STEINS;GATE 0

I really wanted to like this game. I really, really tried. But if I had to describe Steins;Gate 0 in one word, it would be: nothingburger. Nothing meaningful happens. I know this game suffers from being stuck in the aftermath of the first game and having to build toward its culminating point, but GOD, DOES NOTHING EVER HAPPEN. They introduce a plot point and it goes nowhere. They introduce a whole new area of science and it goes nowhere. There was literally a chapter where the characters get attacked by some Russian thugs, and then the next day they're just casually going shopping. WHAT?! The old cast also feels completely washed. Literally. I liked some of the growth Daru had as a dad, but then they just build that up only to ruin it by making him a total creep toward Suzuha. So what's even the deal with his character in this game? He doesn't really grow. And don't even get me started on Luka and Faris being reduced to convenient plot devices. These are characters I genuinely liked in the first game, and here they barely feel like themselves. And OH MY GOD, MAHO. I really, really wanted to like Maho. I did. She had so much potential to be an interesting character, especially because of her relationship with Kurisu and everything surrounding Amadeus. But instead, she feels like some weird, unnecessary love interest for Okabe while simultaneously being used as a plot device for Kurisu. And I don't understand what the game is trying to do with her and Okabe. Okabe literally states that he only loves Kurisu, and yet the game keeps pushing Maho onto him ALL THE TIME. It's like every opportunity they get, they have to remind us that Maho and Okabe have some kind of romantic tension. Why?! Their relationship could have been completely compelling without turning it into this weird pseudo-romantic thing. Maho's strongest aspect, in my opinion, is her connection to Kurisu. She is grieving her, she's dealing with the fact that she feels like she couldn't live up to Kurisu, and she's carrying all this emotional baggage because of her relationship with her. THAT'S INTERESTING. That's the stuff I wanted to see explored. Instead, so much of Maho's character gets wrapped up in Okabe and the Kurisu/Amadeus plot. It makes her feel less like her own character and more like a convenient way to keep Kurisu's presence hanging over the story. And considering how much potential Maho had, that's incredibly. Also the new art direction is a huge let down...

Completely and utterly bizarre that a VN can be programmed so badly and never be fixed. First theres a bug where everything is super sped up in full screen mode so im forced to use windowed mode then use a third party program to make it full screen. Then halfway into the story I got this memory error bug which shouldnt be happening. Then a day later the game hard crashes on me and all my saves are completely wiped for zero reason. All my settings changed too. Its also not a me issue because in the forums other people are having this issue too. All my other games seem to work just fine and it seems to be an issue with just this one. So now I have 15 hours of progress lost because of a stupid bug with this VN.