Well played this through for the first time. I feel like there is a lot of wasted potential because of the stiff dialog and plot points being a bit nonsensical. I think it's a mistake they introduce him as a fighter in the beginning, or at least to make him seem like he's very experienced. The fact that he basically helped his coach get a gym on their winnings together and seemed pretty competent as a fighter makes like half the training talk feel weird in the present. It's one thing to retrain his muscles, speed, and flexibility but the way things are presented you would think he barely has any experience or skill from his past like he developed amnesia.
I like the variety of characters even if there isn't much in the way of content with them besides Jess. The dialog in terms of relationships is a bit too straightforward and stiff too. Very matter of fact and sometimes the characters feel like a robot trying to imitate how people talk to each other. It's also a bit unpleasant watching our lead act misogynistic but then get offended by others acting just like him.
One mishandled character for me is Juli who has a pretty small role for now. I liked having a different body types and saw potential in her for the future but in her last appearance with the blonde hair she looks bad comparative to your first run in in the park with her.
Also not a huge fan of adultery but I like Mrs Johnson so far and if anything would play through it again even with all the flaws when the game is finished to see that play out. Makes me feel shitty to betray my friends trust there though. I'm hoping the father is at least shown to be not just neglectful but cheating or something else to make me feel less shitty hitting on her lol.
I quickly went through a second time speed skipping to see if choices lead to different outcomes like not choosing help with boxes (but you end up with that job anyway if you want) or not selecting the right choices to Jess. Things come out linear from what I see so you have the best choices to increase relationships but things progress day by day pretty similar even if you want less Jess and more of someone else. Not the end of the world but definitely takes away from the idea of this being a game to me.
If I decided to never check this out again it's like a 2.5/5 stars. Im tempted to revisit it though since the bones of the game are not terrible and the models are pleasant enough.