I just started the game up and will be playing it tonight. I've decided to start the game from the beginning to refresh myself on all the characters and events. So, everything said after this should still be taken with that in mind, I haven't played the latest batch of content.
When I first started being a DM back in the late nineties it was like that. I had solid groups that would finish out campaigns regularly. For about the past fifteen years of so I've run the TTRPG club on the campuses I work at and I'm lucky if a group stays together for more than three months. A group will form of college students, they'll be good for a couple months then finals will come, summer or winter break, they'll get new jobs, excreta, and then the group will splinter. A month or two later a new group will form and go through the cycle too. I've gotten really good at having ever couple of sessions have a punchy event that could serve as at least a satisfying, if not full, campaign ender if needed because I never know if it might be the last one for that group of players. It's a lesson I'm carrying over into the AVN scripts I've been working on while I'm trying to find/learn a good tool for making the visuals.
Just as an aside, Aoibheann is probably my favorite character.
Also, I hope you know I don't hate Chiara or anything. I think she is a good character for what she is. I just think she is an odd type of character to have in the AVN format of storytelling, and some of the events around her could be tweaked is all.
Some people get upset when developers do reworks, but I'm not one of them. I've been a writer for almost 30 years, a large chuck of it I was actually teaching it. Until it's done (and sometimes even after) reworking is part of the process of any story. The issue is people (sometime even developers) on this site and elsewhere thinking of this as a completed work being released in parts as opposed to a demo or first draft that could be reworked if needed. It always bugs me more when a developer notices a problem and then doesn't fix it. As long as the developer is upfront about what they are doing I think anything is okay. Most fans will stick around and wait a little longer for a better game and story and then that better game and story will bring in more fans later because it is, well, better.
I think that you have a leg up on a lot of other developers on the site in that, while you are an amateur game developer, you are not an amateur storyteller. You know the value of feedback, even if it is harsh, and even if it is unreasonable in fact. You're able to take a step back and sort out the good criticism from the bad, find the pearls in the pile so to speak. Some developers take any criticism personally thinking, "This person didn't like this character I made, or plot point in my story? How dare they!" As if it is an attack on them and their value as a person. A good storyteller can step back and look at it more objectively and say, "Could I have done that better? Why didn't they like this?" And that helps them improve the whole of their craft.
I'll never forget one of my books while it was being worked on, my editor came to me and asked when I would finally kill off one of the characters. I was shocked when he asked because that character was one of my favorites, I had a whole redemption arc plotted out on my notes board. I took the time and re-read the earlier chapters and realized that I had made him too unlikeable. Noone would give him a chance at redemption because I had made him too unlikable before he had his turn. I had to rework all the earlier stuff because I still wanted the redemption arc because the story resolved around the push and pull or revenge vs. redemption and this anti-hero secondary character was a key part of the main hero realizing that some people can change and be saved, some can't, and wisdom was in noticing the difference. Noticing people's nature and actually intent is a lesson I had to learn myself the hard way as my former publisher has been sitting on my book for over a decade, hence why now I'll only self-publish.
Bit of a rant there, I swear I don't do it on purpose.
I don't think I'm familiar with that program. I'll look into it; I've been struggling to find a good visual to use for my AVN ideas.
This reminds me of a Stan Lee quote, I think from all the way back in the 80's. Basically it says, "Hawkeye is someone favorite character." It was kind of a mantra he had for whenever someone would ask questions like, "Who wins between X and Y hero," or when they had two hero characters square off against each other for an arch in a comic. Every hero is someone's favorite and it was, in Stan Lee's mind, wrong to lift up one hero at the expense of another, to disrespect one hero just so another can shine, to denigrate those fan's favorite just because they were a smaller group. That's what villains are for, to challenge and eventually lose to the heroes, heroes shouldn't lose to each other. Everyone knows that Thor would crush Hawkeye or BlackWidow in a fight, so if they had to fight, he had a rule that they had to get interrupted and work together before a winner was decided. The first Avengers movie handled these types of moments perfectly. It's a lesson a lot of the people making the new stuff should take to heart.
That's one of the reasons I brought up Nook in my example. She's one of the biggest fan favorites around, so it would be silly to even think about unilaterally pairing her off with someone else besides the MC. Some people may say, "Well, I don't care because Eshtel is kind of meh, and look at all the other girls you have access too," but the problem there is that you (hypothetical *you* not you specifically) see her as meh, but someone else she's her as the best girl and all the others as meh meaning now they have no one they are interested in perusing. So, while it may only be a few people, or a lot of people, she is someone's favorite. This is why a developer needs to remember that every girl you introduce could become someone's favorite, the only girl they are interested in, and so if she isn't a possible love interest then why create her so fully at all? A faceless shadow girl (like the red or blue background figures some games use), a girl who exists only in text form as someone talked about, or a girl designed from the ground up to look unappealing (Grandma's House and Eternum do this, though this can be subjective so it might still end up as an issue) could serve such a role better.
I actually didn't get the sense, in the story as it was at the time, that Chiara had much interest in the MC herself or sharing her girlfriend if she got one. Knowing the common trope in AVNs of course it stands to reason that if you hook them up there might eventually be a chance to get some play time with them, but that never appeals to me. I'm not a fan of the "every girl is secretly bisexual" trope, but I can deal with it as long as both bisexual girls actually care about and love the MC equally to each other. Even less so am I a fan of the MC being a third wheel in other people's committed lesbian relationships. Being a dildo with a pulse to a pair of lesbians doesn't appeal to me when I can have a real relationship and interaction with another girl, pair of girls, or more who actually care about and are committed to me.
I did suggest one way it could play out as well; that Chiara and Eshtel learns that outside of Chiara's physical attraction to her they don't have much in common and probably wouldn't work out. It could be used as the first chance for Chiara to show herself as a friend wingman for the MC. Her thoughts could go like this, "It won't work out between me and her, but I know that Aurum and Eshtel were into each other. I probably shouldn't have made him help me try and hook up with her, that was kind of a jerk thing to do to a guy who hadn't been anything but nice to me... maybe I can make it up to him by helping them find each other?" That could be the start of their buddy-cop comedy duo. Later on, maybe she comes to him for advice about some faceless girl that she's talking to, and he could still help her get a relationship with someone else that we never see. Or she develops a budding bisexuality and hooks up with the MC and then her and one of the other girls in the harem can have a good time together from time to time with the MC's approval and interaction.
