Not just users, but also reviewers.
So, I'm trying to understand if it's just a "vocal minority", or something else?
How would a dating sim without stat raising work? You have scenes that trigger in fixed sequence? or you decide who to visit to advance the plot?
And then the outcome / relationship would be decided only by the choices, without a real possibility to fail but just different endings? A bit like what Miakoda did in PSCD, where every choice has a little consequence in later scenes?
Just trying to understand because to be honest, the dating sims I made are MUCH more popular than my VNs. On the other hand, I have to say that I just did some sci-fi/male targeted VN (Bionic Heart) and the Heileen series which was written by me and not really a dating sim. Perhaps I should try to do one of those "dating sim without stat raising" one day then!
Well, a good candidate could be Never Forget Me, since it already works that way, and I was just trying to find a gameplay for it (but since it's about a married/couple life, you just choose at beginning which path to play, and you can't date different guys). Maybe the solution is to not have a gameplay?
