I'm glad you had a better time with the new writing. Keisuke in particular got polished up a lot in 0.12.0 to give him more depth and to show that there's a reason Zach places him in such high esteem (despite being a himbo). There are multiple reasons why that scene happened (and the dubious/coerced consent bit still happens), but
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Britney has way more depth than Keisuke does, but Zach hasn't known her for as long despite her and Zach being besties for about a year and a half of high school, and Zach puts her on a different type of pedestal than the one he puts Keisuke on because of his crush on her and he is ultimately the narrator of the game. She's a bit of a bitch at the start, but it's more that she feels like she's being used after being contacted out of the blue by a friend from a time in her life were things felt more "normal" (and something else which the coming 0.13.1 update covers).
When I said Britney was "shallow" I didn't mean she's "uncomplicated" or that she's not well-thought-out as a character, but that she is focussed intensely on image. Most of her character beats revolve around how much she is controlled by that images that her parents or society want to fit. It's her highest value.
Aside from her need to fit a certain image, her superficiality is expressed in other ways as well. All of her compliments and gifts are based on appearance, she has a complete lack of empathy for any character (except possibly Z), she can't read red flags so obvious that
Zach sees the (with Z's Mom and with Chet;"word of god" in the narration is that Britney is good at reading people, but the examples on the story are the opposite), her activities to rebel from her parents are all about being seen (cosplay, acting), she abuses her "hot chick privilege" constantly, doesn't even mention the name of her only friend at college or of the girl she kissed at the party, makes a show of being Catholic without seeming to get any philosophy or meaning from it, uses her church to further her aims but again seems to get no deeper value from it, etc.
I get all of that, because it hammers the importance of keeping up appearances with Z. Even her story about Chet, which Z sees as revealing something deeper, is just about the pressure of keeping up appearances the way she tells it.
Britney is a fun character, I want to like her, and there are a lot of moments where I identify with her, but her path is like Keisuke's old one in that she does things that are pretty hard to stomach
before showing off that she's got something worth persevering for. Her path reads like a divorce, where I can see why there is attraction, but also why the relationship can't work.
I won't be following her path past her leveraging Z to help her with drama club, but before that point she's written as very shallow. Helping Z is the only clearly selfless thing she's done at that point, and by using that as leverage she loses what makes her worth taking a chance on.
Around the arcade scene, I really stop seeing any of Britney's bitchiness as cute or forgivable, so I'm just seeing things that Britney should apologize for if she wants a second date.
To be fair, the arcade scene might just toque my gears for meta reasons. It makes me Kirk out, because it's a Kobayashi Maru test. I don't believe in no win scenarios, and it's the player that is put in that situation rather than Z, so I take it personally. That scene is the reason I walked away from the game for a year.
Ironically, the way Britney dealt with her "Kobayahi Maru" test with Chet (finding a "hack" to make it winnable) is one of the things about her character which I can identify with. I've been there, and I don't think the type of person who just accepts that 'some things can't be won' can survive those situations. It's not that I
don't understand it —
I don't want to be the type of person who understands it.
((Not trying to kink shame, or degrade anyone who does like no win scenarios. Unless they'd want me to degrade them.))
I'm self-aware enough that if I were Zoey I'd probably try to find a way to end the date gracefully after the arcade. I'd let Britney know that it's not her fault, but those games made me feel powerless, and I've lost so much that I just can't handle another loss. I'd let her know that she's been the best thing to happen to me, but that I feel too emotionally wrecked to be a good girlfriend for her, so I'd like to put the date on pause. I'd still go buy the skirt as promised, and buy clothes because I NEED to get some certainty in my future. I'd feel like I'd just be poisonous if I continued the date though.
I can understand not getting all those thought together before the restaurant, and I know that Z doesn't feel the same way even when I set her CHEATS as close to what I think mine would be as possible (544145), but Britney is a total dick at the restaurant, she treats bit characters who don't matter as if they are bit people who don't matter, she keeps calling Z an "idiot" (which no one who wants a girlfriend does to their girlfriend, it's not cute), she doesn't understand how
blessed she is that Z called her for help, she doesn't seem to realize how much Z has grown as a person in the last two days, she doesn't treat Z the way Brritney herself would want to be treated... yuck.
It's all understandable behavior, but it feels like I'm reading why they ended up divorced.
A lot of it comes off cute earlier in the relationship, but it needed to stop at some point.
Like with the old Keisuke path, there isn't enough to give Britney depth or make her a desirable partner
before she uses her help as leverage. At that point, I'm wanting her to sweeten up a little and show me why she's a pineapple and not a pinecone. I might not blow up the relationship, but I'd ask to put aside the fact the fact that she's trying to blackmail me and talk about the relationship first.
The dumb thing is that at the point where I abandon her path, I would have chosen to help her with drama just because she asked, but that option isn't available. Instead Britney has to show off that all of her help has a price, and she demands payment. Just helping when asked would be consistent to all of 544145 Zoey's internal monologue and actions on the date too, because she is pretty empathetic and would want to spend more time with Britney.
I said Britney was "shallow" before because I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about the character and her path, the only constant is that she is superficial. I'd rather puzzle out why the path is not working for me so I could offer constructive criticism, but I don't know all of it exactly.
The part of the Gender Bender genre which works least for me is the loss of power or loss of control, so I usually apply congnitive empathy to those parts and turn my affective empathy off, or I just don't even bother trying to empathize and just file it away as "not my kink" and try to make the choices that avoid it most. The Kobayashi Maru test gets me though because it's given to the player rather than the character, so that's me having to suffer through the no win scenario instead of Zoey. After that I'm not sure I can reengage my empathy the right way to enjoy the path.
There is a planned "split" route between Keisuke and Britney where Zach wakes up from his dream, Ai tells him he can't register a friend, and Zach still contacts Keisuke and Britney for help with re:/Dreamer but never tells them exactly what happened to him.
It should be interesting as Zach has lied to both about the other. Neither has met the other, but Keisuke was told Britney is this beautiful but very dorky and emotional unstable young woman... with a crush on him, who Zach turned down because he doesn't want the type of drama that dating a girl like that would bring into his life; conversely, Zach has told Britney that Keisuke is this borderline Neanderthal jock who's a heartbreaking womanizer and was so inept as a kid that Zach had to keep bailing him out of trouble.
I think Britney could be fun in a less intimate relationship — she is definitely a fun girl — but I think she's too hung up on her own issues.
I can't really do the path with the dream because Zach has to submit to avoid dying to the static, AND he associates "femininity" with "weakness" and "submission" (even if he's got a high trans score and has already admitted to wanting to be a woman). I'm not going through that door when it advertises that it's something I don't like.
If it was just "call for help" I'd probably it because that's a logical part of working the problem. I'd resent taking a path that forces me to choose "submission" and "girly=weak", so I know better than to look.
As a 544145 girl, looking at women as weak should not be an option (high trans+empathy), calling for help
should be an option (high empathy+control, and low awkwardness), and looking down on herself should not be an option (high self-esteem).
It's fine if some things aren't for me. I get that Z is more submissive than I am, but I'm going to focus on paths that give her a better deal. I'm not invested in the "dream" path because that choice is up front. The Britney path bugs me more because it doesn't start going downhill till midway through the date.
At this point Keisuke's path is fine to me, and I can play through the more submissive forks because I know there are other options.
