A Kiss from Death

It's boring and entirely forgettable. It has a story and a setting but it's flat and not immersive. One would think it is on purpose since the main purpose of this book is clearly smut. But the smut is not engaging either. I got it on sale, so no big deal, but don't be like me and just play the demo first.

Reviewing (mostly) every game (or DLC) in my library, part 622: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️☆☆☆ (7/10) William Lowman's [i]A Kiss from Death[/i] is one of the more interesting works published by Hosted Games. I'm truly not quite sure how to feel, even after doing three playthroughs and getting the "true" ending. It's a bit—okay, [i]really[/i]—out there, experimental in both prose and story. It frequently breaks the genre's recommended conventions: it is blatantly nihilistic, has no happy endings, features a complex (almost unlikable) wide cast, a shorter playthrough, and some questionable writing quirks. But I see what Lowman is trying to do. His juxtaposition of immortality and mortality is masterful and thought-provoking. I'm just not sure if, ya know, I actually [i]like[/i] it. This is the first review I made that has more Mixed notes than Pros or Cons. Still, [i]A Kiss from Death[/i] is unique and pushes the boundaries of what interactive fiction is or can be, prompting me to give it a thumbs up. [b]I was given a free copy by the staff! Thank you![/b] [b][h2]Pros:[/h2][/b] ✅[b] Sex scenes.[/b] First off, I can't believe Hosted Games allowed such explicit content—good for them! While the sex scenes vary in length and detail, they are [i]super[/i] explicit and unashamed about it. However, they are also relevant to the game's themes, as they are both provocative yet uneasy. Most explicit scenes are romantic or sensual, focusing on the melding of souls and whatnot. Nope, not here. My first encounter with a demon involved her [spoiler] sucking the soul out of me—literally. A satyr was so thorough and passionate with my character that he pushed my character onto the forest's floor and ♥♥♥♥♥♥ me into the Earth. You can have sex with a dragon (somehow, don't ask me how), which involves a magma bath—both thrilling yet dangerous.[/spoiler] Even in sexual or romantic moments, there’s always something slightly off or unstable. The monsters aren’t softened into human stand-ins either; they stay alien, unpredictable, and unsettling, and that doesn’t disappear just because things turn intimate. So you end up holding two reactions at once: attraction and discomfort, or curiosity and unease. The writing also leans into stakes that feel bodily and extreme—souls, transformation, environments that can hurt you as much as they can heighten things—so the experience isn't ... [i]normal.[/i] ✅[b] Good replayability[/b]. This game is meant to be replayed, as it's almost a rogue-like? Many events are randomized, and some need a specific stat or event to trigger. I've done three playthroughs, and I still haven't encountered some ROs! The variety of characters is broad, the most I've encountered in a long time. And I think some new content shows up in a run involving the true ending. [b][h2]Mixed:[/h2][/b] 🟨 [b]Perspective/tone.[/b] The biggest takeaway is the game’s commitment to a kind of constrained, melancholic nihilism. It’s consistent, even deliberate, but also somewhat limiting. In a sense, the game feels most interested in reinforcing a specific philosophical stance: that time is cyclical, immortality is a curse, attachment is fragile, and meaning is transient rather than accumulative. It laments the inevitability of death, and if everyone dies and everyone is forgotten, are our struggles void of meaning? Really interesting stuff. Yet it's downright depressing, especially when factoring in the romance. I mean, all my mortal lovers died. Real. But once I finally find an immortal being I liked, the world ended! 🟨 [b] Concept/rail-roading.[/b] I have played many a game where they promise me the world: 4+ ROs, multiple different endings, unique origin stories, and so on. They are always spread too thin. There's not enough depth in each choice to be a meaningful experience, and some paths feel more like copy and paste. [i]A Kiss from Death[/i] is a bit similar... but on purpose, I think. You play as an immortal being with enormous implied scope—centuries of time, powerful abilities, and the suggestion of world-shaping potential—but most of that is narrowed into relatively small, self-contained outcomes. You can master three types of magic, but you can't grant your ROs the same immortality. Or, you can't unfreeze yourself from a vampire's spell. I can [spoiler]feed my special, powerful blood to my vampire lover, but I can only watch as a vampire hunter shoots and kills him.[/spoiler] ➡️ [b] Thematically, it's brilliant.[/b] No matter how powerful I am, I have to watch my lovers, family, and friends die again and again and again. But I have hope! Maybe next time, things will change. Things will be different next cycle. I just have to try one more time. Mechanically, it ... irks me a bit. It gives me a feeling of forced convenience, where something [i]must[/i] happen for plot reasons. 🟨 [b] Romance.[/b] The way Loman approaches romance is unique. There's quite a large cast of moral and immoral lovers. Mortal lovers involve a short storyline—a couple pages at max—and the narrative theming of "X is a mayfly. Born yesterday. Dies tomorrow" is brilliant. Immortal lovers are much longer and involve detailed storylines. In one playthrough, I encountered... perhaps five ROs? The game doesn't delve deep enough into the numerous ROs; yet that's also on purpose. Again, I'm not sure how to feel. How can you describe a RO? Lowman does it concisely: you will know a character's name, age, gender, and the basics. And you are also given a character's hopes, dreams, and fears. That is all. That is the measure of a man. Instead of growing a life together, you are desperately trying to grasp any fleeting moments of happiness you can. The abrupt pacing feels intentional, but it also makes things kind of hard to settle into. Scenes move quickly, relationships kick off fast, and then you’re already onto the next moment before there’s much time to really sit with what just happened. You end up meeting characters in these sharp, concentrated bursts rather than through slower buildup. It’s not necessarily bad design, but it does create that push-pull feeling: you’re drawn to them, but also slightly distant from them, like you’re always a step behind actually connecting. [b][h2]Cons:[/h2][/b] 🟥[b] Prose.[/b] Lowman's prose is quite similar to the themes behind [i]A Kiss from Death.[/i] It's quite dry, rather clipped, and does not linger on emotions or descriptions. I'm not a huge fan tbh. 🟥[b] Time-skips.[/b] It's hard to explore a human lifetime properly, giving due diligence to each major event. Kevin Gold has handled this decade-long time-skip choice quite well. It's even harder to cover an immortal's 2,000 years of living! At that scale, it becomes almost impossible to show lived experience in a detailed, continuous way without either overwhelming the reader or fragmenting the story. So the writing has to rely on compression—summarizing long stretches of time into brief narrative beats—which can make life feel both vast and oddly distant at once. 🟥[b] Bland MC.[/b] For the wealth of options Lowman offers, the MC is quite bland. It's hard to explain, but it doesn't seem like they have any emotions within them. They're just a passive observer. [hr] If you enjoyed this review, please check out my curator page to find more: [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/45814768-Verdict-Play-or-Pass/]Verdict: Play or Pass. [/url] Also, please leave a like and visit [url=https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Indie_Gems]IndieGems[/url] and our [url=https://www.youtube.com/@IndieGems2]YouTube channel[/url] for more reviews like this one. [/hr]

