Black Incense blends adult RPG and visual novel play from Himeros Studios, built in Ren'Py with 2D CG and AI CG art. It places a 19-year-old university student in modern London, where a chance encounter reveals hidden occult societies, political intrigue, and forbidden desire. Players use branching choices, character creation, and consequence-driven decisions to shape her personality, relationships, and power structures. Romance, corruption, and cheating are among its adult themes. The prologue includes more than 100,000 words of dialogue, 200-plus custom artworks, and 30 unlockable scenes.
The current build is S01E01, released on December 29, 2025, as an ongoing Season One episode. It runs on Windows, Linux, and Mac in English, with uncensored adult content. Season One Episode One Hotfix 2 fixes incorrect stat tooltips for certain prologue choices, looping audio, missing or misplaced emotion overlays, a manifestation tooltip position, and save/load screen memory. Because of save/load code corrections, saves may not transfer automatically once, though players can manually copy old saves.
Developer's description
Black Incense is an adult RPG and visual novel set in modern-day London. You play as a 19-year-old university student whose ordinary life begins to splinter after a chance encounter exposes the hidden world beneath the city, a network of occult societies, political intrigue, and forbidden desire.
Across a branching narrative filled with choice, consequence, and temptation, you will define who she becomes and what she is willing to sacrifice. Every decision shapes her personality, her relationships, and the power structures around her. The prologue already includes over 100,000 words of dialogue, more than 200 pieces of custom artwork, and 30 unlockable scenes as you shape her life up until the start of the story, a complete, self-contained introduction to the game’s depth and ambition.
Season One Episode One Hotfix 2
Note: Saves may not automatically carry over for this hotfix due to certain fixes I had to make to the save/load code. This is a one time issue, future releases will have saves carried over as normal. You can manually copy your old saves into the new folder if you wish.
Fixing incorrect tooltips indicating stat changes for certain prologue choices
Fixing issues with audio looping
Fixing issues with certain emotion overlays not being found
Fixing issues with Molly's emotion overlay appearing in the wrong place when encountering the Watcher
Fixing the manifestation tooltip appearing off the edge of the screen in the character stats screen
Fixing issues with the save/load screen not remembering the last screen you were on
Fixed issues where cryptics was sometimes referred to as analytics causing confusion in game.
Fixed an issue where if you slept with Yuri and Moshe the fantasising option later in game gave the solo Yuri option instead
Season One Episode One Hotfix 1
Fixed issue with the floating Molly face when leaving the Dawnfellows HQ
Fixed issue with some narration appearing as the name of the narrator whilst in the backrooms of Dawnfellows HQ
Added six new achievements into the game including unlockable tarot artwork
Added tooltips for all achievements in game that give more of a hint on how to unlock them when locked, and explain how they were unlocked once they are unlocked
Updated the music - there are now three brand new extended tracks for the prologue, S1E1, and nsfw scenes, that come in at 1hr20 minutes of new/non repeated music in total.
Season One Episode One
Play the first episode of Season One of Black Incense
Begin Molly's descent into a strange new world
Over 75,000 words of new dialogue (so 175,000 in total so far)
75 new images
Prologue Hotfix
The Nat first time sex scene (unlocked if Molly goes to Northgate High and is in the rebel clique) crash caused by a missing character definition has been fixed.
The character log will now update from non-smoker to social smoker as intended if Molly chooses to accept a cigarette from Esme after successfully hiding the cigarettes from Mrs Poulton.
The line starting "The day Josh leaves for Leeds..." now does not repeat for players who chose a Libra star sign.
Tooltip boxes should now disappear once an option is selected - they were lingering on some screens before this.
I have edited the archetype selection screen slightly so the player has a chance to see their stats for the three premade archetypes before any dialogue box appears asking if they are content with their choice.
Changed one mismatched variable check in the Alps gap year branch where the game looked for lower class instead of working class.
Molly now has both her legs (!) in the image of her and Josh in the cocktail bar.
Prologue
Play MC’s life through to the start of the game
Over 100,000 words of dialogue
Multiple branching choices
Character Creation
30 unique sex scenes
Over 200 pieces of unique art
Player reviews
Player rating5.0 / 5 · 10 ratings
Written reviews10 · avg 4.0★
Positive (4–5★)70%
Latest review2025-12-27
What players say
Most reviews praise the writing and customization despite criticism of AI art and pacing.
5★6
4★1
3★1
2★1
1★1
Players like
Strong writing and engaging story setup
RPG choices and customization are praised
Adult themes and player choices appeal
AI-generated art is praised by some
Common complaints
AI art often looks unnatural or inconsistent
Writing can be verbose and pacing feels slow
Some adult content feels unavoidable or off-putting
Best for players who enjoy story-focused adult games with customization and RPG mechanics.
Summarised from 10 written player reviews.
Wilwock2025-12-27★★★★★
Extremely promising start, although I think the writing is overly verbose at times. I especially like the potential for cheating content. Hopefully this game gets a lot of attention and updates. Good luck to the dev.
FollowBobb2025-12-25★★★★★
Slop all the way down. From art unchecked for frequent jarring errors (in addition to everything being yellow, everybody has huge mouths with demon teeth, eyes looking different directions, and changes hair and clothing color between images), to writing you…
MyNutella2025-12-22★★★★★
Nice example of how to properly use AI illustrations. It is intruiguing how all the stats are going to influence the story after the prologue. If there were soft animations too it would a 10/10. Can't wait for next udpdates…