This is an incredible VN, easily one of the best on this website. The story of the budding of the romance with a crippled, depressed girl, and its development through a long series of trials testing the protagonists' relationship and their strength of character, with the MC Inco slowly trying to gain her trust and her friendship, and Olivia learning to abandon the hard shell she's been developing throughout years of neglect and bullying.
The character interactions are impeccable. When you read their dialogues, the characters feel like actual people, and you can really relate to their struggles and feel how important the events affecting them are. You'll grunt in annoyance when you see Olivia's more cynical side bubble up to the surface from time to time; you'll be really sad when she breaks down and cries from all the trauma and self-loathing she suffered for years; and you'll be similing and very happy for her when something good finally comes to her. Her relationship with Inco is neither forced nor rushed; the writers took their time to establish them as characters first, then as friends, then as lovers, and it feels really satisfying to see Olivia breaking her shell open and showing the side of her and will make the reader fall for her too.
The only part about the characters that I don't like is in relation to Inco and Mia, the main antagonist. Mia is a fine character, she doesn't really need a motivation as to why she's the main bully to Olivia, but she does kinda only serve as the service bully throughout the entire session, and that does feel kind of a little bit caricatural and odd given her importance to the good ending, and how much more detailed the rest of the cast is.
As for Inco, the feeling I got was the writers wanted to do a blend between your typical faceless nobody protagonist and an actual character with layers and depth. This is difficult to pull off well, and I don't think they pulled it off perfectly well here. Although he really starts off as an empty canvas, it's nice to be able to influence his personality and make him become a totally different person in each ending, but his naive nature and his blandness at the start of the game was a bit grating to me. It doesn't help that he's got no face or hair, wears sunglasses at all times and is named Inco G. Nito... Like, the only way to make this more blatant would have been to give him just a colored outline like the nobody background characters, and it wouldn't have changed much.
Also, he seems to have some sort of backstory with his neglectful and overworked parents, but this never goes anywhere. It is mentioned at times in the first half of the story, but is never relevant to the plot nor impactful on what ending you get. It's a missed opportunity in my opinion.
Speaking of endings, I think it's kind of a shame to have us get all 4 endings to get the epilogue. First, it's never clear at any moment what choices in which branch will give you the points you need to reach either ending; I had to go through a guide on Steam to figure that one out, which is a big negative in my eyes.
Secondly, I feel personally that the bad endings kinda "tarnish" the wholesomeness and the value of the good ending, if that makes sense. The first 2 endings are really emotionally rough, really showing the nasty side of what Olivia and Inco can truly become; and while they're important to get a full picture of the characters, I don't think they're essential for a satisfying conclusion, and they kinda deflate the value of the fourth ending when they keep nagging at your mind how wrong the events could have went instead.
I don't know, maybe it's just me, but if you want to reach the epilogue, start with the 3rd (neither good nor bad, a bit sad but still statisfying in its own way), get the 1st, then the 2nd, and get the 4th (good) ending last. It will make the thing more palatable.
There's not much to talk about besides that. I really appreciate the presentation, how colorful and alive the scenes look, and I really like how they went the extra mile to add proper cutscenes, although the animations are more on the rough side honestly, and are more distracting than effective at their job. The artists could have spared a few more panels for important moments, like the protags' first kiss and what not, but most of them are piled at the beginning of the story, which is wierd because it's the least interesting part of the VN.
But overall, it's a fantastic experience. I wonder if this was partially inspired by stuff like Katawa Shoujo, because if you like that one, you'll probably like this one even more. The story kinda drags on at times, but it never feels like a waste of time. It's an incredible story from start to finish. It has a theme, it knows its subject matter very well, there's no wheel-spinning, the character conflicts are tastefully handled, the payoff to the main couple's months of struggles is very rewarding to read... It's just an excellent story.
