Summer Pockets - General Discussion

HeliosAlpha · July 16, 2019, 10:27am

Route Topics
Common Route Discussion
Shiroha Naruse Route & Character Discussion
Ao Sorakado Route & Character Discussion
Tsumugi Wenders Route & Character Discussion
Kamome Kushima Route & Character Discussion
ALKA Arc Discussion
Pocket Arc Discussion
Tenzen Kano Character Discussion
Shimamon Topic
Ping Pong Topic
Summer Pockets Fanworks
Summer Pockets Quotes & Screencaps

General discussion thread for Summer Pockets. Please tag late-game spoilers with the [spoiler] tag with adequate context provided in parenthesis.

ukulelembo · June 29, 2018, 12:23pm

So, is there some “final” route again? What is its name? And what is twist this time? No need for full spoilers. Just imply.

Hydron · June 29, 2018, 5:18pm

4 Main routes > Umi’s route > Pockets

ukulelembo · June 29, 2018, 8:08pm

Just saw CGs. Jesus, for love of Abe. Even here, really Key?

MKL · June 29, 2018, 11:17pm

Well, they need to promote love somehow

Ron_Boom · June 30, 2018, 8:29am

So as per Key tradition for the final route, does we get to hear Hairi’s fully voiced and VA?
Also, who is the heroine for the finale?

HeliosAlpha · June 30, 2018, 9:16am

So the true route’s called Alka. Information is trickling down, just very slowly.

Hydron · June 30, 2018, 9:25am

From what I heard, the final route is quite short and is really just Umi’s backstory. I’m pretty sure Umi’s route is meant to be the true story.
Shiroha is really just the main heroine of the game.

Ron_Boom · June 30, 2018, 11:46am

Awww dang, I’m hoping for granpa Kobato to be the one.

Takafumi · June 30, 2018, 5:27pm

Here’s some general common route thoughts:

My first impressions of the setting were, surprisingly, nowhere near what they were when Summer Pockets was announced. I expected some kind of heavy-atmosphere AIR kinda dealio, and while some of the backgrounds and environments are the spitting image of AIR, it feels nothing like it.
Instead I’d liken it more to Rewrite. The VN feels very open, and in a way it’s kind of empty. Part of that feeling comes from the background music, most of which is very quiet and peaceful with a hint of adventurousness. If you’re a FF fan, expect some similarities to Crisis Core or 15 in music.
Another reason for the very open feel is the protagonist. He’s not exactly a bombastic character…

Hairi is a real downer. He looks at a defunct lighthouse and is like “yup, I feel ya lighthouse.” You buy the boy a happymeal and just asks what is happy about it. He has some of the same problems that Kotarou had, but he doesn’t have that happy go lucky outward behaviour to make everything fun. Hairi just feels like he’s ready to accept death in a way. He’s kinda lost, but he’s not really looking for anything…

Shiroha is slightly reminiscent of Mutsumi Suginami at times, certainly at the start. I’d say she’s overall more awkward and childish compared to Mutsu however. Her various facial expressions are some of my favorites in the entire game. Rather subtle when compared to Ao or Tsumugi, which makes for a nice contrast. It fits her personality.

Ao is basically a Mashiroiro character. She even has the weird animal companion. Her sprite naturally takes up a lot of the on-screen attention because of how flashy her hair is and how expressive both her poses and expressions are. More art that is very fitting of the personality.

I swear every single sprite and CG of Tsumugi is ever so slightly off. Her eyes never look like they’re in the right place. Still, her voice is amazing (had a bit of a Menma thing going on) so I like her. Not normally a fan of these kinds of characters, but there’s something sweet about Tsumugi. Her little peace sign sprite is adorable.

Kamome takes forever to show up, and when she does it’s rather surprising. I was expecting her to be more collected and cutesie than she actually is. The skull hairpin doesn’t match her personality at all. Her face also looks quite different when her eyes are closed, definitely not what I imagined her to look like.

Side character wise, Miki is pretty cute but her character feels very flat. The boys are both very flamboyant, which I’m sure some people here will love. The group dynamic that occurs whenever these characters show up is very similar to the ones you’d see in 1st Beat’s common route. Infact, the entire common route of Summer Pockets feels similar to Angel Beats. Lots of meaningless choices and dumb comedy choices.
Also Na-Ga needs to chill with the muscly dark haired glasses guys.

