The fact that this game has spent over 4 years in development, only to remain at v0.2 is quite disappointing and the content that is available thus far leaves much to be desired.
While the game does have quite attractive renders, and quite a bit of love definitely went into character design, lighting and posing, the game's plot feels quite empty and the characters are written in predictable ways.
The mc is extremely mediocre, for the most part he acts like a man-child who has undergone essentially no real development and growth in his time spent away from everyone else. He has failed to impress anyone in any meaningful way since his return and his entire personality is "I'm dumb but I'm hot". A shallow "alpha male" who "asserts dominance" by projecting sexual energy, and honestly, the sexual tension between him and everyone else is ridiculous. He still holds onto petty grievances and his vocabulary is riddled with words and terms that would only be used by a frat boy. Given his presumed age, it's not a good look. The women treat him as though he's the shit, but in actuality, he shares very few traits in common with a high value man. A man, by societal standards, is valued based on what he's capable of; what he's done and what he can do. This mc is on the receiving end of boundless admiration while he continues to act like a child. It's very important to have a well written mc considering the game will be experienced through his pov, you don't want to establish this disconnect between the protag and the audience but I couldn't identify with him not one time. When he met with the girl he publicly embarrassed, his remorse was lacking, then he'd have the audacity to say "Stop projecting the way I treated you on how I would treat Helen".
The emotional focus of the plot is driven by the mc's guilt towards abandoning everyone the way he did, and honestly, it's hard to take it seriously. It constantly feels as though they're making a large issue out of something trivial, while the mc continues to fall for the same guilt trip. The "small town" vibe where everyone knows each other is creepy enough, added to that is the fact that everyone acts as though the town itself is a prison of obligation to the mc, discouraging him from leaving with constant emotional manipulation saying shit like "I'm sure mc will make the right decision". Honestly had me laughing thinking "What is this, the church of scientology?" I can't take it seriously.
The mc having predisposed opinions of everyone leads to him acting familiar with people who the player has no inclination towards. This robs the player of the opportunity to identify with the mc and his judge of character and a lot of the context behind the nature of his relationships with others. I still, really and truly, have no idea what half these characters mean to the mc.
So far, the choices leave you without agency as the mc's personality overshadows the player's thoughts and opinions on the events that transpire as mc acts in his own way. There are also times at which the developer attempts to flex their literary muscles and butchers any intellectual conversation with fake deep generalizations of the issue at hand. I'd say the rating this game has received is a testament to how easily impressed the majority of this community is, which can be both a good thing and a bad thing.
Play it, you'll prolly like it anyways.