Chapter One: Introduction
I received a free copy of this game from Chaos Gate. They wrote,
“Succubus Heaven” is an erotic 3D rogue-lite action game where exorcist heroines challenge dungeons that have become dens of succubi. The game does not have a traditional health system; instead, players must manage unique resources such as arousal, corruption, and the durability of magical armor.
Chaos Gate had me at “rogue-lite action game”!
But they kept going,
While the game emphasizes adult content, the theme is “fighting with everything you’ve got, and being able to lose,” and it is designed with a somewhat challenging balance. We hope you enjoy the heroine’s experience of “submission and pleasure.”
I love lewd action RPGs. Although the graphics of Succubus Heaven didn’t suggest “high caliber”, I’m willing to forgive common Unity assets as long as they are used well. Just because you’ve seen characters from another game doesn’t damn a creation.
Chapter Two: Gameplay (3/5★)
Section One: Overview
Succubus Heaven is a rouge-like, action-RPG that plays like beat ’em up with an emphasis on resource management. By far, I spent the most time cycling between teammates and managing loot.
With twelve inventory slots to share between three characters, it’s a struggle to maintain precious, limited use items including weapons. Win or lose, every playthrough nets “Score”, unlocking new scenarios and modifiers to refresh gameplay. Either way, there’s so much sexual content a “loss” is hardly a set back.
Below, Nellie locks onto a “slug” and winds up an attack.
Section Two: Combat
Chaos Gate writes,
“The action system is simple, with basic “Normal Attacks,” high-damage but resource-consuming “Special Attacks,” and “Dodging” to evade enemy attacks.” (2)
“Simple” is an understatement.
Combat is as brain dead as mashing the mouse and running circles while waiting for your “fatigue” to restore. I never bothered with the finnicky dodge mechanic, but it’s there if you want to pretend Succubus Heaven has more combat depth than it actually does.
Where this game really shines is resource management.
Shown below is the third major boss fight. After being overwhelmed, I ran away to allow my teammates to draw aggression and take the brunt of damage.
Chaos Gate writes,
“You lead a party of three characters, progressing through dungeon rooms one by one, managing your resources carefully to reach the deepest floor.” (2)
This, this here is where the game really shines.
Potions and magical items have limited usages. Both are extremely rare, often having risks and side effects which must be taken into consideration. Most importantly, all items suffer from “degradation”, a mechanic shared by spells and weapons.
While all items can break, barring the rare curse of “Weathering” only spells and weapons must be monitored between teammates. Often, inventory management is struggle between necessity, and risk versus reward.
Below, I consume precious Holy Water.
Section Three: Balance
Maybe I’m just a pro-gamer. But I didn’t find a “somewhat challenging balance” (1) during my first playthrough. I blasted through the game in about two hours without seeing much of any adult content. I didn’t even know how to see a “game over”.
Fortunately, my first playthrough didn’t represent the trials of LOADOUTs, shown below.
Unlocked after beating the game once, LOADOUTs dramatically alter gameplay. If for some reason you found the game too difficult, “Excessive Support” and “Guidance of the Strange Sword” offer powerful gear from the get-go.
The rest of the LOADOUTs penalize players with restricted equipment, explosives, and an already damaged team up to near loss from the get-go.
“Hard Work” took me several attempts. . . with blessings.
Each playthrough, whether you complete the game or not grants “score”. Accumulating score unlocks “Curses” and “Blessings”. Curses increase the difficulty of the game in exchange for increased score, and Blessings have the opposite effect.
I enjoyed strategically mixing curses and blessings to maximize score and tailor gameplay to my playstyle. Below, I select a blessing to enhance gameplay.
Section Four: Controls
When I booted Succubus Heaven for the first time, Steam recommended I use a controller. I ignored the suggestion and opted for my keyboard instead. While playable with a keyboard and mouse, it’s a clunky compromise. Key bindings are not intuitive and inventory management is not drag-n’-drop.
By far, a controller is the best option for quality of life.
Although the default button bindings are strange, having my inventory bound to a d-pad and team switching to bumpers promotes rapid decisions in the heat of battle.
The only time I preferred a mouse and keyboard was outside of core gameplay; virtually every menu in the game is well suited for a keyboard and mouse.
