izigame.me

tl;dr

i liked the previous games, but i don't like this entry very much. i don't like its story. i don't like the majority of its characters, and not in a "man, this guy is a bad person" way, but a "man, you are not interesting and i don't really want to keep reading" way. that's not to say i don't appreciate the developer's work, i certainly do - however, i hope any future endeavors of theirs have stories and characters that i can enjoy more.
full spoilers ahead - for the whole game, and repeat playthroughs.

this game... is not a fantastic followup to the second game. there's technically more content with side activities and such, but the game frustrates me with its story's execution, its cast of characters, and especially what one can find in repeat playthroughs.
if you played the previous game, you need to understand: despite being named similarly, these are not quite the same characters. you might remember distinct character traits emily and evelyn showed before, such as emily wanting to be independent and free, where evelyn wants to settle down, which both were nice contrasting traits to what one would stereotypically expect from each person and this would be reflected in both of these characters struggles. that is gone now. any of these qualities are homogenized to hell in this game, to the point that there is really no reason to like one character over the other. they don't have the distinct, strong personalities they had in the previous game. they talk... normal. they feel... the same.
it feels... generic. emily and evelyn don't feel much like characters here. they feel like a slightly adaptable script, and not like two individuals that you might relate to, or even really like beyond "oh, the character said she wanted to date me, and all my choices are 'yes' in different flavors". it hardly feels like they want anything tangible throughout the entirety of your interactions with them other than to just give you the sense that you're dating someone, and even that much, from the perspective of the player, at least i didn't really know why. the things we had in common were because i said i liked it, and the character just sorta... changed to agree with that. save for one, very easy choice which is functionally identical for both characters - there was no moment where the girls have issues, and you have to support them. there's no reason to like either girl.
i liked exactly one (count 'em) character in this game, and that is the only person who i felt was a fully realized character, with an interesting story to them; mat. the dude singlehandedly brings the most engaging drama to the game with his own breakup, with some nice visual change in his color palette to symbolize his own feelings, as well as his changing dynamic with the protagonist, showing his initial vulnerability and later being a person the player can place their trust in. he also has a massive pair of nuts for alerting the player to (what should be) obvious red flags for them, and sticking around for them afterward. mat's story is one i liked more than the protagonist's own story.
locking the "good" ending behind a second playthrough should have been where the game shows how different emily and evelyn have become, cementing these characters as two different human beings entirely. but in truth, it achieves the exact opposite - the second playthrough shows almost no substantial differences for the majority of it, and noticing how much of the text was literally the exact same but with a dot added or missing from the end of sentences, was extremely disappointing, and made me wish i could simply skip through the text as the illusion of messaging another person was now fully broken. at times, it made me consider that the game might have been better if it didn't include evelyn this time around, as the only things that separated her from emily by the second playthrough felt more like flavor text than genuine expressions of the character's personality.
while the aesthetic of facenook - being an obvious parody of facebook - was nice and nostalgic, and i did appreciate it regardless, it did not do enough for me to favor this game over the previous, especially with that game having a far stronger story and characters. i also struggled to read into this game's story and its message; what exactly is being said here? was the inclusion of a good ending necessary? i would argue that it confuses the narrative and detracts from the story, if anything.
in all, while i can see things that would interest some, and i look forward to seeing the developer's future work, i cannot say this game in particular is one i enjoyed very much or recommend.
anyway thank you for reading through my autism fueled rant, i hope you're having a nice day there. remember to drink water or something idk.