Okay, finally have a moment to write up my thoughts.
First off, I'm so happy to hang out with these girls again. SI was likely my second favourite game for the cast characterisation and I missed it. Some things are different, but they are still the same girls and it's great to have them back.
Regarding the renders, they're all outstanding in terms of quality. Alex and Gracie in particular look amazing. I miss Lillian having brighter hair, and Lillian and Celeste both seem to have gotten much rounder faces. For Celeste in particular, her cheeks now look quite... chubby. I'm not sure it goes with her tsun attitude so well, she's just not intimidating, even before her tsun breaks. It's like trying to take a hamster seriously. Still really glad to see her though, she was amazing in SI. Quality tsunderes are surprisingly rare.
Moving on to the story, I'm aware this is more a reboot than a redo, thus the change of having the MC grow up alongside the cast as opposed to moving in with them at the start of the game. For the most part, the change is grounded though I do miss Celeste's more gradual warm-up to us. That said, some issues do arise. The one about Gracie not knowing we've never made a garden despite having grown up with us has already been addressed in this thread (also, perhaps the backyard should have the new garden present after we've constructed it?), however in general I strongly feel some sort of instigating incident should be present in the story as to why the events of the game then occur. Some girls casually changing in front of him when they apparently hadn't in the many years previous, Gracie going as far as to shower with us, Alex suddenly wanting more intimate bonding with the MC. I feel that there needs to be some explanation as to why these things are happening now as opposed to before the game started. As an example, one idea I came up with which should require minimal dialogue/plot alterations would be having the MC return to the house after studying somewhere else for a year, with him having arrived again two or three days prior. Not too long a period of time compared to growing up with everyone, but long enough that specific things could suddenly be new, the girls reconnecting with him but in a new way. It could also factor into why he's now getting the dreams: they started after he got back. Further on down the line, it could be used to get past why all the girls have certain... hidden features, but the MC doesn't know about them despite having grown up with them, assuming he is to remain surprised by that development. Basically, he was away for just long enough for specific important aspects of the girls to change, and now they want to bring him into a whole new world but aren't quite sure how to. (Leading on to that, I always felt the weakest part of SI was after you'd had the reveals of a couple of girls but just went on like normal with the rest. You could bring it up to them but they'd just brush it off, then they'd also turn out to be... different, but it never seems to occur that maybe they're ALL in on it. Twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action and all.)
I'm sure there are other ways of accomplishing the same goal, that was just one I came up with which should be applicable with a minimum of new/altered lines.
To round up, I'm really glad to have this back and I eagerly await more.
