VN Ren'Py Yesterday's Crossroads [Ch.3 v0.4.1a] [CHAQUINN0]

[Crimsonfiend76]

This information that Zeke was sleeping with the entire sorority, and the MC knew nothing about it, only made me believe that they were never really friends, which was strange since they were supposedly childhood friends, studied at the same place, and saw each other all the time.

There are several signs that Zeke knew, or at least suspected, about Keyla and the MC, especially her interest and how she looked at the MC.
(I'm going to assume he was talking about Keyla, in this scene.)
View attachment 3854792 View attachment 3854793

Regarding the negative points we can accumulate with Zeke, I believe it will serve more for Zeke to antagonize the MC than for the MC to antagonize Zeke. The MC has no moral ground to comment on or judge Zeke's actions, since he had an affair with Zeke's girlfriend for months. Zeke already suspected it, but never said anything.

As for Keyla accepting to marry Zeke, it's really hard to believe that someone would do so, but if we are to force an excuse, we can consider that she intended to stay in the MC's life, even if only as a friend, and perhaps with a chance of an affair. If she had refused Zeke and the MC ended up with Kim, she probably couldn't stay around. It's a weak excuse, but it's what I can think of at the moment.

Zeke staying married to Keyla all this time also makes no sense. Was he afraid that Keyla and the MC would leave him to be together?

Well I finally got to play the update and if Keyla's excuse can be believed... she claims she said yes to Zeke because she truly wanted/hoped to move on and get over the MC. Around that time, the MC's dad just died and who was there to pick up the pieces? That's right Kim... and Keyla saw this... in her desperation she wanted to break up and end things with Zeke ASAP only for Zeke to weirdly decide to propose out of nowhere.

People say Zeke is being made out to be the bad guy to excuse Keyla's behavior, but I think Zeke has been an asshole for a long time all on his own. My opinion is he never loved Keyla, she was just a possession to him. She even mentioned to the MC that if he ever knew a guy liked her... he wanted her to tell him so he could have a 'conversation' with that guy and set him straight.... presumably to threaten him to back off HIS woman. So it's ok for Zeke to fuck any girl that's willing, but unless he was finally ready to let Keyla go, no way was he going to let her be with someone else.... which is why he proposed to her... so he could lock her down while still doing every girl he could.

Kinda fucked up that these were the MC's friends... but I digress, Keyla wanted to move on or try to so she stubbornly accepted a proposal from the last guy she should have (yikes! Hope she gets tested at this point for stds) and wanted to keep the group of friends together... she never liked Kim, she was her rival, but being married to Zeke gave her an excuse to still interact and see the MC on a regular basis. Sounds to me she has very low self esteem... and/or was completely obsessed with the MC and couldn't/wouldn't let him go.

 

[DaffyDuck_Wiz]

Well I finally got to play the update and if Keyla's excuse can be believed... she claims she said yes to Zeke because she truly wanted/hoped to move on and get over the MC. Around that time, the MC's dad just died and who was there to pick up the pieces? That's right Kim... and Keyla saw this... in her desperation she wanted to break up and end things with Zeke ASAP only for Zeke to weirdly decide to propose out of nowhere.

People say Zeke is being made out to be the bad guy to excuse Keyla's behavior, but I think Zeke has been an asshole for a long time all on his own. My opinion is he never loved Keyla, she was just a possession to him. She even mentioned to the MC that if he ever knew a guy liked her... he wanted her to tell him so he could have a 'conversation' with that guy and set him straight.... presumably to threaten him to back off HIS woman. So it's ok for Zeke to fuck any girl that's willing, but unless he was finally ready to let Keyla go, no way was he going to let her be with someone else.... which is why he proposed to her... so he could lock her down while still doing every girl he could.

