I'm with you on most of the post, but I can't agree with this. The problem was never about the MC's "forced" monogamy, it's about the execution. DPC wanted to make a big spectacle of the MC committing to a girl (or not) to end Season 2, but he himself wasn't willing to commit to what that required. You say it makes sense for the MC to make a decision at the crossroads, but that's only true in a handful of cases. In most cases, the decision is very late in coming: Maya had to talk the MC out of committing to the throuple back in Episode 5, and the conflict between Bella and Jill should have reached a breaking point in back in Episode 7. Meanwhile the relationship with Sage was so unproblematic that DPC had to invent that ridiculous Rebound Guy speech just to force the issue.
Looking back on things, I suspect that DPC intended Season 2 to be about the MC sowing his wild oats. His comment to Maya and Josy about how he needed to stop acting on instinct was supposed to indicate he was going to focus on casual dating rather than obsessing over true love. Thus Season 2 becomes the path by which the MC decides he's finally ready to settle down, with the crossroads being the natural endpoint.
But if that is the case, I think DPC *really* muddled the message. First, because the MC was already very comfortable with casual sex by the midpoint of Season 1 - particularly if he's a DIK. Second, because DPC's emphasis on sex in the the highly amorphous Affinity system makes it feel like casual sex is something CHICKs should be avoiding rather than embracing. Third, because if we control the MC's actions and have eyes only for one of the girls, it's not clear why we'd *want* to wait for a crossroad to make things official. And fourth, because the existence of an 'Others' path allows us to obviate the season's alleged theme just so we can keep playing the field.
This is then compounded by the way DPC pivots directly from the theoretical climax of the crossroads into the three-hit combo of meeting Sage's parents, the Vixens, and the Interlude. By making the MC panic about Sage being Jade's daughter regardless of his relationship with either or both of them, DPC inadvertently highlights the way our choices are illusory. By naming Episode 9 after the Vixens (and relentlessly hyping up the Halloween party as the big ticket item), DPC contradicts the notion that the MC was ready to focus on becoming a proper boyfriend. And by cutting away from the main action to an Interlude focused squarely on Zoey's backstory, DPC raises the specter that Zoey will displace our chosen LI whether we want it or not.
The combined effect really is nothing short of disastrous IMHO. It makes Zoey a near perfect manifestation of all the shortcomings in DPC's approach to drama, and gives us a full year to stew in that impression before DPC gets a chance to disprove it. And I say that as someone who wants DPC to disprove it - I'm actively trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. But he makes it so damn hard sometimes. I sincerely hope we can get out of this mess and never look back, but I'm not going to pretend I like where we are now.
So no, I don't think it's unreasonable to complain about the 'forced' nature of the crossroads, nor to worry about where the game goes from here. DPC brought this on himself.
Naaah…
The only thing I’ll concede is that we’ve had too long to stew over it.
The delays between episodes skew our understanding of just how much (or specifically how little) time has passed. Referring to
Holy Bacchus' timeline analysis, the mc has been at college for only a couple of months (which fits the mid terms timing as well).
So in just two months, the mc has fallen head over heels for a bunch of different girls, and decided it's time to get serious with one (or two in the case of M&J) of them. That's not a shocking amount of time to be playing the field nor to be getting serious.
But for us, depending when you joined the party (for me it's been just over 2 years, for others it could be almost 4), it's all been a fucking long time coming.
Now I don't think it's unreasonable to debate the "forced" nature of the crossroads. I don't agree, but I don't think anyone is being unreasonable (except perhaps the "
Milker Motherfucker Brigade"
).
The bit about Maya (in episode 5) being open to no strings attached after the throuple was formed: That was like at the end of the second week of college. He'd literally only known Maya for two weeks, so committing to her and Josy at that point would have been a little premature.
You'll have to refresh my memory about the conflict between Jill and Bella in episode 7. If you're talking about Bella calling her naïve and all that, I didn't see that as a big deal, otherwise Bella was just trying to help Jill minimise the pain of dating Tybalt in that episode (and timewise, both of them had only known the mc for 4 or 5 weeks at that point).
I can't really sugar-coat the Sage drama. The mc was happy to fuck her while she was angry that her boyfriend was cheating on her, and the mc even kept hinting that she should dump Chad and move on. Then he goes all rebound snowflake when she and Chad are over.
The only thing that gives the rebound reaction any traction is that it wasn't Sage who did the dumping; in the end Chad dumped her and she took it hard, and then she wanted to jump into the mc's arms. This wasn't the scenario the mc was looking for.
Maybe I kinda get it even...
If Sage had dumped Chad for the mc, that would be a positive. But Sage only got interested in a relationship with the mc after
she got dumped. Rebound alarm bells!
Looking at that scene, right before they start sparring, the mc says to Sage:
mc: "I understand what you went through...or what you're going through."
mc: "Break-ups are tough."
So when Sage starts kissing him and looking to get physical after the sparring session, the mc is like, "Hang on, you probably need to take step back, I'm not just here as second best after Chad dumps you..."
So yeah, it wasn't what the reader wanted right then and there, but was it ridiculous that the mc behaved that way? Not really...
Maybe...
And regarding all the casual sex, as long as it was casual, the mc didn't have a problem with it. At the crossroads the mc was more concerned about the more-than-casual relationships. He knew he wasn't hurting the likes of Mel, Sarah, Riona, Cammy etc by randomly hooking up with them. But he was concerned with hurting the girls that he was getting in too deep with. And that also works with taking the "others" option. He didn't want to get into a serious relationship with any of the girls, so he chose path that lead away from that.
And regarding the mc's panicked response to Sage's parents being the Burkes. Even the most benign path is complicated (i.e. he was on the receiving end of Jade's very unprofessional behaviour towards him - basically sexual harassment if it was unwanted). So the mc panicked, sure, he hadn't done anything wrond, but doesn't make it any less awkward.
And Zoey. This is the
best time for her to arrive and fuck shit up! I'm happy for shit to get real.
My opinion is definitely stemmed from the fact that I don't care specifically about any of the LIs. I mean, I enjoy all their content, but it's not like I'm hanging out for the continuation or enhancement of any relationships in particular. I'm just enjoying the ride.
I get it but they are taking a minimum of 13k a month! Bit more than support! haha
It's probably a hell of a lot more than that. But so what? Good luck to him and any other developer that can attract that type of support.
I hope it is really Halloween, not another D&G session.
- Sally, you're next!
- Don't you dare!
Actually, it was fun up to a certain point. When I opened all endings, it got boring and I just skip this content.
The first thing I thought was DnG!!!
But yeah, it looks like they may be pranking KRJ with some Halloween horror.
Speaking of spanking Sally, part of me would prefer seeing KRJ spanked...
