oh definitely. Sujin Ri openly states she makes up things as she goes when she writes and Another Story suffered a LOT from that.
But at least OS felt more cohesive? With Another Story each new content released felt like an wildly different direction

I also suspect they did not want the twins' relationship to get backlash in any way nor hurt their best seller character popularity because of them being too obsessed with each other so they had to nerf the twins relationship and shut down that from Saeran's side quick and redirect it to MC instead

Cheritz's also an immense pushover when it comes to what's popular in fandom; and they are pretty blatant about changing their own story to meet the fanbase's expectations 🫠
or if they see a trope that's popular and successful they try to force it in.

I honestly wonder that too. From what I can assume from interviews, is that main issue for them is that the original would be too abrasive and cause drama because of that, and wouldn't prioritize MC in any way for a long time. So they had to change it to make more people happier.

I assume way too many people wanted his effin cookie so bad they really didn't care how and Cheritz using him as the sacrificial lamb for fanservice to pay the company bills was just added bonus. Bleh.

How the heck the majority of the fandom was okay with it even after playing Se2 is beyond me, like, not even the fake cult induced DID can change the fact that we ended up with a completely different character cuz cheritz no longer wanted to write for them.

Although it still baffles me she was okay with letting them change Saeran from his original self so much to the point I cringe at the way they did it in Another Story ("he was a split personality created by the cult's drugs guys!")
I guess she really wanted the money to finish The Ssum's development

They're often much better at coming up with ideas than executing them. It's the same with the Ssum.
Also yes, the main writer is Sujin Ri but she has several assistant writers working under her and it's obvious they change a lot since the quality of the writing varies widely.

Another Story is fully voiced, has more Visual Novel scenes and the chats are longer (which gives you more story but also a curse since they can get exhausting).

Also managed to flesh out some parts of OS plot that needed to be polished; but I'm not fond of the majority of the retcons they did.

Like yeah it's nice if it happens but not so nice if the writing around it is absolutely ugh. bad.

He remains a neutral party if not provoked. So the SEs were okay and likely betting on his position in power being temporary as a politician+the danger he poses being temporary.

I get the fandom fixation with removing him as an obstacle but it doesn't mean a route is "better" because that happens.

Also if you want to know my opinion about Saejoong / the twins dad. I think there's potential there for an interesting story and character.
Taking him down isn't as necessary as the fandom thinks for the twins happiness tbh (the way Ray AE went about it was also absolutely horrible for the victims)

that by the time you are near the end of it you feel like you are playing a route/AE of a total stranger.

You can also tell the writers struggled a lot to write AS Saeran, since when they make him too repetitive they resort to summoning a new personality and forget the previous one

Despite a couple of improvements both Another Story routes are kinda bad and overrated, the hype is solely due to MM being kinda unique in its niche.

Even if they wanted a major selling point for AS, it's still a pretty poorly written route/AE when the changes to Saeran's personality happen so fast

It's been 9 yrs of MM and I still have such a massive hateboner for Ray route and Ray AE.

And the reason is that they need a extremely clingy and romantic character to lure players to spend 550 HG since V was "too distant" so Saeran got downgraded to invasive extra personality that gets exorcised.

yeah I think needing funds for the ssum is why they went forward with that idea for new routes for MM...

I still haven't forgiven Cheritz for that, they just straight up made a new character and treated the original as an intruder.