Kinda fucked up that these were the MC's friends... but I digress, Keyla wanted to move on or try to so she stubbornly accepted a proposal from the last guy she should have (yikes! Hope she gets tested at this point for stds) and wanted to keep the group of friends together... she never liked Kim, she was her rival, but being married to Zeke gave her an excuse to still interact and see the MC on a regular basis. Sounds to me she has very low self esteem... and/or was completely obsessed with the MC and couldn't/wouldn't let him go.

Yes yes perfect

 

[erkper]

Well I finally got to play the update and if Keyla's excuse can be believed... she claims she said yes to Zeke because she truly wanted/hoped to move on and get over the MC. Around that time, the MC's dad just died and who was there to pick up the pieces? That's right Kim... and Keyla saw this... in her desperation she wanted to break up and end things with Zeke ASAP only for Zeke to weirdly decide to propose out of nowhere.

People say Zeke is being made out to be the bad guy to excuse Keyla's behavior, but I think Zeke has been an asshole for a long time all on his own. My opinion is he never loved Keyla, she was just a possession to him. She even mentioned to the MC that if he ever knew a guy liked her... he wanted her to tell him so he could have a 'conversation' with that guy and set him straight.... presumably to threaten him to back off HIS woman. So it's ok for Zeke to fuck any girl that's willing, but unless he was finally ready to let Keyla go, no way was he going to let her be with someone else.... which is why he proposed to her... so he could lock her down while still doing every girl he could.

Kinda fucked up that these were the MC's friends... but I digress, Keyla wanted to move on or try to so she stubbornly accepted a proposal from the last guy she should have (yikes! Hope she gets tested at this point for stds) and wanted to keep the group of friends together... she never liked Kim, she was her rival, but being married to Zeke gave her an excuse to still interact and see the MC on a regular basis. Sounds to me she has very low self esteem... and/or was completely obsessed with the MC and couldn't/wouldn't let him go.

Ding, ding, ding, ding... we have a winner!
If this was Keyla's motivation (as I agree it seems to have been) the only part of the narrative that doesn't make sense is why Zeke would propose to her in the first place. He says to MC "out of desperation" and refuses to explain what exactly that desperation is... I suspect Zeke actually did know about MC and Keyla hooking up and proposed to keep her from leaving him for his "best friend." If it's not made public, he isn't humiliated, can keep his friend, and pretend he doesn't know. In the end, my opinion is that they were ALL pretty shitty individuals in college - Kim, Keyla, Zeke, and MC alike. All the new reveals about Zeke and his cheating ways don't make Keyla and MC's sleeping together under his nose any better or more acceptable, they just mean Zeke is also not someone to feel sorry for in this messed-up situation. But I knew from the prologue that I wasn't going to pursue Keyla or Kim (if she reappeared as seemed inevitable right from the start) so I really don't care what justifications and hoops they jump through to try to salvage those two LIs' reputations and characters.

 

[micojive]

Well I finally got to play the update and if Keyla's excuse can be believed... she claims she said yes to Zeke because she truly wanted/hoped to move on and get over the MC. Around that time, the MC's dad just died and who was there to pick up the pieces? That's right Kim... and Keyla saw this... in her desperation she wanted to break up and end things with Zeke ASAP only for Zeke to weirdly decide to propose out of nowhere.

People say Zeke is being made out to be the bad guy to excuse Keyla's behavior, but I think Zeke has been an asshole for a long time all on his own. My opinion is he never loved Keyla, she was just a possession to him. She even mentioned to the MC that if he ever knew a guy liked her... he wanted her to tell him so he could have a 'conversation' with that guy and set him straight.... presumably to threaten him to back off HIS woman. So it's ok for Zeke to fuck any girl that's willing, but unless he was finally ready to let Keyla go, no way was he going to let her be with someone else.... which is why he proposed to her... so he could lock her down while still doing every girl he could.

Kinda fucked up that these were the MC's friends... but I digress, Keyla wanted to move on or try to so she stubbornly accepted a proposal from the last guy she should have (yikes! Hope she gets tested at this point for stds) and wanted to keep the group of friends together... she never liked Kim, she was her rival, but being married to Zeke gave her an excuse to still interact and see the MC on a regular basis. Sounds to me she has very low self esteem... and/or was completely obsessed with the MC and couldn't/wouldn't let him go.

