Finally got around to trying this out and I gotta say, it's coming together quite nicely. Images are always a plus -- if for no other reason than adding another element of stimulation to the senses -- but the UI & writing are clean and effective enough to not really necessitate it. Despite the polish I can definitely see this is the first time you've done something as big as this -- which isn't a downside, obviously, because everyone has to do something for the first time.
I think the biggest mechanical pacing issue (how the game feels to play) right now is how Liana is implemented -- the timing feels really off for how the events are supposed to play out with the scheduling. She's unlocked a little too late in Kiara's storyline to be done simultaneously with Blair & Kiara -- and her events are actually kind of annoying and hard to find IMO. There's the obvious, 'there are waaaaay too many clicks-to-porn'ration problem, but given the way you've implemented fulls schedules with varied events per level of control, I'm not sure there's an elegant way to solve that problem. Cracking up the points gained per event simply encourages players to go to the next level without seeing all of the content -- I suppose the goal would be to get a player to the point where they can do each level in a week if they're playing vaguely optimally? On the other hand, as more characters are introduced and the 'finished content' line gets pushed back, this could be alleviated and feel like there's less of a 'right path to follow.'
Alternatively, you could implement some sort of dream-replay feature where, once you've crossed the threshold into the next level, you can go back and see any scenes you've 'missed.' It seems like it might be irritating to implement though, so I'm just spitballing ideas at how to keep people engaged while also not overly worried about missing content.
I really like the shiny, functional schedules. It's very good, especially for a first attempt. Like I said -- there's a huge amount of polish here that's quite impressive.
I'll say that the variety of characterizations in the story feels increasingly odd as things progress deeper and deeper into the plot. You, essentially, mindwhammy bitchy-cheerleader Blaire into being an obsessed 50s tradwife who will let you do whatever you want with her and others in the course of ~two months. At the same time, you're getting constantly 1up'd by your spunky tomboy childhood friend and the MC doesn't really seem to display much annoyance or distress at her potentially building a mind control device that can control him. Even if he implicitly trusts her, that's kind of a Big Deal(tm) story wise.
There's also, I think, a pacing problem independent of characterization. Kiara goes from some unnamed, unexplained serious sexual frustration and inability to orgasm --> cooming her brains out in the bathroom after being next to you for an hour or two after very little tweaking. It's pretty jarring, especially when it takes Blaire about 3 adjustments to show any serious results. It makes it unclear exactly what and how powerful what you're doing is. Implicitly, a willing subject is going to see faster results, but that's never explicitly stated as far as I'm aware and it also muddles what exactly K's storyline is supposed to be. If she's intended to be a long-running character in the narrative -- as she's definitely being set up to be -- then having her inability to orgasm solved so quickly really makes it confusing as to where her arc is going. Not in a good, mysterious ways of intriguing possibility, but in a 'well this character is kind of uninteresting now' sort of way.
Like, she's obviously set up a Sheego to your (competent) Drakon, but I think drawing out the process of 'fixing' her would make things a lot more interesting and would also allow the MC to more believably shape her personality -- which as I understand it, is one of the main draws of Mind Control as a fetish. Pushing her to get off at being more controlling and confident is the 'Partner' route, and pushing her to get off on being your devotee and subordinate is the 'sidekick' route. Drawing them out over the span of a few 'levels' make the changes to her character flow more smoothly as a narrative, and also fixes a fundamental problem with her character seeming too immediately willful, which I'll dig more into in the next section.
Further, I think some discomfort induced by the fragmented characterization has a lot to do with how self-contained the three current plot threads are. You have Blaire, who is essentially acting as a test-case, in one route getting her brain pretty mushed (outwardly, by all appearances, doing a serious 180 in personality) into being your sweet gf/housewife. This is happening concurrently with the Kiara plotline, who is a lot more personally cautions, but surely knows exactly what you're doing with Blaire just from observation. MC doesn't take any particular steps to conceal what he's doing, and if anything kind of flaunts it. It's unlikely to trigger, like, a police investigation or whatever, but Kiara would almost certainly know what's going on. She doesn't raise any particular concerns about what you're doing, even when a plausible excuse goes from, 'yeah I'm just trying to make her chill out' to saying that she's 'essentially being turned into my mind-controlled loveslave.' The MC knows the rules of hypnosis, but Kiara certainly doesn't, and I don't think anyone even tells her the 'can't make people do things they wouldn't want to' rule. Of course, even Sam admits that with enough time, you can make anyone want to do anything, so it's not much of a rule to begin with.
