Babes Network.com (0)
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| Status: |
Current Member for less than 1 month (at the time of review).
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| Pros: |
+ Exclusive content that updates 5x a week.
+ Good $10, 30 day membership through TBP.
+ Great 2500 x 1700 pics with zips and true 1080 HD vids with good download speeds. 4 DL options for vids including mobile device sized. Also streaming available with good speeds and ability to jump within a scene.
+ Smallish watermarks
+ Attractive girls (18 - 30 range) with few "enhancements". A good mix between porn stars and more unknowns, at least to me.
+ A unique site in terms of the artistic and hardcore factors it tries to combine.
+ A good mix of content (about 40% HC, 40% solo, and 20% lez).
+ User ratings and comments sections and social media connections. |
| Cons: |
- Tags / search engine is poor.
- Navigation needs an overhaul.
- Some ads on main page and when logging in.
- Prechecked cross sale on signup.
- The "artistic" feel the site is trying to convey gets lost with bad lighting, bad composition and iffy camera / cropping work.
- Very few positions shown for all scenes.
- Has a model directory but with very little info.
- You get timed out somewhat quickly and there are capcha's every time you log in.
- A fair amount of photoshopping and post production effects going on.
- More complicated than usual cancellation process. Web based cancel system doesn't seem to work (call or use email -- aka: don't wait until the end before trying to cancel). Also, must cancel at least 7 days before end of 30 days to keep from getting rebilled. |
| Bottom Line: |
This is my first voyage into the world of "heartcore" / "lovecore" figuring it looked like it had great quality and would be something different. True, it was different. You won't find anal, dp's, gagging and the like here which is fine by me. I'd like to think that years of overexposure to gonzo porn and too much degrading porn (sort of the default it seems) has made me so jaded to my inner sensitive new age guy. However, even using that standard of measure this site just didn't seem to add up for me. Here's the lowdown:
PICS: The setup looked good. Site has about 125 HC, 56 lez, and 106 solo sets (all have 100 or more pics) and the pics are quite large with zips. However, it quickly broke down. When viewing in browser, the default setting is for a slideshow but you can click to a thumbnail layout. If you click on a thumbnail and go back a page you get the slideshow again. Way too much clicking. You can only view the full sized pics by DL'ing the zips; the inbrowser view is only 800x550. Additionally, you can't even see all the thumbnails and the way the thumbnails are laid out (horizontal as opposed to the usual vertical) you have to use their in browser "forward arrow" which is clunky at best.
There are several photographers working here and most seem to be too damn artsy for their own good. Lots of scenes use natural lighting which results in dark pics and lots of shadows. Also the default seems to be to have the camera in a fixed position which limits the angles and views we're used to seeing.
For hardcore, there is a big focus on foreplay which results in only about 2 positions for actual sex. Given that the camera seems trapped in a fixed position for many scenes the result is that it often feels like your watching a scene from some 1980's Hustler where they couldn't show actual penetration, you just sorta know they're doing it. The lack of positions comes across in the lez and solo stuff too. I guess I like more variety as opposed to just soaking in what's in front of me.
While you get about a lot of pics per set, most of it seems to be a mosaic masterclass - here's a pose but in one frame you get a head, another the torso, another a leg, here's another with some artistic blurriness, etc. The vids are better in this respect but it does gets frustrating regarding the pics. I guess when I think artsy I think of some originality and professional output. A lot of these scenes feel more like someone who knows photography but hasn't shot porn before and isn't quite up to it.
VIDS: About 130 HC, 120 solo, and 60 lez. In browser stream works great and the HD is real HD which looks great ... meaning it's only as great as the way the scene was shot. My main complaint with the vids is their composition and artsy feel which is mostly identical to the issues I outlined in the "pics" section above. A lot of the vids have music in the beginning, some music go throughout.
NAV: Yet another site that built a navigation system when they were small and it no longer works for beans once they've grown. I already groused about the in browser pic issues. The scenes have tags but they are limited. If you search under tags, say "brunette", you'll get a result saying there are 182 scenes. However, it will only bring up 30: there is no way I can see to show them all. The tags are too few (some scenes are mistagged too) and too generic given the number of scenes they have.
If you poke around under their 3 general categories of HC, solo, and lez you'll find that recent updates aren't included. The only way to look at everything is to go through every page of updates - which only lets you jump back or ahead a few pages at a time.
I give this site an 82 because of the quality, the amount of content and the hot girls. However, for me they missed the boat on what they were trying to achieve. This is not porn for women since the focus seems mostly centered on the girls and there is no real talking or kissing-centric theme and the HC ends with a body or facial cumshot. The softer artistic side of porn put forth here seems to get washed over by the crop / framing jobs, low lighting and one position camera angles in many scenes. Those who like artsy porn may be interested in this but I think that for most the HC isn't the hardcore we're used to seeing (and not just the gonzo / rough sex stuff, just the composition in general). The softcore / lez stuff with an artsy feel is done much better by places like HegreArt, MetArt and the like.
I guess I went into this with my hopes set a bit too high. I think this site would work best for someone who digs softcore and art photography and might be looking to try some hardcore. If, like me, you have more of a hardcore background then you're more likely to walk away disappointed. |
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