Eh, I think this is up to personal taste.
But I will say that in this particular game, pretty much all the relationships are open and polyamorous, because your character is canonically polyamorous.
I think worldbuilding is used as an excuse to justify putting in polyamorous, open, voyeur, and cucking content because Savin likes it. I dislike voyeur and cucking, and am neutral on polyamorous. I would prefer monogamous, but I don't mind an interesting 3 character relationship if its done right.
I get what you're saying here. I think it all comes down to a push-and-pull between the porn and the plot. I think such options hurt the plot (at least for me), but I can see as to where they'd improve the experience of the porn part. The call would come down to where you want your game to focus on; there are plenty of games on this site where the porn is subservient to the plot, and vice versa.
The vast majority of people prefer monogamy, and they are willing to deal with a harem even if they never would want one in real life. I'm not sure how a PC being in charge of a harem would be detrimental to the plot? Other people can have sexual relationships in the background without it needing to be brought up. I think you can write a good story without needing to have the other character having sex with each other, even if it is a porn game.
Yeah, lack of buildup is an issue that I've seen come up a decent amount between this and TiTs.
An example of this specific thing for me is Brienne. After you transform her, if you sleep with her, it pretty much immediately goes full steam into your characters acting very much in love. A bunch of her scenes fire automatically, too, upon stepping into the Wayfort; she'll basically tackle you and get you to knock her up as soon as she's done with her previous litter. My characters had to start taking blank powder to get out of the cycle. She doesn't really have any buildup at all.
Of course, most people do really really like her, largely because Wsan is a goddamn wizard at pretty much anything he does, so its not really a problem that comes up much, but for me personally, it was bit offputting. Evelyn, another Wsan character, also has the issue of a lack of buildup I think, but for a different reason.
I'm not sure it's necessarily Wsan magic, but I do enjoy her scenes. I suspect the more likely reason she's so popular is because she is monogamous, and that's rarer in this game. She's probably overall mediocre in development. I'd prefer if there was a slower burn romance up to where her content is. I am interested to see if Drifa could potentially become more popular than Kiyoko/Brienne.
Funnily enough, the context was something to do with a Kinu Quest. I don't know what specifically it was, because, again, I've done basically no kitsune content still (lack of interest in Kiyoko, mostly) but it was just something I noted people had opinions about. Sounds like a recurring Tobs problem.
Yeah, I avoid anything that will trigger Kinu content. I went from caring to preferring not to care.
My personal issue with Gweyr was being misled. After she first gives you her story, you basically get to make a judgment call on how she behaved in her tale. You can say what she did was necessary, or you van say she's a monster, as well as a more neutral option.
The issue is that after that, no matter what you pick, as you continue down her questline your character comes down on the side of basically being 100% on her side and convincing her she deserves to go home.
I don't like choices that don't do anything.
Yeah, Tobs doing that originates from Fall of Eden.
Eh. You run into a matter of practicality there: Brienne (or any other character} doesn't have enough content to hold up a game by herself. She wasn't designed that way, no character was. I wouldn't devote the time to run through the entire game just for Brienne scenes.
And then, as another consideration, she just doesn't hit any of my buttons. I don't like lactation or pregnancy, and I prefer my PC to play the sub if someone has to.
How about this then. Assuming Brienne did push your buttons (whatever they are), but your player character was able to devote the time to each character in their harem due to some sort of power?
Sure, but that just makes you a decent person. There's a difference between a character being particularly brave and a character being The Chosen One. Heck, to bring back my earlier One Piece example that's a huge argument going on in One Piece about Luffy right now; that's he now way too special and it damages the story, despite the fact that he was already pretty damn special.
I don't personally like most stories that cross a certain line in putting the MC on a pedestal, no matter the medium.
To be fair, it depends on how you consider fate in a fantasy setting. The PC could be the chosen one simply by being the only decent person. I'm also not sure the whole being super good at learning has anything to do with the portal. That's only the soul.
Tangent:
Which mechanically, you level the same speed as your companions, but you can change your entire fighting style within basically two in game days. Not sure if that implies experience is separate from the "learning" idea and something else, like you absorbing people's essence when you defeat them and improving the power of your soul. Which, getting smarter shouldn't improve the power of your soul, so it probably is some sort of power absorption.