itch.io

That's really strange, it sounds like your game saved despite the fact it isn't supposed to be able to do so until you hit 'logout' at the end of a day's content :O That might be an additional issue too!

Ah, curiously, I restarted the game and something very different happened compared to when I was originally playing; originally, prplsqrl's spot on the Millenium Net Chat didn't even exist at all until AFTER I had found the private message on the PGFH forums and clicked the "add friend" button. With this restarted version, their icon and chat (plus pings) were viewable from the get-go. Whereas before I basically had no idea they were a part of the game until I found that private message. Might be a totally unrelated issue? But also hope this helps in some way, haha.

I'm having the same issue sadly :( The last person I spoke with before reaching this barrier was Andy, I held off on starting the conversation with him until after I had spoken with Sam and prplsqrl. After he marked Away there was no other apparent way to progress.