I know the game is worth playing and has a great story according to all the reviews and discourse i've heard about in the past. However, I'm planning on playing it again properly (played it before but never went further than the first few hours cause it's to sandboxy) but how do you guys get over the grindy elements of it? I really want to enjoy but the sandbox undoes it for me a little.
I don't like grind games, I find them boring. This game is not boring. I use the money cheat, I generally do on grind games if possible. You can enable a full cheat console that lets you up the stats, but I recommend not doing that, you can easily break the game. If you do use the cheat console, do not touch Friendship, that stat tracks the automatic events in the game, and you can end up with a very broken game by messing with that.
Raising each girl's stats is the most grindy aspect to this game, and it is mostly not required. There is one girl who you will need to raise stats on, and the game lets you know ahead of time and allows you to build the stats before you agree to the event that requires the stats. Mostly the stats just unlock "extras" i.e if a girl has a high enough exhibitionist trait they might strip in a scene. If they have a high enough sluttiness or submission, they will wear an outfit you bought, otherwise they turn you down. The game will tell you if they don't have high enough stats for the thing. Most of the game's story happens automatically, the more grindy parts just add flavor. You have to decide if the grind is worth the added bits or not.
I have played through the game a few times now, and this last play through, used the cheat console to raise various stats to near the trigger point, and then trigger the stat by doing it because despite not liking grind, I am completionist and hate not having full stats.
