Skeltom

Engaged Member
Oct 9, 2017
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I mean, she is the MC's girlfriend now
That's one of the better parts of the Jill route for me. At the end you can strait up say that you are her boyfriend. Unless I read it wrong you kinda can with Sage but it doesn't have the same oomph to me. I am, and don't you forget it.

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TomUK

Engaged Member
Sep 28, 2021
2,912
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Agreed. DIK players are going to get punched in the DIK if one of their LI's is preggo. I don't think it's a main girl thoug, none of the 5 at least, but I do think it's a HOT.

I saw Mona tagged before as possibly the one, also have seen Dany mentioned several times. Odds are it could be either, but I doubt it's a main LI
Sage was having a few bad days but I'm struggling to remember what girls outside the usual suspects the MC fucked and all them at one time got creampied, on my game the MC didn't fuck any of the girls that wanted money for sex, mainly cause I never had any. Didn't get to have sex with Jade and I got no idea who Madame is.
 

mindern

Active Member
Jul 7, 2017
542
2,224
There's too much to cover everything. To quickly sum up, you can see my original take here. shazba had a somewhat more positive take on a lot of those elements here and here.



Based on the rate of rate of time passing in the latest episodes (and the teaser of the mansion in Halloween regalia), I suspect the Halloween party is going to be the first test of the MC's loyalty. That's a big part of why I've gone from eagerly anticipating it to wishing we'd skip it this year. :(

Just to be clear, I'm not saying the MC shouldn't face temptation, just that I don't see the Halloween party as offering a particularly effective temptation. I like all the LIs. If my MC just committed to one (or two) of them, self-destructive, drunken antics with someone I didn't choose is an easy pass. There's nothing worse than having to endure the MC agonizing over what should be an easy decision.

Sure, people who picked others deserve their fun. But by forcing us to commit to the choice, DPC upped the stakes. The Halloween party can't just be about sexy games anymore, which makes it feel like one of those WW2-era battleships that was obsolete the instant it hit the water. Maybe DPC will surprise me, but for now it feels like such a waste.



Something more might come of it eventually, but to date there's almost no difference. If you don't defend Chad, during the Episode 7 party he tells Alex the MC isn't worth it rather than saying the MC is cool.



That presumes that the man to whom Rusty sells his car owns (and/or founded) the dealership. Also, it's much more likely DPC is just reusing a model and the two characters are no more related than the MC and Tommy.



I don't think it's one or the other. For all the faults Episode 4 had resolving it, I think the twist of Josy showing up as Maya's surprise girlfriend was good for the game. Likewise I think the destruction of the mansion in Episode 5 was a good moment that hit hard and paved the way for the MC's rise to glory; hosting the Halloween party wouldn't feel nearly as satisfying if the audience didn't share the sense of how tough the path back has been.

Of course, the flipside to this is that we need lulls in the drama to appreciate what's been lost or gained. If everything is balls-to-the-wall drama all the time, it loses its impact. Nothing is at stake if any winnings will immediately be imperiled before we can spend them. No sense worrying about any particular crisis, it's business as usual.

DPC excels in the slice of life material and struggles with high-stakes threats, but his instincts to have both is correct. He just needs to learn that less is sometimes more. If he keeps the scale personal most of the time and saves his powder for a few pivotal moments, he can get an even bigger narrative bang without having to strongarm the story into a series of convoluted crises.



Could be. We'll never know exactly what DPC had planned originally. My overall impression, though, is that the game we have now is pretty compatible with the game we saw in Episode 1. The only thing that feels like it was adapted after the fact is the '4 episode season' aspect. Episode 5 felt like it SHOULD have been the end of the first act but had to be booted to season 2 for logistical reasons. Likewise, it wouldn't surprise me if DPC leaned more heavily into things like the Tybalt blackmail plot to stretch the crossroad out from Episode 7 to Episode 8 simply to match the season end.

Other than that, though, my guess is that DPC always intended to tell the 'traditional' romcom story and then bring Zoey back as a way to test the MC's choice. The 'new' roadblocks were part of the story from day 1.

To the extent that the narrative feels repetitive, I think that's because DPC doesn't quite appreciate that Zoey's backstory on its own doesn't make her sufficiently different from the other LIs. Ideally, the rise and fall of the MC/Zoey relationship would have been the first act in its own right. Only after that would the MC move on to college, meet the new LIs and eventually settle on one. Then, when Zoey returns unexpectedly, we can share the MC's confused feelings; if we hadn't been forced to abandon Zoey, would we really have picked the new LI at all? What do we do now that we have?

Presumably, that's what DPC is going to try to do with the Interlude: make us retroactively buy into what the MC and Zoey had and thus question the decision we just made. Unfortunately, the timing is all wrong. By making such a big deal out the choice of new LI, we're instantly going to be far more defensive of that choice than the MC is. Right away our perception of Zoey differs sharply from how the MC's.

On top of that, by making the "original" romance retroactive, we're going to be instinctively reluctant to commit to it fully - unless we didn't have much investment in the new LIs to begin with. Worse, if we have invested in the new LI, we want to see the MC spend time with his LI!! That last thing we want is to watch the MC hook up with a mortal threat to that LI! Yet we will be forced to endure the latter before we can get back to the former. The idea that we would ever side with the force-fed Zoey romance over the new LI after that is... let's call it overly optimistic.

