Sometimes, I wonder if people actually read at all when they play games or if they just click through and look at the pictures. To balance out the unwarranted negativity, allow me to play devil's advocate.
The first argument I am seeing here is that the dev wanted to rush an ending because he was losing money or is wanted to move onto some other new project. For the money argument, simply look at the earnings for this game and the number of patrons. During the course of three months, the number of patrons and earning have been relatively steady with no big changes. If you want to get into the details, it has actually increased slightly. And as for the wanting to move on to another project argument, I say that this game has been in development since 2017. There has seldom been a delay in any updates during that time. Moreover, it seems like most people were happy with this game during the course of these three years. How can anyone justifiably say that the dev wants to rush to a new project? And on top of that, you have one of the creators say in this thread that there are at least 6 more updates to flesh out all the choices. It boggles my mind that anyone can accuse the devs of being lazy or wanted to end this game prematurely.
The second argument is a big subjective, but I want to discuss it anyway. MC's relationship with his father strikes me as a pretty plausible. Personally speaking, I had a very bad relationship with both of my parents up until recently (and I would not say it is good now either). It took my parents retiring, moving to the opposite end of the country, and a few years for them to even invite me to their home and for me to even agree to do it. I jokingly refer to our present situation as our "peace treaty". When I do visit, it is incredibly awkward and it takes me a few days for me to get comfortable talking to them normally. And even when we do talk normally, there are always the underlying memories that we try to just sweep under the rug. But on the surface, we're all jolly and smiling and all that bullshit. And yeah, I shed a few tears in private during those tumultuous times. It happens to the best of us. Just because it might not have happened to you doesn't mean the situation isn't plausible. I'm not expecting world-renown writing in these types of games, but this scenario was executed in a plausible manner. You'd be surprised how unwittingly selfish people can be, even those who claim to be closest to us.
The third argument I am seeing is that the time skip is proof of rushing to end the game. I find the first time skip to be just fine. It can easily be assumed that during the course of the first time skip (which was only a few weeks, if I recall correctly) that MC and Alice simply spent their time with these parents exchanging mundane pleasantries, catching up with them or just helping Alice and MC look for a new place to live. Maybe they did not spend so much time with the other characters during this first leap. Nothing exciting or worth making an update about and it isn't a big leap in logic to suppose that. Why show those things?
Now, the second time leap of a few years did catch me off guard along with the sudden list of choices. However, one of the devs has already clearly stated in this thread that each "ending" choice will be its own update. That is a lot of content to an ending. Also, think about this. The dialogue of the father indicates that he hasn't really been following what MC has been doing during the second time skip (which, again, is fully plausible given my own situation in life described above). I imagine that the time skip will be filled in when the MC fills his father in with what has been going on after making a choice about who MC decided to be with. Then, when those "ending" choices get their own updates, I imagine that those updates will have their own choices in them to determine how that ending plays out. If the choices pan out this way, then the complaint about the time skip becomes moot along with the argument that MC has lost all agency.
Finally, the complaint about Hailey and Susan. While the dev has indicated that there are currently no plans for them to have their own endings, this dev team has made changes to this game based on fan feedback before. Hence, it is a possibility that it might change. Even if it didn't, that does not necessarily mean that these characters won't play a part in the other choices. Heck, the "I broke up with all of them" could be a potential segue to a Hailey or Susan ending.
Look, all I'm saying is that the negative reaction has been ridiculously overblown. The game isn't completed yet and all the pieces are still there to give a satisfying ending, and yet people are here declaring the game is now a disaster and they will never play it again. I'm telling you to take some deep inhales and exhales and be patient. Voice your concerns in a civilized manner, if you must, but tone all this down.
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