On the psychological side of things, Jason and Tori's explanation of dominant and submissive behavior is quite realistic and accurate. They are not talking about hardcore domination and submission here. They are talking about a person's inner balance and the back and forth of personal roles each person plays in their lives. Nobody is entirely dominant or submissive. Using the example they provided of who is leading the sexual activity at the moment is a good way to see that. But we are really talking about semantics here.
They are not talking about the BDSM standpoint, dom/sub play...the Kink. On the high confidence path, Tori clearly states that neither she nor Jason are into that. Instead, Tori encouraged Steph to get in touch with and flirt with her innermost feelings at the moment. Trying to not be judgmental of herself. Allowing feelings of jealousy and desire to feed the sexual fire. Welcome the need to be both submissive and dominant. On the low-confidence path, we see a complete reversal of this stance and Steph's behavior. Instead, the developers tap directly into the sadomasochistic aspect of cuckoldry, dom/sub play, and sex in general. While the alternate paths and the remaining scenes with Tori and Jason are not fully implemented yet, the player still has the ability to back out of any of the previous decisions. This is a very welcome change and I would love to see more visual novels adapt this into their mechanics.
The added Gina scene appears to be unfinished. We get to see the result of the high-confidence path where the MC remains faithful and the dream sequence gives the player something to think about. The next update will certainly fill in the remaining paths. If I had to speculate, the MC has the chance to "visit" her on one path and Steph will "visit" her on the other.
I also truly enjoyed seeing the different versions of Tori. With high confidence, Tori sees the MC and Steph as equals and future swinging partners. There is a stark and welcome contrast between the high-confidence and low-confidence Tori. The player gets to see how she protects herself, her husband, and their relationship by telling the MC she is not interested in continuing a mutual relationship among the four. And yet another path where she clearly states that the MC has been manipulated for his own sexual satisfaction and desire to become a cuckold and watch Jason and Steph together. It is quite extraordinary to see a visual novel pay tribute to this lifestyle with maturity and the psychological complexity involved.
I agree with you that on the psychological side, that part and dialogue was well done.
And that just makes me angrier at how it actually plays out! Because at the end of the day, it's all
bullshit. (ofc everyones entitled to their opinion) You mentioned seeing the variations of Tori - but I hated how cold she was with the mc on
all paths. You can be on the dom4 or dom5 path, and they still talk to you like a child ala "If you're uncomfortable, that's okay....."
When you mention different variations, there's no symmetry. At best, Tori is a lukewarm companion having about the least sexy talk I've ever heard before future orgies take place. There's no flirting (when you're in her room, not the clothes showoff), it's all sturm and drang with zero levity - yes I get these adult talks need to happen, but the fact that simultaneously jason and steph are certainly NOT having a asexual "responsibilities" talk at the same time tastes so acrid.
^^^^^^^^^^^and thats on the high confidence path! On the low confidence, it's a pure ntr fest.
This is what I mean by symmetry - if the highest confidence path resulted in tori sneaking you off to a side room to give you a blowie, then there'd be this natural balance between that, the med confidence, and low. Right now, it's 50% pure ntr ending or 50% lukewarm swinger planning.
When I first said I feared the game will go a certain direction but I hope I'm wrong, I'm now 90% certain everything else will be in service of the bbc ntr story. That doesn't mean side paths wont't exists, but they'll get second-chair attention to the core narrative. Yes, I'm sure there will be new content in a few months with Steph and MC finding adventures separate from Tori and Jason, but I'm sure that'll be dwarfed by the amount of content produced for the ntr path. (I keep using that word because that's what this is, it's not even a cuck path as described by my prior post, it's a pure ntr path) 20 bucks says tooPerilous loves anime. Yeah, I'm bitter.
