Back to Menu
I wanna take the time to talk about a little visual novel I just played on Itch.io that I really enjoyed.
The game is Victim Doll, made by Communistsister and published by Domino Club. Domino Club is a collective on Itch.io which publishes really interesting, creative and often erotic games. I've checked out a few projects published by them before, such as Cold Sweat, Erostasis, Cavity Girl Fucks and an essay called Good Writers are Perverts, and I really enjoy what they put out! I had Victim Doll saved in my collection so I could try it out when I had the time, and today I finally did!
This VN is a short, yet dark and intense story about a robot girl named Ines trying to survive by any means necessary, which includes taking on a variety of odd jobs around her city, with some of them involving extremely violent and dehumanizing sex work.
I must warn you right now that this post is just me talking about my experience with this game, so there will be heavy spoilers ahead. If you are curious about this game and want to try it out for yourself, then you can use the embed provided here and take some time to play it.
-------------------------------------
The game starts off with the robotic main character, Ines, waking up in the middle of the night in what appears to be a dumpster. She has no memory of her what happened prior to her waking up in such a state, and her body is severly damaged. The only instuctions she has to go off on are notes left by her "previous" self before whatever incident transpired which led up to this point.
Broken and falling apart, Ines rushes over to the Koen's mechanic shop immediately, where he keeps her for the night to repair her mashed-up body for free. During our stay, we learn that Ines and Khoe do know eachother and have a little "arrangement" in place, but of course we don't get all the details about it just yet. Ines then goes to her apartment, the only place she can call "home", only to realize that rent is due in 5 days and she needs to make $700 before she gets kicked out on the streets. Great.
Looking for quick ways to make easy cash, Ines looks for job opportunites through VTOM, a company she works with temporarily just to get by. We also learn that Ines used to be a model before the modelling agency she worked with went bankrupt. After working all day at a dead-end macaron factory only to gain just a measley $100 from it, Ines grows frustated and desperate. She turns back to sex work and looks through her potential clients. She has three to choose from.
The third one was the one I chose as it was the one that shocked me the most. It was Koen himself. He is one of Ines's clients.
At Koen's, he takes the time to be upfront about his feelings for Ines, wishing that she never had to live the tough life she does. He then offers to take her under his wing as a father figure. We also learn that Ines agreed to let Koen erase her memories after each session they have because it would be akward for the same mechanic who fixes her to be a client. They then have extremely violent and passionate sex in which Koen punches Ines in the stomach several times, breaks off her arm, stabs her in the navel and fucks her in the belly with a strapon. Hot!
This leads to one of two endings to the game, the "Father" ending, where Ines lives with Koen from now on as father and girl. From what I'm hearing, this is the more "heart-warming" ending to the game, as the other one is said to be more heart-wrenching. It's sweet in a way, but also has some darker, unsettling implications to it.
"Yesterday we were a person who hurts and a person who is hurting, now a girl who brings her dad coffee".
Man.....
-------------------------------------
So that was a quick rundown of the story and ending I got. Now I want to briefly dive more in to the writing, presentation and other little details.
The presentation of Victim Doll is so simple, but so effective. The main visuals presented are these dark, grimy, pixellated backgrounds of alleyways, the city and god-knows-where. The music is grungy and compressed sounding, like it's coming from some seedy underground rave. Erotic scenes are narrated with a pink background, gore scenes with a red background, and erotic gore scenes with a blinking red and pink background. There's also the calm piano music with the kitchen dream sequences which are so clean, pure, wholesome and peaceful, which contrast the cruel realities of the waking world in this story.
The writing is so good too. It's fast-paced and snappy, but never feels rushed. The "Cog" metaphor was especially impactful and really highlighted Ines's status as a misfit in her world. Everything comes together so beautifully to create a tragic, disgusting, beautiful and extremely sexy story that is as incredible as it is unmarketable (and I mean this in a good way).
Definitely don't sleep on Victim Doll. It's peak.