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Hey there! Thank you so much for playing LoveSick Darlings! I'm especially happy to hear you're a player who got try out the latest version of the demo, and it left enough of a good impression for you to make this post! Thank you so much for taking the time to write to me - and to leave such detailed thoughts! I really appreciate it.

Your struggle "playing matchmaker" for Syd is exactly my intention when making this game! Doing what Syd wants, what the others want from him, and what YOU the player want for all the characters is a delicate balance! I'm glad you think Maisy and Syd have the best synergy though. I really worked hard to make their friendship believable and real. In fact, their synergy is so high someone might even think those two are perhaps even better just as friends...? There's one extra layer of difficulty for you hahah!

"What if Maisy falls for Syd while dating Nacho?" "What if Jayda becomes dependent on Syd?" "What if Steph thinks Syd is trying too hard?" are all thoughts I wanted to stir in the player! I want the player to have just as much social anxiety about these three friends as Syd does haha! I'm genuinely happy to hear these thoughts are in your head as you play. As cruel as it sounds, it tells me that I'm doing something right. Thank you for sharing, really!

To answer your question: being brushed off doesn't raise your relationship, unfortunately! At least... 99% of the time. There's one or two instances where a character will thank you for asking to hang out, even if they aren't available. Those gives a small amount of points.

Regarding your suggestions:
- I agree. It'd be nice to have more backgrounds. I've been thinking about investing in a stock photo pack just for interior homes. But we'll see, no promises!
- I did consider doing this style of voice-acting, in a similar way to FE Awakening but... personally, I found the voice quips in Awakening to be a bit distracting and even take away from certain scenes when they weren't implemented right so I avoided them for LoveSick Darlings. Then if I instead used them sparsely, they might catch people off-guard and also take away from scenes. It'd be a delicate balance if I did such a thing! I'll take the suggestion on board at least though! It'd add a bit of life to the giant chunks of text at least.
- That's actually SUCH a good idea, damn! How did I never think of that?! Aw man... I might actually do this. Or at least try my best to. The artists of this project have moved on to new endeavours, but I'll see what I can do. As that'd be a great way to fill those scenes with something to look at! Instead of "bed.jpg" as you said haha!
- I never considered I'd need more pages for saves! I might update the UI to show additional pages! I can imagine over multiple playthroughs, the saves would fill up fast...

Thanks so much for your input!

Regarding the size of the game.... this game is absolutely monstrous. I've created a beast and I'm doing my best to tame it, haha! The game is currently at 800K words. I'm writing the final week of the game currently. In fact, there is a closed Beta for Kickstarter backers that covers most of the game and the feedback has been positive so far. So rest assured, the game IS coming along! But slowly. 2023 is the goal, and I really hope it's ready by then!

In any case, I hope you enjoy continuing to explore the demo! I hope it's fun!

And that's the end of my long reply back to you! I hope it wasn't too boring or wordy! I can literally talk about this game all day. Thanks once again for playing and sharing!

PS: I especially loved that you called Stuart "normal" - you're probably the first person to call him that! Most players call him a bit odd or weird hahaha. But maybe compared to the rest of her cast he's a different kind of "normal" hahah! I'm also glad you liked Albie too. He was originally a very simple character, but giving him depth over the updates has been an unexpected treat! This is the case for most side characters haha!