The way the story 'develops' is very simple and predictable. It's dull.

Great concept, bad execution. Very poorly written, I refunded after 20 minutes when the game forced me into a sex scene

[spoiler]Your choice wasn't with whom to spend eternity. Anything that suggested so was a lie. From the very beginning, your choice has always been with whom you are willing to die.[/spoiler] 非常喜欢这一部！很安静的叙事风格（性事的部分又很色），像一个个讲述爱与死亡的成人童话故事的串联：有的爱意永恒，有的交往只不过是漫长岁月中的蜉蝣，朝生暮死；但无论是哪一种，结局皆非happily ever after，而是“直至死亡将我们分离”。 虽然刚开始因为没有直接切入主线剧情、支线人物又太多，让我有一点茫然，但随着几千年间在这个世界不断探索，也就慢慢沉浸到了整个故事当中。个人非常喜欢Aursley和Stal的故事线以及Nyeru这个角色，每次读到结局都觉得惆怅又释然；当然还有很多角色都没有来得及了解，适合多周目阅读！ 另外，强烈推荐人外爱好者来体验一下！！可攻略对象包括蜘蛛女王、体型绝无缩水的红龙、内里不含任何人类成分的盔甲罐头等多种正宗人外，而且基本上每一个都可以睡，请试试看！

This was surprisingly one of my favorites so far. I think the best part is probably the character stories that you can stumble across throughout the game. The immortals are a little easier to find and their stories are all unique and interesting, yet there are quite a few mortals as well that are all generally compelling as well (and they are a bit more difficult to find in all). I would highly recommend playing through this several times, trying different things out, seeing different stories, etc. Some of the encounters are shorter than others, and some may not be to your liking, but there's a lot of variety and great moments to be had. The stories overall are rather bittersweet might be a good way to put it, but worth experiencing. P.S. One of the other reviews played much like a murder hobo in a DnD campaign. Really funny tale to be sure--just be aware that you will miss out on most of the content if you kill everything in sight hahaha.

Honestly, play the demo before buying. It's what I should have done. Story? Lacking. Characters? Boring. Concept? Actually not too bad. Well executed? Let's see... Three origin stories, which don't matter all that much but the introductions are pretty cool, albeit short. Played with the Champion and the Cytomancer, liked them both. But beside that, you don't really get attached to your character. You don't have opportunities for development or introspection. In the end, you just don't care about who you play as, you don't have much of a personality anyway. The story itself hasn't a real plot. You finish the introduction, you do whatever you want within a list of choices, then you're hit with the ending (which kinda sucks). In the beginning, it is said in passing that you are born under the sign of the God of Time. [spoiler]Four visions later within the 2000 years you are allowed to play (so much for immortality), you're thrown into some narrative about that same god wanting to destroy the world and you're the only one who can stop it. Boring.[/spoiler] Of course, since this is supposed to be a story of romance, there's bound to be interesting characters you are entranced by and invested in. Right? There are many encounters thrown at your face along the different events of the game, it's basically a smash or pass. With only a few exceptions, you aren't given much to care about and be involved in. The game is also surprisingly short, but that's probably because of the game mechanics. It's a nice concept, a bit sandbox-like with a light side of gestion. But it's detrimental to the plot. You're presented with lots of choices which sometimes lead to a small side story in which you encounter one of the characters. But be warned, it is mostly just smut (which I didn't know before playing) and ends up being very repetitive. There's not much of replayability despite the many achievements. Go for it if you just want something chill and light to read or if you just want to enjoy some smut. Don't expect more than that.