After a year or more of following this game, I just have to say, I completely do not understand it.
It's almost like it's scientifically designed to be annoying and make the content not worth unlocking.
Case in point: There are apparently scenes in the spa. In order to get to the spa I have to run through an area with several enemies. The enemies award no experience, there is no real equipment to buy, and I can't take party members for whatever reason, so at no point will this task become trivial.
Moreover, there are three time "chunks" each day. 7 days. That means in order to catch the spa scene I may need to run through this area up to 21 times. Takes a few minutes each time, so it could take UPWARDS OF AN HOUR just to see this one scene. And that's assuming I never hit an enemy. If I hit an enemy, a few more minutes are added to my time. So it could take me anywhere from 1-3 hours to see the spa scene, theoretically.
And here's the thing... I only know it's there 'cause I read the changelog. This would never get unlocked by the average person in a blind playthrough of this game. And many of the scenes are locked behind garbage mechanics like this.
Other points of frustration. The GRIND. Jesus fuck, the grind. Watching affection tick up at 1 point per day doing the same event OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER. It's genuinely baffling. All I can say is "Thank fuck for the cheat room", because it's basically not worth playing without it. At this point I wish this game was just a scene gallery, because every part that qualifies this game as a game and not a collection of random sex scenes is basically awful.
I keep waiting for the gameplay to incrementally improve with the updates, but it's actually going the opposite direction. All that ever gets added is a scene or two (which are good, mind you) but usually hidden behind a bunch of bullshit, RNG, fumbling around in the darkness, boredom and blueballing.
I hope that significant changes are made that make this game less of a grindy, fucking frustrating to play snoozefest. Or just add a damned scene gallery already.