other games we’ve played and have posts for, here’s our list of current games.

Where can you buy?

Pros:

  • 20+ adult scenes
  • Multiple endings
  • Two clues required to blame someone
  • Time countdown clearly visible

Cons:

  • Diary is spelled ‘Dairy’
  • Image unavailable in diary
  • Character expressions don’t match emotions
  • AI involved
  • Loud repetitive music
  • Some lines not translated to English
  • Characters smooshed in scenes
  • Too many interactions
  • Can’t hide dialogue text
  • Lacks imagination

All links below this section may not pertain to the game itself, and don’t need to be clicked. They are affiliate links that take you to random products that I think are interesting.

Explanation to Negative Feedback

Diary is spelled ‘Dairy’

I just thought this was funny, as every time you need to go into the diary, it’s just in your face every time. I’m sure this could be considered a simple fix, since all they need to do is correct the spelling, right?

Image unavailable in diary

One of the images for the characters actually has an error written on the screen for it, because it’s unable to be found, I guess? But if you hover your cursor in a certain area of the image, it’ll show up. But just in that cursor-placed area.

Character expressions don’t match emotions

I think this is maybe the problem when it comes to creating images with AI. You create specific characters in their happy little stances–though maybe not in the instance of Marie, but at least she does still somewhat smile–and you don’t take into consideration that they might not always be so cheerful.

Like Chloe is constantly berating Marie. And yelling. And just overall angry in regards to her clown counterpart she has to work with, but she’s always so freaking happy looking in her images, and it’s annoying.

Match the face with the emotions.

Please.

AI involved

The Steam store states this:

Music was generated by AI. Art was generated by AI and rework by human

But I’m doubting the rework, because otherwise, the character’s would match their emotions just a little bit better, I feel. Like, how is it reworked?

Loud repetitive music

This had to be one of the most annoying aspects of the game, as it can become really loud and obnoxious and in your face. I also didn’t want to just put repetitive music here, because a lot of games have repetitive music and that’s not really saying much in the way of it being a con in itself.

But yeah, I was doing commentary for my patrons (shoutout to my Patreon supporters, both free and paying), and this music was blasting.

It’s not even bad music, honestly. It’s the kind of hype music you’d get, probably during certain events at a circus, so it’s not like none of it makes sense, but there’s only so many tracks and after it goes through all of them, they repeat.

Some are on the lighter side, but one specifically has trumpets and really gets into it. That’s the one that probably causes the biggest issue.

Some lines not translated to English

As far as the visual novel aspect, I only came across two lines that had Russian text to them, but when it comes to looking into the phrases section of the clues, that’s where you see all of the Russian words that have yet to be translated, and I don’t know how they managed to skip all that, because there are a lot of phrases.

Bear in mind that the translation is skewed when you first look at the phrase. If you click onto it, then it’ll show the phrase and information about it in English.

Characters smooshed in scenes

It’s obvious that the character models were not made to fit into the scenes, because they don’t look good, with being stretched and smooshed to fit into the environment. I guess they were so focused on making the art look good for the visual novel portion, they just didn’t care about the scenes themselves.

Too many interactions

Gathering the items and the time limit reduction for doing so isn’t bad.

What’s bad is the whole talking to nine different people and choosing each item for all of them. It’s just not possible to do within the time limit you’re given, so you’ll have to go through multiple save states to figure out who responds to which items, because sometimes they have nothing meaningful to say to them and it’s still a time reduction.

That’s just with the items.

You have to remember there are also phrases people say that you can get more information on by speaking to other people about them, and that’s even more time to use.

I went through this game so many times and had to write down the items that actually gave vital information from each girl so I didn’t waste time. And even then, I wasn’t able to go through every phrase for the girls, so there’s so much to do here in a small amount of time and it can become overwhelming and exhausting.

Can’t hide dialogue text

This is for the adult portion of the game.

Basically, you’re unable to see the full image given to you until the text momentarily disappears before the next scene takes its place. It’s a little disappointing, considering there are many times when the text box covers what you might want to look at.

Lacks imagination

Again, this is for the adult portions of the game.

We’re a part of a circus. And yet with every adult scene we get…they’re so generic. Where’s the imagination at? There are acrobatics to be done around here. Characters can use the props all around them, but nooo. They prefer the vanilla side of things.

Every single one of them.

After seeing a character do the same thing for us more than five times, it gets a little boring.

Explanation to Positive Feedback

20+ adult scenes

While there are animations in the game, the animations don’t really pertain to the adult scenes.

And while there are quite a lot of adult scenes, way more than 20, if I’m being honest, not all of them are “engaging,” so to speak. Some of them are just the ladies teasing us with the whole look but don’t touch ruleset. Still, naughty images are naughty images.

Multiple endings

There’s an ending for every character in the game, including yourself, if you fail to find a proper suspect via proper accusations. I like the idea of getting multiple endings just by choosing the wrong suspects and not having any real repercussion to it, aside from the fact that a murderer got away with doing what they did and it’ll probably happen again.

There’s just so many items and info that you acquire within the game that even by gaining a lot of information, there’s a chance you’re still unable to pinpoint anyone, which I don’t think is all that fair.

But yea. With so many characters, there’s a lot of paths to take, if you want to blame anyone and everyone.

Two clues required to blame someone

Thankfully, this is all you need to point the finger and accuse someone of having murdered poor Claire, whether they are innocent or not. It’s just that sometimes, it’s a little obnoxious trying to find those two specific clues in all the hints that we obtain.

And yes, your crew will gang up on you if you choose too many wrong choices.

I’m happy that the developers didn’t see to it that we had to find every clue on a single person in order to pin the blame, because that…that would’ve been cruel to a man that isn’t even an investigator in the first place.

Time countdown clearly visible

It’s not an active timer, but time does get taken away whenever you go to another section of the circus, or when you speak with a character about a clue, unless they have nothing to say about said clue, which is nice.

You’re not totally wasting your time.

Anyway, the amount of hours you have left is labeled at the top center of the screen, and it looks like a circus ticket, which is kind of a fun touch.

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