Chapter Three: Sexual Content (4/5★)
Section One: Content
There are 8 “game overs” featuring an extended animation and narration. Each enemy has at least one grapple animation, offering at least 21 animations encountered in-game. Additionally, player characters can be found masturbating and giving birth to enemies.
Barring masturbation, there isn’t a single consenting sexual animation in the game.
Section Two: Implementation
Enemies may attempt to “restrain” and rape player characters. As clothing is torn from their bodies, a successful grapple will likely result in loss of virginity. To prevent penetration, each character has a limited “stamina”. When stamina is depleted, restraining will be “Hard to Resist”, preventing escape.
Shown below, I fail to avoid an aphrodisiac slime.
After being freed, I fall prey to a mat trap, exhausting what little fatigue I had regained. When a ghoul successfully grapples me, I trigger “Hard to Resist” once again and have a hard time escaping without help.
Additionally, there is a bare bones pregnancy mechanic. Slimes will impregnate party members if they successfully penetrate. Pregnancy causes characters to periodically stop in place due to “something [ . . . ] wriggling inside [the] womb.
Eventually, a hostile slime will spawn. Overall, the pregnancy mechanic is anticlimactic, but I like the wriggling mechanic. It creates organic, vulnerable moments for player characters to be approached and restrained.
Shown below, Nellie gives birth shortly after engaging a group of ghouls. Fortunately, my team was available to quickly dispatch the baby.
If your party is “Wiped Out”, one of eight “game overs” will play depending on story progression. Game overs are narrated sex-scenes with all party members.
I enjoy how they continue looping after the narration, allowing players as much time as they need to see what happens. However, most game overs are simply animations already encountered in-game.
Shown below, is a game over.
Section Three: Interactivity
Sexual animations are not interactive, unfortunately.
The “BATTLE GALLERY” allows players to load previously encountered enemies into a room with Nellie and her friends to view restraining animations at will. The battle gallery offers extensive customization, such as damage, sensitivity, and virginity. I loved “Gallery Mode Change”, a free camera mode allowing players to catch new views inaccessible in normally gameplay.
Below, I demonstrate the BATTLE GALLERY. I spawn a variety of enemies and fiddle with the camera and user-interface to showcase this mode’s usage.
Section Four: Quality
If you can get past censorship and the lackluster models, the animations are kind of hot. I enjoyed the consequences of loss, going so far to sabotage my teammates so I could watch them be fucked up at my leisure. I wish there were more grapples overall, although each enemy has two animations based on equipped clothing. Most of the time, my team wasn’t clothed, so clothed animations were sorely missing from my playthroughs.
Shown below, I launch a last stand against the arachnid boss fight. But I quickly run out of stamina and impurity, resulting in a wipe out.
Chapter Four: Story (2/5★)
Section Two: Plot
Nellie, Sera and Dorothy are magic warriors known as “exorcists” employed to rid a dungeon of a succubi. They threaten to corrupt inhabitants with “miasma”, a magic substance which drives all creatures into a horny frenzy. But the stakes go beyond the succubi — if allowed unabated, a new “age of the succubi” will begin, putting the world at stake.
Section Three: Characters
The playable characters are paper thin. Honestly — beyond the weapons they bring into combat, there is nothing remarkable about Nellie, the main protagonist, or her teammates, Sera and Dorothy.
They’re so unimportant to the actual narrative it makes no difference if one or the other completes the journey. In fact, there’s even unlockable settings that removes up to two characters from the party!
Section Three: Writing
It’s clear Succubus Heaven was translated. I didn’t have an issue following along the dialogue, but item effects are somewhat ambiguous.
Chapter Five: Sound (4/5★)
Section One: Soundtrack
The musical score of harmonies and foreboding pianos does the atmosphere right. It’s generic and repetitive, but non-offensive. At no point was I bothered by the music and elected to keep it playing.
Section Two: Sound Effects
Chaos Gate covered their ground on sound effects — literally! Stepping on different surfaces plays appropriate sound effects. Sure it’s unremarkable, but it shows an attention to detail a lot of developers can’t be bothered to program.
Everything that ought to have a sound effect has one; unlocking chests, throwing items, swooshing swords, magic spells and even echoes in enclosed spaces. In the following clip, I loot a treasure room to demonstrate.
Section Two: Voice Acting
All voice acting is in Japanese. I’m not familiar with Japanese, so I can’t confidently speak about the quality of voice acting.
