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Really fun game with tons of personality! Just finished what I now know to be slut mode and it was quite satisfying. 

You've got a rich, vivid world, and really have a knack for storytelling through small details with big implications. I particularly appreciated the cheeky quips coming from the boars and Mezz himself, along with the subtle touches from the ear clips. Together with the mechanic changes they carried off the tone-shift into submission convincingly, coherently, and with a depth that struck the perfect balance between menacing and inviting.

Mechanically everything is sound, and combat is fun with the right level of stakes. Playing Mezz's three bars off each other provides a flexibility in strategy that I'm looking forward to using for the normal end. 

Well done and very much worth it!

Just finished my first route --TJ's--which I was gonna say happened by accident since this is just my second ever VN, but I get the sense there aren't many true accidents in Echo. 

*Spoilers Ahead*

I don't have many regrets, if at all. In hindsight, I can see how my instincts to protect TJ at *all* costs led to Chase doing exactly that. What I didn't count on was the town counting on that, and so here I thought I was the player when I was getting played. Very well done, and hauntingly reflective. 

It's a shame what happened to Flynn, but given the influence of the supernatural, it was nothing (too) personal. Chase gave him what he asked for; shame it wasn't what he wanted. This does seem to be the route that gives Flynn the most closure, though, compared to what the other comments are saying about his own route at least.  

It was also a fascinating portrait of an otter as a predator animal, which is something it seems we don't see as often, even though they do fill that role IRL.

To me, the true horror of TJ's route comes from what's left unsaid but almost certainly will happen after the end: (1) the hysteria apparently gets delayed by two years after the end of TJ's route (Flynn dies in 2015, epilogue notes hysteria that was the final blow for the town happened in 2017?) so this means Jenna, TJ, and  Chase aren't likely to be there to save Carl and Leo, who presumably then die isolated in the ensuing chaos; and (2) if Chase continues as he was with TJ then he'll likely end up killing the object of his affection, TJ (similar to what seems to be Leo's "bad ending" per the other comments). It's pretty clear Chase is the source of most of TJ's trauma, at least as the avatar of the town's intentions towards the lynx/the rest of the group, so even if TJ facilely reciprocated Chase's affections, it would still strike me as a case of really unhealthy attachment behavior on a lot of axes. Eventually the lynx would try to leave (or a paranoid Chase would perceive his behavior as such), and for his (TJ's and/or Chase's) "own good" the otter would likely attempt to kill the lynx, and would probably succeed.

All that said, this hurt real good. The kind of knife you keep wanting to walk into. Impressively done!

PS: I never quite trusted Julian. I kept being worried he was possessed like Janice, but I'm not so sure he ever was. It seems the town still managed to use those two to make me perceive threats to TJ, specifically, and therefore become even more protective of him. I mention it because it caught me blindsighted and I only realized it hours after the route was done. But what was the deal with Janice and Julian?