thanks for the comments and remarks. That makes a lot of sense but arguably this is the worst way to cut corners or do "clever" shortcuts as a dev in this type of game. The game sells by looks (it lets you customize a nice character) game mechanics and story. If they start taking your customized character away and replace with a generic one (worst case unappealing to the player and potential customer) a core feature gets removed. YMMV.
in any case the dev should do a poll on patreon. if all patreons love this kind of generic shortcut than who am i to say differently. But for me at least these things (and a substantial no nonsense update frequency) are essential to get me hooked as a patron.
I feel like a basic disguise woulda been sufficient for Haven. Not a single person in Haven has a reason to "recognize" Sammy. Plus this game has colored contact lenses, hair dye and a tattoo parlor. I noticed I was given both tattoos the parlor had, and wasn't entirely surprised, since they had exactly 2. A part of me figured those were more for the Haven plotline than for me to buy.
Fact is, we could've done all of that ourselves, aside from the skin color change, which again seems pointless. No one in Haven would know Sammy. Fortunately it's easy to recreate my girl Caroline. Ginger, pale, green eyes, freckles, long hair, pulled-back bangs, big tits, "small" areola, no bush, done. Carie. (They made me grow a bush for Haven... WHY)
On the plus side, I don't think that shirt they gave me for Haven is available for purchase, or those socks. So if nothing else, I got free new clothes. There are still things from the last version I can't find though, like the open bra. Advice for anyone making a new character would be to start on the last version, earn $300 and go buy the 2 missing bras from Funwear, then switch to the current version.
For those who can't get the Mira questline to start, it happened to me yesterday in school. I believe her friend walked over and spoke to me right after lunch on her own. I'm at the beginning of month 3 (winter). I have no idea if this info matters but this is how the Mira quest started for me. So at least we know one trigger exists, and it's in the school, as either RNG, or scripted to happen on the 1st day of Winter. It may have been coincidence it happened on that day. Who knows.