Critical Point

Robert E. Howard once said, describing the premise of Red Nails to a friend, “when a civilization begins to decay and die, the only thing men or women think about is the gratification of their body's desires. They become preoccupied with sex. [...] the normal, accepted life style ain't strong enough to satisfy the damned insatiable appetites of the courtesans and, finally, of all the people. They turn to Lesbianism and things like that to satisfy their desires.” While it's no Red Nails, Critical Point actually explores similar themes as Howard's final Conan story in a fascinatingly bizarre fashion, retracing several of the steps of that seminal work of fiction.

Critical Point is a Sci-Fi Horror Mystery-themed erotic Visual Novel in which the protagonist is sent to investigate the strange happenings and security breaches at an isolated space station. The main character arrives to find discipline and morale have crated among the almost entirely female staff of the station, many members of which have resorted to degenerate and violent sex to alleviate the tension and sense of mania that has gripped them.

Gameplay is standard of Visual Novels, with branching path nodes affecting the outcome of the story, including which of the women the protagonist has encounters with. In this regard, Critical Point is entirely unremarkable. However the game is largely voice-acted with the original Japanese VAs presented over the translated text. Most of the sexual scenes, which are all uncensored, are more shocking than erotic, underscoring the violent depravity which many of the characters have sunk to, including the [sometimes unwilling and unwitting] protagonist. The game does, ironically, look at and deconstruct player and character agency in the acts the player/character partakes in—at times, the character is literally out of control [and part of the story's mystery is in trying to discover why characters are behaving as they are, uncharacteristically engaging in violent and harmful sexual behavior].

Critical Point's story does have a lot of potential, and the sci-fi plot twists and the mystery offer some genuine “gee, shucks, makes you think” moments, but it never quite transcends its nature as a gory and intentionally unpleasant hentai game.

Review By P. Alexander