@Caribdis I did add an additional paragraph marked with “[Spoiler]”, not knowing you’d replied already. I know it’s a lot, but I was still processing my thoughts a bit.
BrainJammer
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A member registered May 14, 2022
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I expected a story-deprived harem game and got probably the best VN I'd ever played. It made me laugh more than any other game had, and it managed to pull on my heartstrings pretty heavily, particularly at the end. The music and imagery were beautiful.
[Spoiler] I only loved one character romantically, Lauren. Watching her grab my hand at the pier and look into my eyes lovingly made me melt and tear up. I’d have wanted to be with only her but having impregnated 6 other women, I was relieved that I could have them all. It did require too much suspension of disbelief, though, to accept that I alone could satisfy 7 girls without anyone feeling neglected. I did try getting monogamous with Lauren at some point in the story, but watching Oli take Judie and Iris for a drink made me go back and decide to lie to Judie that I loved her romantically as someone else would do worse to her otherwise. And I realised that I had to snag all the other women too for giving them the best outcomes. So as a romantic I was a bit disappointed with that predicament, although I still enjoyed the harem ending.
The only major downside was something that I find in almost every VN - having to be calculative in your decision-making to achieve certain outcomes or a certain ending. It takes you out of the story - and there's no way around that. You end up either needing a walkthrough (which can be found easily for free with a search), or you end up needing to keep replaying parts of the story and redoing choices until you get the outcome that you desire. Trick questions, dead-ends, game-overs, etc don't hold much value if the player simply rejects those experiences and goes back in time to steer clear of them. I do like puzzle games and skill-based games that assault you with failure until the end of time, but definitely not in VNs (although in certain minigames within the story it could be fine).
My suggestion would be to use choice as a mechanism to understand the player, i.e. preferred character interactions/relationships, personality traits like power-hungry or otherwise, creepy or otherwise, etc - and serve outcomes and endings accordingly. Or just create an alternate playing mode that adds transparency to what choices take you where exactly, for those who hate being taken out of the story.
I almost never take time to complain about a game, but this one was incredible. It was so good that minor frustrations stood out way more. I loved the experience and felt bummed out having to leave the game behind after seeing some of the endings.
I'll definitely buy all future games.