Its just Zeke is made out to be the MCs one real true friend that he has had. It just doesnt seem realistic that he is THAT far off the mark with what kind of guy he really is. The Keyla to Zeke relationship I can KIND of understand the thought process to. Maybe not to the extreme of marriage but I've known people who got together with someone to just try moving on from an ex.

The Zeke too Keyla thing just makes no sense to me story wise, and honestly feels entirely like a plot device to have some big reveal in a few chapters and thats it. Something completely out of left field that is just created to try and make the player forgive Zeke, like he was pushed into it from the MC's dad actually being a bad guy with zekes dad and he was trying to protect him or something. It just doesnt make sense that a dude who slept around and was a manwhore randomly marries someone he doesnt love who just happened to love the MC.

Like why would Zeke care about locking down Keyla and not any other girl.

 

[Krytax123]

How was Zeke ever a bad friend towards the mc? Youre all judging him like he's the pure evil because he cheated in college??

And all this while his girlfriend cheated on him too (but is excused because of whiteknight bullshit?) lol. The mc is a worse friend than Zeke at this point, Zeke never wronged him as far as we know.

They are either both shitty cheaters or both excused because of dumb youth, and neither ever loved the other one (zeke & keyla).

 

[ImSenjou]

The game appointed Zeke as the MC's best friend, they have been friends since childhood, but in this latest update, we discovered that the MC doesn't seem to know Zeke as well as he should, and it's not even that Zeke has hidden something, but if even Kim knew about Zeke having sex with basically every girl in the sorority, and probably many others, how could Zeke's "best friend" not know this and be so surprised to hear about it? Even Keyla knew!

It's not that Zeke did anything wrong to the MC, it's just that their friendship feels fake or superficial.

Unfortunately, we don't have enough information and can form assumptions.

 

[Canto Forte]

This is clear that Zeke used MC for girls, because if you look at the two dudes, seriously, MC is more alike to Bob Marley while Zeke looks so much more cleaned up and slick and, you might say, offputting. Frat boy look and mentality, as it seems.

Spoiler

You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.

Zeke one uppped MC on every turn - married, got Keyla, kept being a player - emulating the usual cellebrity boy toy who strings many girls along and has many babies with different girls - while enjoying watching MC be a total train wreck with Kim dissapearing as opposed to getting married and then MC keeping the dead end job he had thought of leaving for months while Kim comes back like a boss at his work place having levelled up as opposed to the slumped clueless MC.

 

[OWSam000]

Some context from the game's code:

# Routes/Paths (MAIN LI)
default kim_route = False # LOCKS CANDACE
default julia_route = False # LOCKS CANDACE / OLIVIA
default olivia_route = False # LOCKS JULIA
default michelle_route = False # LOCKS ALESSA
default vera_route = False

# Routes/Paths (SECONDARY LI)
default keyla_route = False # "Default Route" (only active if no other girl is active / MC solo run ending)
default kimmy_route = False
default candace_route = False # locked if JULIA / KIM
default alessa_route = False # LOCKS MICHELLE (Vera included)

It seems A lot of paths are mutually exclusive. Keyla is a poor love interest as a left over. Candace, Julia and Olivia path seems conflicted towards each other. You can't have the sisters path but only Alessa and vera threeway. The Dev may have the harem path deleted later as long as DEV STILL follow to this game code. But I still want to see if Dev can create the impossible harem path of this reality-like game.

 

[Quetzzz]

It seems A lot of paths are mutually exclusive. Keyla is a poor love interest as a left over. Candace, Julia and Olivia path seems conflicted towards each other. You can't have the sisters path but only Alessa and vera threeway. The Dev may have the harem path deleted later as long as DEV STILL follow to this game code. But I still want to see if Dev can create the impossible harem path of this reality-like game.