Kiara, on the other hand, also doesn't seem to be particularly interested in losing meaningful amounts of agency, because much of her plotline is actually her dabbing on you and your expectations of being able to covertly control her (she has a hatchet!). I mean, maybe the big reveal is that she also wants to slip totally under your sway, but frankly it really doesn't seem like that's the case given her independent and project driven personality -- she wants to be either the partner or the sidekick. Furthermore, that reveal is already kind of done with Blaire, and Kiara is much more obviously into the MC which makes it even weaker as a dramatic flourish. Kiara is watching you essentially reduce one of the most willful and independent people at the school into being lovey-dovey brainmush and this should, at least, get some discussion or concern from her. She's clearly a fetishist, but this is the ol' "characters are written too convincingly as real characters to not be somewhat concerned about the implications of this fetish" problem.
I mean, it's also easy to play this as an 'us vs them' mentality with her. She sees you going around doing 'bad' things (or, more likely, things which have elements that she would prefer not to happen to her), but knows that she's on your side and you're her friend who would never do that to her. Even, despite, you know, that you actually did try to do that to her and she caught you. The whole thing is just somewhat narratively... loose. It's squeaking. Now, obviously, this is a dumb superhero porn story, some some allowances can certainly be made for brushing over characterization to get to the fun stuff. But there's already enough non-porn writing that those elemesnts are going to be integral to the enjoyment of the story -- and Kiara's personality is simply somewhat scattershot.
Which is all to say -- I don't want to make the complaint sound as if K is too domineering, because she's not. This is a fetish that is in large parts about power, so it make perfect sense to have people represent various levels on the spectrum of what actual people can comfortable with. It seems like the niche you want K to fill is something of a power-sub or, alternatively, an equal partner in crime who enjoy the side benefits of being a coomer through someone who can make you feel euphoric. I propose that you probably shouldn't give us a choice in her characterization.
Because right now it doesn't really feel like she can or should be a sidekick given her personality and the influence she exerts on things. Unless her next arc, as a sidekick, is literally all about tamping down on her independence and willfulness, it's always going to seem like she's disposed to be a bit more controlling in her role as second fiddle than that title would imply, even if she's nominally okay with the state of things because it's getting her off. Which -- hey, if you want to make that be the centerpiece of the drama, that's a perfectly fun kind of drama to have@ Paranoia about your competent secondhand being the real leader? Great stuff! But it doesn't seem, at all the kind of story that you're writing which just makes it feel jarring instead of interesting. Kiara, as a character, needs to be spaced out a bit better. Either take the choice away and let K be K, or you're going to have to put some work in by making two pretty distinct character arcs where she actually becomes a sub or grows with you into a dom over a longer period of time.
Lastly, we have Prism. Is Prism not going to notice the really hot girl who just happened to move in with you? I mean, a few lines to Blaire about keeping this all under wraps are warranted, but it seems hard to believe that Prism isn't going to get a little suspicious once you really start putting your moves to work on other characters. Maybe this is currently an 'in development' problem of Prism simply not being fleshed out enough to fall under the MC's sway faster because her content isn't here, but I think it's just adding more to the pile-up of out of sync characterizations and implications.
My point is that having all of these things happening independently might end up straining credulity if things advance too quickly. Understandably Blaire seems like the test-case for both the player and the developer. However, she might end up generating cracks in the narrative if something isn't done once you've firmly established her existence as your weirdly devoted 50s larping waifu. Obviously, the FWB can pretty neatly avoid detection -- but I feel like the final step of adding her to your harem requires some sort of narrative force to really make it fit in.
Of course, that's probably a shitload of work to do to integrate characters with increasingly complex as more characters emerge into the story! Still, I think that a bit more thought should be put into placing all of these characters together; as it stands, it feels like they're all separate routes in VN that happen to be occupying a sandbox instead. Perhaps this is simply an intractable problem of not wanting to use too much developmental resources on an increasing complex and interlocking set of characters, that's up for you to decide what's most fun with working on your leisure project.
Not, of course, to sound overly negative! The writing and banter is mostly good, and it seems like you've got an idea of the overarching plot. There will be some obvious growing pains in execution and planning, especially for a first project, but overall this is a fantastic showing! Bravo! I hope that at least some of this critique is helpful or thought provoking. I really do like the schema you've laid out.
PS. Sam kind of shows up too much. I get that he's your mentor, but it seems like he shows up in literally every scene where you do something. He's a fun character so it's not really a bad thing, but the MC being a total black-slate is made a lot worse by any chance of being introspective and establishing a character being immediately cut off by Sam monologue him. If you intend for the MC to be an anime-ish self insert, then Sam's presence sort of works in your favor here. However, his constant presence in the 'meat' of the mind control scenes, where you're actually making changes to people, takes away from some of the intimacy and eroticism. Like, if Tony Stark kept showing up to clap Peter on the back and dispense advice in some theoretical spider-man porn fiction. It takes away from the moment, ya know?
pps. holy shit that was so much longer than i intended it to be
