Without knowing your origins, it is impossible to know where you are or where you're heading. Although this proverb is quite cliched, it does have some truth, as do most proverbs from long ago. However, when it comes to visual media, particularly when it comes to adaptations, these feelings seem to vanish into thin air and disappear beyond fields.
Since this is essentially the spiritual successor to Kimikiss, a lot of people may already be aware that the series is just another dating sim adaptation. Therefore, it makes sense that Enterbrain would want to replicate the relative popularity of the latter game and its anime adaptation. However, Amagami SS chooses to handle the plot differently than its predecessor, breaking things up into bite-sized relationship pieces in the hopes that this will make them easier to stomach. This strategy sort of works.
The six short stories (plus one "special" episode) that make up the series tell the story of Tachibana Junichi's search for high school love and his encounters with six different females (no, this isn't School Days all over again, before you ask). Many relationship shenanigans occur along the route, leading to the customary miscommunications, reconciliations, attractions, repulsions, etc.
Amagami SS now appears to be a romantic comedy set in a common or garden harem, but it uses the harem theme in a different way. The plot follows the game's philosophy, giving the protagonist a choice of numerous girls to pursue. While this may seem like a novel approach to some, the series' attempts to hide its flaws by using varying narrative styles from story to story make it seem unoriginal.
The main issue with short stories is that there has to be sufficient information and background provided by the narrative to support the thoughts, feelings, and actions of the characters. It's amazing that Amagami is able to provide at least a hint of a plot throughout each story. However, it's not surprising that there is at least a passably good tale there because most storyline and character development areas in anime and manga have been thoroughly explored.
Even while each story is quite good on its own, the image changes when one views them in the context of the entire collection. A sequence of inconsistent behaviors and acts that don't seem to make sense emerge. One may readily interpret them as a result of presuming that people behave differently toward different persons and vice versa. This would explain Amagami's actions. The issue is that this presumption essentially reduces the characters in the earlier stories to blank canvases by ignoring how they were portrayed. This is made worse by the fact that some characters appear to have no idea what's going on with folks they've known for a long time.
Even so, they can be enjoyable if read as a collection of short stories. However, each story's plot is unremarkable, and the formulaic style of telling each one can occasionally be a little too familiar. They also offer very little in the way of originality and a lot of predictability.
Amagami SS is, in a strange sense, a classic example of too many girls and not enough time, and the idea to produce it in the first place appears to have been driven more by the desire to show off how amazing the games are than by any desire to tell a story.