In the end, Zoey's "threat" to, say, M&J, is no different than Bella's: we're told the MC has powerful chemistry with her, but we may or may not feel it ourselves. If Bella didn't edge out M&J in our eyes, Zoey won't either. (Meanwhile, if we did choose Bella's case, we know the player already bought into the chemistry with her. So Zoey is at best a pale copy with ~7 episodes less development to catch our interest.) Artificially elevating Zoey to be a threat to each and every other LI yields the same problem that's bedeviled many a franchise sequel over the years: it's just doing the same thing all over again with more flash and far less substance.

Thus the repetition. That's my take, anyway.

I'm hoping DPC doesn't try and legitimately have Zoey compete with the other LI (or even worse have the MC fall for her against our wishes just to create drama and repeat himself). What I am ok with is her be a lightning rod for showing established insecurities. I agree with you entirely that DPC is going to struggle immensely setting her up as a viable alternative to the established LI's but he could segue all the established jealously and unspoken feelings from each LI onto her.

MC keeps making a big deal about having dated multiple girls. Scenes like the recital aftermath has the MC talking about how he's involved with, even "dated", all these girls even if you did your best to avoid them. Im ok with Zoey basically holding up a mirror to each LI and showing them something wrong with their relationship with MC.

Zoey as a full blown LI? I’ve got reservations. Zoey as a tool to simply drive the current LI’s character development? A foil to the established LI? Yeah I am on board with that.

side note, I looked up where a character “foil” comes from… it’s from how jewellers used to put foil under a jewel to make it shine more and look better. That’s what I want. Her to come in an make the LI’s shine by contrast.
 
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Deleted member 4298851

Well-Known Member
Oct 27, 2021
1,761
2,366
Sage was having a few bad days but I'm struggling to remember what girls outside the usual suspects the MC fucked and all them at one time got creampied, on my game the MC didn't fuck any of the girls that wanted money for sex, mainly cause I never had any. Didn't get to have sex with Jade and I got no idea who Madame is.
Yeah I only knew of the Madame from the gallery unlocker. Never met her but she's the madame of the Pink Rose
 
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Nov 9, 2020
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I think why Zoey comes back because she wants to open up a drug business, with MC as a business partner. Think about it both Quinn and Vinny are drug dealers. So, the next logical step is for the MC becoming a drug dealer with aid from Zoey.
 

OFT

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2020
1,165
14,041
How many surnames do we know now?

Maya Victoria Baily Bailey (corrected so felicemastronzo won't send Dalli into a conniption)
Derek Bailey
Patrick Bailey

Tybalt Archibald Stewart Burke
Jade Burke
Stephen Burke
Sage Burke (presumably)

Jill Royce
Lana Royce
Amelia Royce

Isabella Roberts
James Roberts (assuming Bella took his name in marriage)

Cathy Jones
Rusty Burgmeister
Hagar Schmidt (teacher)
Philip Hoff (teacher)
Mona Davis
Karen Rebecca Johnson
Benjamin Ingsfeldt (chess player) *Thanks, ename144
Bianca Thomson *Thanks, ename144
Lydia Henderson (granny grenade)
Will Burr (ANΩ alumni)
Nora Bailey (please direct any doubts to AchedCroissant :KEK:)

NOTE: The following are not being considered as accurate surnames (as ename144 suspected), because the basketball uniforms from which they were derived are actually just Daz3d assets:
  • Chad Connor
  • John Hanson
  • Anthony Drake
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Did I leave anyone out?
 
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Deleted member 4298851

Well-Known Member
Oct 27, 2021
1,761
2,366
That's one of the better parts of the Jill route for me. At the end you can strait up say that you are her boyfriend. Unless I read it wrong you kinda can with Sage but it doesn't have the same oomph to me. I am, and don't you forget it.

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Out of reactions so +1'ng this (y)

Such wonderfulness
 
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AchedCroissant

Conversation Conqueror
May 29, 2020
6,122
28,104
Maya Baily Bailey (corrected so felicemastronzo won't send Dalli into a conniption)
Derek Bailey
Patrick Bailey

Tybalt Burke
Jade Burke
Stephen Burke
Sage Burke (presumably)

Cathy Jones
Isabella Roberts
Jill Royce
Rusty Burgmeister
Hagar Schmidt
Philip Hoff
Mona Davis
Karen Rebecca Johnson


Did I leave anyone out?
You forgot Nora Bailey
 
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Daxos89

Newbie
Jan 12, 2019
54
66
I don't know now if I'm allowed to post this or not, but I do because it should be interesting for everyone. It is an excerpt from the original walkthrough.

The choices you can pick between, depending on your history with the girls, are:

Josy & Maya: You have to be in their relationship to be able to choose this.
Isabella: You have to be dating her to be able to choose this.
Sage: You have to be her fuck buddy or fucked her in episode 7 to be able to
choose this.

Jill: If you were invited to dinner with her friends, this will be an option. It may also be an option in other rare cases, but if you didn’t get invited to dinner, she will reject you if you choose to be with her.

Others: This option is only available if you aren’t in Josy’s and Maya’s relationship and don’t have a successful relationship with Jill. Choosing that none of the other girls are right for you will cause you to reject any main girl relationships and stay friends with them.

Hint! Whatever choice, it will have a huge impact on the story that follows. The choice you make will be referred to as being on someone’s branch from here on. For example, the branches are referred to as: Josy’s and Maya’s branch, Jill’s branch, Isabella’s branch, Sage’s branch, and others’ branch.
Still nobody with the newly released E8 Walkthrough yet? I'm not a high-enough tier to get it from his Patreon and pretty sure others are waiting for it too...

In the words of Bonnie Tyler...I need a HERO!! (man that was a great song at the time too)
Can someone share the EP8 Official Walkthrough please? We need a HERO!!
 
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