itch.io

>I certainly wouldn't want to add any Mary Sue stuff, because that would be bad writing.

Mary Sue stuff isn't bad writing per se, it depends less on the nature of the character and more about the writing of the story for it to be bad writing, i'm almost sure that all shonen protagonist are Mary Sues, Goku never grows, Naruto was chosen for greatness since he was born, Saitama whatever, Seiya whatever, etc, yet Dragon Ball, Naruto, Saint Seiya and One Punch Man are quite popular for some reason (Not a big fan of shonen, but i'm sure that the reason aren't the main characters, but the world around them, there are a lot of mangas that will never reach the popularity of those above even if they have similar main characters because they can't simply replicate the world building without getting sued).

He's talking about the player, ¿Got nothing? Here's a business, ¿Have no idea of how to manage that business? Here's someone to do it for you (Btw, she's hot and is into you), ¿Are you polygamous? Everyone else here is too, and they are hot and into you.

(He's a Mary Sue by definition, but doesn't counts because he isn't a character).

That said, Mary Sue traits can be found in almost every character in the game (Mostly because of the nature of the game), 

The elf: ¿Are you a slave in a world of shit where your kind is used and disposed of without consequences nor regrets? Don't worry, you will have masters that won't do as much as even scar your pretty skin and will go to lose your virginity with the person you love(? who will also listen to your dangerous ideas that could strip him of his life, and who will believe in you even after failure because dying and dragging everyone around him to their death or imprisonment isn't as important as saving you from a world of pain that so far hasn't even scratched you (The player here comes as the biggest piece of shit, no doubt that Autumn, the twins and the poor bartender at some point will also bet their lives for the little elf, but until that point the hotel is being the cover of a super risky operation that could throw all of its inhabitants and employees into reeducation camps with them not even knowing why).

Ashley: ¿Are you a little useless self absorbed kid with shitty parents and no talent whatsoever? Don't worry you can threaten your bad parents with a knife, steal from them and live off of them without repercussions (Like being thrown in jail) and when living off your parents is no longer an option, don't worry, you didn't need money all along, the guy you raped, drugged/tried to drug and almost dragged into issues with the police due to your reckless behavior will now look after you, btw, everyone likes you and the ones that don't are just jealous.

Nice job with Maria, worked hard without results, lived a life that wasn't hers to begin with and went into more than one depressive episode as her world came crashing over her twice (Within the game, bet that there were some more before it began), pretty human and the flaws associated to a super expensive and rare creature being bought in an AUCTION by some broke hotel's manager is part of the flawed system around the game is build in, you can't fail because if you fail the story is lost.

Android: Doesn't counts, your creator intended you to be flawed, so you are flawed, your system knows of your flaws and doesn't like your flaws, but can't just crash (like Windows) because you are somewhat sentient and can overwrite such attempts, also you can dump your memory and do repartitions of yourself, but that's what your system dictates you should do.

The twins, ¿Are they even characters? ¿See the person you have been mean to, the one that pulled a knife to you? Well, you are now living in the same place, and don't worry, pulling knifes or telling his now boyfriend(? to kick you out to preserve her own mental health (Which doesn't seems to be good) isn't something she would do, not even after being victim of your blackmail and abuses, also, ¿See your dad? The very controlling guy that doesn't accept nothing but perfection from you, instead of forcing you into confinement to fix your behavior (Like he apparently has done before) he will let you two off the hook and not interfere with you, not even after he starts getting blackmailed into doing stuff that go according to what you want him to do (It wouldn't take much to put the blame of the blackmail on the twins, regardless of if it was them or not), also, you don't need money either because of bananas, (The best beginning for the twins is to not progress in Ashley Story until after they join the hotel, but that only works as a beginning because went the player encounters them in the school it's like they don't know him at all).

Autumn: Doesn't counts, i don't get Autumn, ¿How ignorant is Autumn supposed to be? Hard to judge her as a character when she seems to be so far removed from everything else, Autumn story feels like it is in a whole different world than the rest.

Kali: I'm almost sure that she has the same or more content than the elf, yet she's so bland that really nothing sticks, she's an Ashley, but by choice, and everyone is happy with it, really smart with a big future that throws it all away due to laziness, but wait a moment, everything comes back again to her because of reasons and she isn't lazy anymore and everything works out or something, Kali is tasteless bread, the elf has the slavery, Maria has her struggles, Ashley has her shitty parents, don't really know about the android, the twins or autumn, but by default they are more interesting that Kale because one is an Android, the other are a couple of characters which stories evolve together and the last one is a religious zealot, by default they are more interesting that i had a perfect life which i did throw away and now it is back, Kali is lame, the best bits of Kali come as part of someone's else story and that does her no favors as a character.

You are able to tell a story because your characters can't know failure (Except for Maria) since they don't have anything else outside of that story in which they could fail without it stopping the story, if Lin losses the support of the main casts, the story is done (We know that everyone will always be on board with little Lin's plans because if they are not the hotel would fall apart and Lin has no other aspirations in which she could fail), if Ashley gets sent to a mental hospital, the story is done (We know that Ashley mental issues will banish alone and be lost with no actual treatment because treating them would remove Ashley from the story and that won't happen, reason why i liked Maria/Android being actually removed, even if briefly to deal with their shit), if the twins are taken by their parent, the story is done, if Android doesn't fix its shit, the story is done, don't really know about Autumn, again, Autumn seems to be really disconnected from what appears to be the main story, she could move out of the other because she wants to be a full time nun or something like that and so far doesn't seems like the story would stop because of that, same applies to Kali (specially with the introduction of elf-Kali, just as smart and way more interesting), Maria will probably be in deep shit again at some point (Being bait seems to be risky), but we all know that if the player or Maria are killed while playing spy the story would be done, so it will work out.

I'm not complaining about the Mary Sue thing, don't get me wrong. I get that he's a self insert. I just mean he's got no history besides being an immigrant from another country with no family to speak of besides a grandfather who owned a hotel. Despite this, every nubile woman he meets finds him super interesting and attractive and wants to have sex with him. He might as well be Isabella Swan from Twilight.

However, as I said before, I'm not complaining about it. I'm not even marking you down for it. People don't play Half-Life because Gordon Freeman is super interesting.

It's the encounters your protagonist has with interesting, complex people, in a dystopian society on the brink of a civil rights revolution that makes this game interesting.

As for my gripe about sex scenes, maybe I'm just bothered that there's not enough variation in positions in repeatable sex scenes, although I like that anal is optional. Not kink shaming, but massive turn off for me.

All in all, easily the best Ren'Py visual novel I've ever played.