That scene with the three girls at the shrine… Island Girl C is probably my favorite character in the game. Her voice actor is great.

The tabletennis minigame is something else. I don’t know why it exists, but I’m glad it exists.

Also there’s a surprising amount of fanservice in this. Even disregarding the CGs, a lot of the conversations are pretty ecchi for a Key VN, including every single heroine introduction. I’m not sure what to think about that…

Another interesting thing I noticed, some parts of the VN so far, especially those involving Shiroha, feel like they were designed for an anime. There’s camera movements (such as the stereotypical follow-the-flying-birds shot), there are a bunch of pillow shots throughout, and there’s an interesting monologue over visual action thing that feels very anime… In fact, a lot of it seems like something Noriko Takao would do, which is very fitting considering her amazing work on Key anime. For that reason I think this VN really lends itself well to being animated (more so than any of Key’s previous titles) and I could see reason for people to be hopeful about a Summer Pockets anime.

Anyway, here’s an album of pre-Opening screenshots.

[Album] Imgur

Also I know map screens were a discussion here in the past. Here’s the Summer Pocket’s map screen.

MKL · July 1, 2018, 1:56am

Pretty sure they mentioned at some point that a Summer Pockets anime is already planned.

Anyway, how long is the common route? How many routes does it take?

Takafumi · July 1, 2018, 2:14am

The common route is hard to judge. It depends where you cut it off, but I think a good cutoff point is when the OP starts to play.

I played for around 6 or 7 hours to get to that point, so I’d say the common route is that long. 6-8 hours for the average reader I’d guess.

MKL · July 1, 2018, 2:43am

Wait: 6-7 hours just to get to Alka Tale? That sounds like a lot of time. Then again, I remember Mag Mell didn’t play in Clannad until halfway into Nagisa’s route.

That sounds odd though: it’s called an OP but it doesn’t even play anywhere near the start.

Takafumi · July 1, 2018, 2:59am

It’s very similar to Clannad in that respect. It treats the entire common route as a prologue, then plays the opening… But then you’re thrown into a semi-common route where you essentially choose how focused on a heroine the experience is.

There is however a segment that appears before you even start to play the game. A beautiful monologue cutscene similar to that of the Darling in the Franxx’s first episode. I suppose that could act as the opening of the game.

Aspirety · July 1, 2018, 7:33am

The demo went up to a day beyond the OP, so I guess this is mostly a review of the demo. Still, thanks for your perspective! I’m interested to see the shape the story takes from there.

MKL · July 6, 2018, 5:49pm

How’s the reception over in Japan so far? Any new information about the release?

grooven · July 6, 2018, 5:49pm

You can find out here on erogescape HIGHLY NSFW, so don’t say I didn’t warn you. It looks like an average median score of 80% so far which is promising
https://erogamescape.dyndns.org/~ap2/ero/toukei_kaiseki/brand.php?brand=83

Cilia · July 6, 2018, 5:49pm

Japanese reception is good and the game is very promising looking forward to playing yattaa

Pepe · July 6, 2018, 5:49pm

I’m really glad to hear that reception has been pretty good since the release! My biggest worry is that this game would flop enough that people would stop caring about Key but it seems my fears were unfounded. Even just reading the reviews on here (although all of them so far are from @Takafumi) makes me glad that they have pretty consistent quality so far.

Although, considering Key’s more recent works, I’d say it’s success lies mostly on the supposed “final” route of the story and, as much as I hate to admit it, this game’s memorability will lie mostly with that. Haven’t heard much about it so far and regardless of whether or not it’s anything groundbreaking, I can only hope it succeeds in touching peoples’ hearts like Key’s stories have been able to do so well so far

Takafumi · July 6, 2018, 5:49pm

Yup, it seems to be doing pretty good. Twitter are loving it (though I think the tweet feature helps) and the character routes are definitely high quality. I’ll remember the Kamome route as one of my favorite Key routes for sure.

I’m not in the final route yet (I’m in Alka, which is followed by Pockets) but I think there was enough just in the heroine routes for it to stand alone as a great Key title. I think there’s more strength in these character routes than there was in Litbus or Rewrite.