I love the story. it was so amazing  I just had to submit it because it had a happy ending that left me wanting more 

Let me begin by saying that I respect the ambition a lot. The production values are ridiculously high; it's really just an insane amount of art to be made in a month even with a big team, and all of it is very good. The flipside: it's maybe not surprising that the jam build ended up with a lot of unfinished assets, and if I had been the game's producer, I would probably have instructed the team to aim a little lower and focus on getting the essentials done first. Still, it's all good work even in this state – the art direction feels cohesive, and the only real polish nitpick I have is that the UI isn't the most user-friendly with the text box's near-transparent background and the buttons disappearing in the art sometimes.

The writing I'm less enthusiastic about, unfortunately. The big thing is the pacing: it feels like the story is constantly struggling to catch up with itself, bombarding the reader with long flashbacks and lines that bluntly explain what a character is feeling or what they think about something. I was smelling trouble when we open in the 1904 story, jump almost immediately to a flashback, and then have the protagonists exposit their backstories at each other in it. It's context overload: the story spends more time on explaining itself than happening. The action climax and the epilogue, for example, feel so fleeting compared to how many words we spend on getting there.

And even then, some of the plot's twists and turns feel like they're trying to play off of setup that's not strong enough. Consider this line: "The legendary Nathaniel Hemlock, finally broken wide open. A crack in the strong man facade he had so carefully built to protect himself." It's kind of hard to take this as a big, transformative character moment when most of what we get of the core duo and their relationship is the long sex scene – the facade just wasn't really ever there for the reader to see. (Also, I think this is the kind of thing you don't have to say in the narration if the story succeeds at conveying it implicitly!)

I think the most cliche feedback to give would be "show, don't tell" – or even "kill your darlings" in that there are elements like Cormac's part of the love triangle that I'd happily lose in favor of more time with the stuff that really matters – but what I'm drawn towards is the fabula/syuzhet distinction. The story, its plot beats, and its character arcs make perfect sense on paper, but the pacing is just too brutal, and the structure is organized around filling in backstory rather than letting scenes be propelled by the momentum of their own drama. The sex scene stands out as a part that was allowed to breathe, I think, and it's written very well in general.

Down the River's Edge ended up being one of my favourite Novembuck entries so far.

When it comes to the presentation, I think everyone did their part really well. I loved the custom UI, especially with the little details like cards and antlers for the characters speaking. Every single one of the many artists did an outstanding job, especially the animator who managed to create an insane amount of animations in just 30 days?? Even the sketchier comic/action segments are expressive and lovely.

The expressions on the sprites are very good too, especially Javi's guarded expressions and body language. Special shoutout to the faces the lawman makes at the end, those were... a lot! My only complaint is that some of the clothes, especially pants, look very strange? It seems like the texture on the material isn't quite right.I think the bartender character is the worst offender, followed by Nate. The music was pleasant and fitting as well.

I enjoyed both the prose and the storytelling decisions that were made. The present and past were interwoven at nice intervals to give us insight into the characters' history in a way that hit in the feelings just right. There was uncertainty until the last moment whether we'll get a tragedy or not, and the journey there was full of intrigue, adorable sappy moments and tension. I was ultra invested in the fate of the main duo without even realising when it happened.

I must compliment the smutty part separately,  since I very rarely enjoy the way sex scenes are written in FVNs. I'm just too picky and they tend to say something  that I find too silly or that makes me roll my eyes. This never happened here, so please take the rare City of sneps horny medal of honour. The animations absolutely helped too.

Congratulations to all team members for all doing their part excellently, and to the project lead for not the good writing, but coordinating it all into such a strong debut VN!

Really good VN, impeccable even. The presentation is outstanding in every aspect, from the background art to the sprite art to the UI to the... steamier bits. This is obviously quite a mushy and horny story, but there's still an intriguing hook to the plot, thanks to the scenes set in the future where Javi is set to kill Nate. There's a big lingering mystery to what happens to them that makes the relatively simple romantic tale in the past an interesting one. Even in the past, the romantic plot and setup is interesting due to the worldbuilding of the Old West. But mostly it's the old/young relationship I'm always a sucker for that got me this time, hehe. The plot in the future is much darker, obviously, but no less gripping. Even if the resolution to the conflict was a little predictable, I was still surprised by just how dark the torture scene had gotten, and frankly would not have been surprised if Javi had killed Nate. But that wasn't even the first death fakeout! I genuinely thought the next one would be the end for them. So to see both of them come out of it alive was a genuine relief in so many ways, bringing the story to an emotional close, complete with some of the best CG-only storytelling I'd ever seen in any VN. A job very well done to everyone on this team.

Down The River's Edge doesn't do anything novel, or special with it's storytelling.
Tale as old as time, lover's old as rhyme or however the Disney song goes, I sure as hell can't remember.
The geniunity(is that a word? it should be) of the lovers feels right, an ambitious youth, an old and gruff veteran with a heart of gold. A sin that's seems unforgivable, you know the drill.
The story is touching and has enough tension for you to also tense up while reading. While the deer character could have been presented as more gruff (the part where he cracks up was supposed to be a special situation, but he never really seemed as rough as the narrative tried to sell me) everything else was solid.
I loved the extremes the lawman's sprite went for in the end, really showing a completely different side of what was presented at the beginning of the story.

What obviously sells this one is the presentation. Custom UI, backgrounds, animation, comic sequences. The devs hopefully all got treated to something nice after the entire project. I even expected voice acting during the pretty well done sex scene, though that one felt a little too modern for me in the writing department.
Other than that, the sweet ending was earned and felt great. My only real point of critique is the way a lot of the sprites look a little too glossy, but that's just an artstyle thing I personally don't enjoy.