Yeah, I think Keyla said as much in this last update, that she'd not make a move on the MC if he was in a relationship. (Paraphrased)

 

[Deleted member 3788572]

Wondering how being on multiple paths will be handled in the upcoming chapters. When I'm both on Kimmy and Olivia/Michelle and I choose to call the latter after returning from the trip, the visit to Kimmy with exchanging gifts and all will just be disregarded.

 

[Deleted member 7636288]

The game appointed Zeke as the MC's best friend, they have been friends since childhood, but in this latest update, we discovered that the MC doesn't seem to know Zeke as well as he should


It's not that Zeke did anything wrong to the MC, it's just that their friendship feels fake or superficial.

Seems like they didn't work out the background story correctly. I mean, no one will ever know anyone, so that's understandable. You/The MC will only ever know/see what the person wants you to know/see. You will never get to know what happens behinds the scenes (in their brain and how they really feel)

It is fake and superficial lol they are made-up game characters after all. The Dev just needs to fix that somehow. Don't make them "best friends" if the MC doesn't even know that his friend has slept with a bunch of bitches. Best Friends would brag about that shit, shove it in their friends faces like "yeaah, I fucked this/that bitch today, sucks to be you, loser" just to be an asshole lol.

That whole "friends since childhood" should be left for their female LI lol if you are going to use that for the bros, make sure things line up and they actually know what each other has done (well, what they want the other to know)

Nothing that can't be fixed but if people are already used to the story as is, eh, idk.

 

[ImSenjou]

...

I think you should read this post:

Hey, everyone!

I see the timeline seems a bit confusing for the time being, especially since the many dialogues addressing the past haven’t been totally introduced to the game itself yet.
It is simple but quite extensive though. We need to go back a few years before the game's prologue in order to understand it thoroughly.

Before turning this story into an AVN, I wrote it as sort of a book for my own life's experiences and adapted it for the game's story, the following is a summarized timeline of the prologue chapter of the book.

Keep in mind that there are no specific days, months or years in some of these events, but they are in the order as they happened.

Spoiler: Timeline

You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.

 

[Deleted member 7636288]

I think you should read this post:

Nah, I'm good.

I was just replying to the post I replied to and just gave it my thoughts. It could also help the Dev out (but if stuff was mentioned already, good to know)

 

[Krytax123]

I think you should read this post:

I really like the thoughts the dev put in the mc's past, the timeline is great and cohererent but unfortunaly just until Zeke and Keyla come back. Than it suddenly becomes nonsensical and just doesnt work.

It could even work in a weird twilight diaries situation love triangle (yuck) like keyla in love with both guys (obviously would be hated to in the avn world and sucks anyway) but in this case there would at least some kind of logic involved.

But Keyla not breaking up with Zeke despite never being in love with him, cheating on him and still not breaking up and than even marrying him to "not break his heart" and its potrayed as Zeke's fault because he didnt gave her any closure?!

What closure if she never loved him in the first place?

It kinda feels like this got this off rails because the dev tries his hardest to justify Keyla's behavior now while at the same time making sure the reader know she only ever wanted the mcs dick anyway and never Zeke lol

 

[Raziel_8]

Yeah, I think Keyla said as much in this last update, that she'd not make a move on the MC if he was in a relationship. (Paraphrased)

If she will follow through with that it would be a really poor path and makes Keyla even more pathetic...
Like girl, you realized your mistakes from the past, you still want the MC and him only, Kim is out away...so lets sit back and wait if the MC comes by, if no other girl has interest in him....i mean, come on girl at least try to get him, even better fight for the guy you wanted for the last decade.

This is just a repeat from college as she wanted to wait to break up with Zeke until whenever the stars had the perfect alignment, like did you not learn anything from that.

 

[Krytax123]

If she will follow through with that it would be a really poor path and makes Keyla even more pathetic...
Like girl, you realized your mistakes from the past, you still want the MC and him only, Kim is out away...so lets sit back and wait if the MC comes by, if no other girl has interest in him....i mean, come on girl at least try to get him, even better fight for the guy you wanted for the last decade.

