The weakest part of The Author was the quality of the writing.
The game often feels like a harem game, as the women all tend to fling themselves at you for no reason at all. The developer realized that this was a problem, but didn't do anything to address it other than to make some jokes about it that just end up making it more noticeable.
Railroading is a bit of an issue at times, especially when dealing with the assistant who I personally couldn't stand. She constantly flirts with you, and then gets angry when you reject her each time. Eventually we get a scene where she asks if we will be keeping her as an employee, and we can only choose to either say yes or maybe. The lack of a definite no made it feel like everyone who disliked her could go suck eggs, and it made her role in the story feel very contrived and forced.
There are definitive choices to be made about who you wish to have sex with, so you won't ever have to deal with any mandatory sex scenes with a character you dislike. Which is great, but it would be better if the game could actually keep track of your choices instead of needing you to input them again because it forgot what you did last chapter.
Out of all of the potential love interests, there was only one that managed to hold my interest enough to actually finish the game. Most of them made rather poor first impressions, so I had originally just been interested in Lyndie. However, that came to a screeching halt when she inexplicably decided to act like an anime cat girl and turn what should've been a high point of the game into its worst scene. I honestly don't understand why the developer thought that was ever a good idea. It was so awkward that I lost all interest in her and ended up pursuing someone else instead.
By the end of the game, there was only one character that I found even remotely interesting. And even then I didn't care much because I didn't like the main character by that point. The game had potential to be good, but it just kept tripping over its own feet.
The game often feels like a harem game, as the women all tend to fling themselves at you for no reason at all. The developer realized that this was a problem, but didn't do anything to address it other than to make some jokes about it that just end up making it more noticeable.
Railroading is a bit of an issue at times, especially when dealing with the assistant who I personally couldn't stand. She constantly flirts with you, and then gets angry when you reject her each time. Eventually we get a scene where she asks if we will be keeping her as an employee, and we can only choose to either say yes or maybe. The lack of a definite no made it feel like everyone who disliked her could go suck eggs, and it made her role in the story feel very contrived and forced.
There are definitive choices to be made about who you wish to have sex with, so you won't ever have to deal with any mandatory sex scenes with a character you dislike. Which is great, but it would be better if the game could actually keep track of your choices instead of needing you to input them again because it forgot what you did last chapter.
Out of all of the potential love interests, there was only one that managed to hold my interest enough to actually finish the game. Most of them made rather poor first impressions, so I had originally just been interested in Lyndie. However, that came to a screeching halt when she inexplicably decided to act like an anime cat girl and turn what should've been a high point of the game into its worst scene. I honestly don't understand why the developer thought that was ever a good idea. It was so awkward that I lost all interest in her and ended up pursuing someone else instead.
By the end of the game, there was only one character that I found even remotely interesting. And even then I didn't care much because I didn't like the main character by that point. The game had potential to be good, but it just kept tripping over its own feet.