Not happy about the happy ending. Spoilers inside of course.

[Risingson]

The fact that you have to encourage a super creepy guy that is 100% the trope of the "good guy" and the fact that you have to manipulate your best friend into making her believe that you are in love with her, jumping over all the respect boundaries, in order to have the reward of the PERFECT ending, is extremely unsatisfying and creepy. It follows some "the end justifies the means" bs message that I am so over with.

No, really, I was enjoying this game until I finished it once with the worst ending, found how to get to the good one, and found that the rewarded path is to randomly encourage the new creepy guy instead of the prick ex boyfriend. All because there can be only guys who save her, as the girl as all girls here is stupid, superficial and cannot do anything by herself. The more I think about it, the more angry I get.

[rpmcruz]

At some point in the game, there is a newspaper article (I don't remember if Greg or Taylor finds it) that explains the girl -> boy -> girl -> ... pattern. It wouldn't then make sense that Ashley would go instead of Taylor.

I also don't understand why you say Taylor is creepy. It is revealed at some point that his public exposure was accidental.

[Risingson]

You don't get why a guy that constantly asks for private information (pictures, etc) of a [missing, probably tortured] girl he is attracted to, asking as well to keep it from her as a guys thing is a creep????

BTW, playing Simulacra 2 and it is way smarter about the themes and characters.

[Alienatedlabor]

I haven't finished the game yet so I can't comment on the endings but both guys in the game are definitely creeps in a way that has entirely become a stereotype. I didn't find this distracting or anything because this stereotype is informed by actual women and their interaction with actual "nice guys" and so on. None of the dudes are likeable characters though.