Hello again! Thanks a lot for the comprehensive review—I'm definitely not going to delete it! 🙂
I was surprised myself that I never uploaded the demo version here. It's probably because I've never had much traction on itch.io, so I didn't bother. The alpha version I have uploaded here is pretty much the same thing as the demo, I think.
The summary works as intended then—I added it precisely to inform the player that they might have missed something. Amusingly, almost all my game testers saw the "Jenna didn't come to sleep with you" notification and replayed the first day. 😄 That romance is meant to be kinda like Sonya's in Dreamwalker—you probably aren't going to unlock it unless you actively try to. Sonya's is still more difficult, though.
Your comments about Alex gave me an idea—perhaps I should write a flashback scene about how he came to know the group. Funnily enough, out of all of them, he's the character that's most based on reality. I used to be a full-on metalhead myself, and went to a lot of metal festivals and gigs... Alex is like a combination of all the people I came to know there.
I've used the delayed relationship change mechanic in multiple scenes now. I even went a step further with a choice that damages your relationship with someone initially, but later, when they've had time to think, they apologize, and you end up gaining more points than you lost. I hope this encourages players to pick what they actually want to say or do, rather than trying to min-max. Of course, that depends on whether they realize this is a thing.
Good point about the cover image, it might be a good idea to revise that before launch. I also forgot that I needed to make a night time version of that one scene background, whoops!
I don't have a set release date yet. I've changed my plan for where the story is going a couple of times now (in ways that still work with the foreshadowing I've done). I usually write knowing the major events that are going to happen, but between them the characters just live their lives, and sometimes surprise even myself. I've also had some really wild ideas recently, both plot-wise and in the way the game operates, but I'll have to decide if they are something I actually want to implement.
- JayzonBH