Controversial opinion but I think
V. A. Laurie deserves some serious praise for taking a chance with his characters and following his own intuitions and imagination instead of letting others dictate how the story should end to him. Huge credit to
FFCreations too for his beautiful rendering, character designs, and his contributions to the overall presentation of the game.
We could write the perfect endings for ourselves in our minds. The final moments are a snapshot of their happiest moments, consummated in the gesture of love, a kiss, a sex act, and so on. That's why the player chooses a particular ending, because you want to see the MC end up happily ever after with Leah, or Melody, or Karina. This way of choosing has a narcotizing side effect. If you already know what the ending is going to be ahead of time, then this removes all the tension from the story, because you think you're getting exactly what you expect, a photograph finish where the characters are frozen in time in their happiest moment. Totally uninteresting, and your desires of wanting a happy ending is more potent than the getting what you think you desire in its actuality. That's why a lot of the time waiting for the endings is more fulfilling than the actual ending themselves, you're building up a feeling that has nothing to do with the game itself. You think you want a happy ending, and when you don't get it, you get angry because that's what you think you want emotionally, but you're leaving out the way the game is structured.
V. A. Laurie dares to imagine what happens after the perfect ending, taking the story beyond where the story would traditionally end, taking the relationship to its logical conclusion. Alice's ending was a perfect example of this. The forgone conclusion (flashback to your previous memories at the wedding, culminating in the ceremonial exchange of rings) is followed up by an epilogue, where Alice's polyamory, present in the beginning of the game is more pronounced. This is all telegraphed by the events of the game (the gay hotel worker, Giraldo, that avuncular man who tells the main character to be authentic and follow his path is present at the wedding, the fact Alice wants to be a psychologist in helping others understand their own motivations and desires) comes into fruition. The best endings recontextualize everything that happened in the beginning and brings their motivations to a new light. Alice has her own sexual desires, her relationship with Leah, your threesome, her masturbating to the MC having sex with his aunt, it's clear she was always a sexual person. The MC has gotten to a point where he trusts Alice to be sexually active with other women and doesn't feel possessive about it, as Alice trusted him. That's the core of a successful polygamous relationship.
I think the game deserves a more thorough and in-depth review with the different characters but honestly the vitriol and hostility the endings have garnered is excessively negative and unhelpful. If the music didn't give it away, with the fact that you're dating your step-sister, a relationship that could end at any moment with your father, teacher, and aunt finding out, I think you're seriously missing a huge part of what the game is about, melancholy, loss, sadness, not resolutions in told in a perfectly controlled and ordered fashion.