But for the most part, dialogue between Nellie and her teammates felt monotone during combat. I enjoyed the antagonists’ voice acting, especially Succubus Arum. Her shrill, bratty voice voice acting was the most entertaining.
Although, that shrill, bratty voice acting may get on your nerves.
The shouts, moans and screams are entertaining. Listening to my teammates have their asses handed to them was a blast. . . even knowing who was next!
Shown below is a snippet of a cutscene.
Chapter Six: Visuals (3/5★)
Section One: Title Screen
While the title screen doesn’t exactly suggest “lewd”, but it’s artistically composed. The playable cast looks over the entry of the dungeon, although it’s disappointing to see Dorothy missing from the shot.
I don’t know why Chaos Gate bothered to show the Merchant when she has no significance in the story. At least the Gatekeeper, shown inside the entrance asks for help.
Shown below is the title screen.
Section Two: User Configuration
The “OPTION” menu is quite robust. From “GENERAL”, players can adjust language and sexual gameplay preferences. For example, “Futanariization” is a togglable setting. Bad endings and cutaway “Critical H Scenes” are both toggleable, welcome settings when you’re just trying to speed through unlocks.
Shown below is the “GENERAL” menu.
The “VIDEO” table offers an assortment of display preferences and a basic graphics toggle. I would have preferred a more in-depth graphical customization to maximize frames on lower-end hardware, but I guess potato PCs will have to settle for a three-sizes-fits-all selection.
Shown below is the “VIDEO” menu.
I was very impressed with the “AUDIO” panel. Not only are a wide variety of sound effects adjustable, so are the voices of all major characters. It’s great having so many options to tune in your hearing experience!
Shown below is the “AUDIO” menu.
The “CONTROL” panel offers preferences regarding the camera view and tracking, including mouse sensitivity. Just about anything can be rebinded via the “KEYBIND” menu, be it your keyboard, mouse or controller.
Shown below is the “CONTROL” menu.
Finally, the TOY SYNC menu allows users to connect to Intiface® Central to control sex toys. Each erogenous zone can be assigned to a specific sex toy connected to Intiface® Central, allowing you immerse yourself sexually as your character is violated in-game.
Shown below is the “TOY SYNC” menu.
Section Two: Navigation
Overall, the user-interface is serviceable, but it feels a little clunky. For example, there isn’t an easy way to navigate inventories. To rotate items between characters, you have to manually cycle between them and individually drop and pick up items. It’d be nice if every inventory could be brought up at once with say, drag-n’-drop support.
For the most part, the English translation is solid, but I regularly encountered inconsistent wording for gameplay mechanics.
In the following clip, I sort through loot and exchange a weapon with my teammate for repairs. As you can see, I have to swap between teammates for a clunky transfer.
Section Two: Graphics
Succubus Heaven was handed lemons and boy did they make lemonade! Using heavily modified assets from the Unity Assets Store, this game utilizes models and animations notoriously prevalent among shovel ware and asset flips to great effect.
With what they had, Chaos Gate did an incredible job creating arousing content. But at the end of the day, Succubus Heaven is graphically below average with boring, uninspired set designs.
Shown below is a rare “Treasure Room”. As you can seem, styles clash between each other, and models are anything between anime, stylized and realistic.
Chapter Seven: Verdict (3/5★)
I’m. . . pleasantly surprised?
Yes, this game is huge mixed bag but it’s a surprisingly fun button masher. Addictive, even — despite beating the game in under two hours, I found myself grinding for another five working my way towards unlockable content. In spite of its visuals, it does get a lot of things right. Succubus Heaven is unbalanced, it’s janky, it’s kinky and that’s exactly why I loved this game.
The price point is a bit steep, but for what amount of sexual content I understand. But I recommend picking up this game if you can look past the graphics and censorship.
Performance
My computer periodically vented heat at maximum settings, but less from actual stress and more so requiring some thermal management on my part.
System Specifications
I installed this software on a Windows 10 Pro machine with an Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-10900KF CPU @ 3.70GHz, an NVIDIA Geforce RTX 3090 and thirty-two gigabytes of RAM. The software was installed onto a Samsung SSD 870 QVO 8 TB drive.
Sources
[ 1 ] Chaos Gate, Steam Curator Connect (private communication), (date unknown).
[ 2 ] store.steampowered.com. (January 3rd, 2025). Succubus Heaven
[ 3 ]
