Holy fuckballs this was good. Really loved the game.
There are some things that stood out to me though.
1. Somewhere in this thread the dev mentioned that "no skills are checked in secret - they exist only as checks for choices to be made". This should be in the tutorial/description. I ran a lot of tests to see if conversations changed based on having/not having certain skills (such as Deb talking about my dadbod with/without strength/powerful). Having that in text from the start would have been nice.
2. Emma is thoroughly incompetent. If that's supposed to be part of the appeal of putting her in her place, that makes sense. Otherwise, she is supposed to be a bachelor/master something in psychology, yet she is less aware of other people's underlying reasoning/personality than Olivia. She is incapable of reason, and she seems to be awful at her job. As a feminist it makes sense that every problem boils down to "man bad", but if she's supposed to be a psychologist it is wholly unreasonable.
3. Emma again. The first time I saw her smile I thought it was a jump scare. Put some white paint on and you have Pennywise from IT. Please make her smile a little less terrifying and uncanny valley.
4. Cheating. A warning of possible side effects when making this choice would be nice (I didn't find any). Also, every choice that follows mentions cheating on Lea; but I was cheating on everyone. Furthermore, since the mental status of the MC is central to the main story, cheating and the stress of getting caught would be an excellent plot tool to add further pressure. Jump scares from getting a text from one girl at night while sleeping with another, having to hide the phone when with one girl and expecting a call from another and all that. Or possibly point out that it's all good. The setup for this game where every girl interaction starts slow and builds up over time means that the player is already invested in a lot of girls (specifically Jen and Lea) by the time you have to make a choice - this makes cheating a much more appealing option. If that's intended, wonderful planning; otherwise, perhaps the commitment choice should come earlier?
5. Uneven distribution of skills. The beginning of the game seems to push MC towards yellow/red, while later on all the good stuff comes from green/red. This is very much a personal choice for me of course, but I do feel that progression paths are somewhat railroaded. I can see how Deb's sub path would be very blue, but going dom with Jen feels like it should be a mix of all four (setting up rules for Jen would be yellow, dominating her would be red, painplay and aftercare would be blue, and convincing her of certain stuff would be green).
Maybe that stuff doesn't matter pointwise, but gathering those points means that the MC would have to be a more balanced person with a wider perspective than just "me man, me no follow rules, me manipulative". It did bother me a little bit that I couldn't be a sympathetic individual without turning into a beta sub, when every emotional choice, such as pointing out that you care about someone, is blue. Or, if you believe that is the correct way to do things, at least provide a red alternative ("you belong to me" or something to that effect).
6. Monologuing like a mad man. The bro-psychology is fun from time to time, but sometimes it gets too much. I know that pretty much every game on f95 will at some point have the MC ramble on with absolute authority like a text book, and I think the dev has solved this immersion-breaking monologue beautifully by making the MC an actual authority. However, it can still be too much, and the regurgitation still breaks immersion to some extent. If the dev could inject a little bit of personality into these parts and make them sound less like a text book it would be great and feel a lot more natural.
7. The project discussion with Bri. Come on man... MC is applying for a grant in social-psych, he should know already that his survey project will be so out of budget it's a joke, and that's before asking Bri for a gwas.
I'm really looking forward to the updates. This is one of few games here on f95 that I've enjoyed all the way and haven't clicked through to skip ahead once. Lea and Jen are amazing, and I didn't even know I had a thing for Emma denigrating herself like a dumb bimbo.
