So, I jumped on over to the Ren'py version after the MC punishment section of Act 3 (so not deep into it). The filler missions were starting to frustrate me (even though they can be funny, too). I just wanted to see how the story unfolds, so I started playing this and skipped over a lot of the filler dialog. I read through the important parts, and finally saw the ending. A couple things stood out that I've seen mention here.
First, there's A LOT of hate for Emma on this forum. Now, admittedly, she isn't a saint, and she is a manipulative bitch. But in terms of what she actually did, I thought it was very mild. Correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know, she did the following. She got Mia and the MC to do porn (though let's be honest, Mia was totally into it). She tried, and failed, to get Mia to have sex with the dad. She discovered the mom and MC were having sex, and blackmailed them. And all that led to was 1 scene where she ball gagged the mom and essentially had a 3some with the MC and the mom. And she messed around a bit with the dad, blackmailing him, too.
All those things are bad, but based on how people talk about her here, I was thinking she was doing stuff like turning Mia into a drug addict and turning her into a prostitute. In all honesty, the worst character in this story was by far the MC. You wanna talk about someone manipulative and sleazy, that's the MC all over. I mean some of the things he did to Mia were borderline rape, and at the very least, blackmail. And that's not even mentioning the sleeping around behind her back (not technically cheating since they're not together, but he knew she wouldn't like it). And that leads to my next point.
The ending. I loved it. And not because the MC got screwed over. In fact, he didn't. During all that time when he started to increasingly neglect Mia to have sex with his mom, he was hurting so many people, including his dad, and most importantly, Mia. It's like he stopped giving a fuck about her because he got a shiny new toy. Yet through all that, Mia stayed faithful to him as she started falling in love with him. If the game would have ended with them ending up together, I would have been disappointed because he didn't deserve her. However, in Mia's last show of love, she did everything she could to try to turn MC in the right direction, so he could become a great man. Gave him $20,000 (to hopefully go to college). An inspirational message telling him he has great potential. And leaving, so he wouldn't have her distracting him from unlocking his true potential. Fact is, Mia leaving could become the greatest thing to ever happen to him. And they still might end up together when the sequel comes out.
It was the ending that the MC deserved, and I have a good feeling it will be for the best. The writing is on the wall. This isn't a "sad" game. It's a game about life, and it's ups and downs (along with a lot of ridiculous and funny side characters in the RPGM version). Even if the MC and Mia don't end up together by the end of Summer with Mia 2, they will end up happy. Either way, I can't wait for for it to come out, but I'm not holding my breath for it to be released any time soon.