This is just a repeat from college as she wanted to wait to break up with Zeke until whenever the stars had the perfect alignment, like did you not learn anything from that.

Maybe she and Zeke will marry again after the divorce as soon as the mc gets a serious relationship

 

[Maviarab]

The game appointed Zeke as the MC's best friend, they have been friends since childhood, but in this latest update, we discovered that the MC doesn't seem to know Zeke as well as he should,

Just going to add something, for everyone:

Sure, we're talking many more years but my best friend, my oldest friend (over 45 years), I really don't know that very well either in reality. And neither does he me. We grew apart. We stay in touch, always will but we became completely different people.

Now remember, Zeke moved away when he was younger also (this is how he met Keyla in the first place)....at that age, you go through a lot of changes, you start growing up, think differently. The point I'm trying to make is, even if they are oldest and best friends, that in and of itself does not nesseciate that they know everything about each other or are the same people they were 10 years ago or before/when in college.

Some of you must be very young, you'd be surprised what you actually don't know about even close family members....behind closed doors and all that...people keep secrets and keep a lot of shit to themselves.

Stay off social media, it isn't a reflection of real life.

 

[Deleted member 7636288]

Now remember, Zeke moved away when he was younger also (this is how he met Keyla in the first place)....at that age, you go through a lot of changes, you start growing up, think differently. The point I'm trying to make is, even if they are oldest and best friends, that in and of itself does not nesseciate that they know everything about each other or are the same people they were 10 years ago or before/when in college.

Some of you must be very young, you'd be surprised what you actually don't know about even close family members....behind closed doors and all that...people keep secrets and keep a lot of shit to themselves.

Stay off social media, it isn't a reflection of real life.

That would explain some things. I'd need all the deets if I were to try and Ringle up some good feedback (my personal own of course) How was he then compared to now?

And I don't think age should play a part on just having common sense (but if you are a kid, I guess it should) People should know that you won't ever truly know anyone because everyone has secrets and won't tell you 100% everything, even if they "claim" to.

Family are just the strangers you grew up with. Most (if not) everything on social media is fake or overhyped, if it has to do with people/their life.

As for the game, you telling me Zeke would never tell his "best friend" that he's banged so and so? not even in a dickish way but friendly way, etc

 

[Quetzzz]

Like girl, you realized your mistakes from the past, you still want the MC and him only, Kim is out away...so lets sit back and wait if the MC comes by, if no other girl has interest in him....i mean, come on girl at least try to get him, even better fight for the guy you wanted for the last decade.

This is exactly what I was thinking while writing out my reply. I do hope she gets proactive about her feelings, so I can turn her down.

 

[motseer]

Just going to add something, for everyone:

Sure, we're talking many more years but my best friend, my oldest friend (over 45 years), I really don't know that very well either in reality. And neither does he me. We grew apart. We stay in touch, always will but we became completely different people.

Now remember, Zeke moved away when he was younger also (this is how he met Keyla in the first place)....at that age, you go through a lot of changes, you start growing up, think differently. The point I'm trying to make is, even if they are oldest and best friends, that in and of itself does not nesseciate that they know everything about each other or are the same people they were 10 years ago or before/when in college.

Some of you must be very young, you'd be surprised what you actually don't know about even close family members....behind closed doors and all that...people keep secrets and keep a lot of shit to themselves.

Stay off social media, it isn't a reflection of real life.

Too much information is often an issue with telling a story. If the reader is only privy to the actions and dialogue of the characters things remain fairly "realistic" for a reader/viewer. When we get to hear the thoughts of the protagonist it gets more immersive but also more complex. If we are allowed to see the emotions and inner workings of the minds of many characters... well, this is the point at which reality and logic no longer apply. Add some past history for multiple characters and things get very messy. In this case, I usually begin with the premise that everyone in the story is wrong...

Jus' Sayin'