Don't Trust Him

Don't Trust Him from ArtisticVillain wraps a deceptively dark premise in the guise of a light romance setup. You wake aboard a pirate ship with no memory, rescued by four conventionally attractive crew members, and begin the familiar rhythm of visual novel dating: conversations, choices, and the slow unraveling of affection. Except the game's title isn't ironic—something genuinely unsettling lurks beneath the banter.

The core mechanic balances traditional dating-sim relationship-building against a growing sense of dread. As you spend time with each love interest, pursuing multiple narrative paths and endings, details accumulate that feel increasingly wrong. ArtisticVillain layers horror elements into what could have been a straightforward romance, creating friction between the cozy dating-sim framework and the thriller undercurrent. You're expected to question the crew's intentions, the gaps in your own history, and whether romance here is genuine connection or something far more sinister. The game includes blood, violence, and explicit intimate scenes, but frames them within this uneasy tonal space rather than as separate "adult content" beats.

The visual presentation leans into this duality: abundant CG art rendered in an appealing style, but framed by text and choices that constantly nudge you toward paranoia. You can customize your protagonist, giving some agency to how you navigate these relationships. Multiple endings and the promise of future updates suggest ArtisticVillain intends to expand the conspiracy further. Note that the game is still in development (version 2.1), so some story threads may remain unresolved.