I wonder if I'll see you today: let's talk about Doukyuusei: Bangin’ Summer

This game is a remake of the Windows version of a PC-98 game—I’m prefacing with this because I usually don't play remakes if I haven't played the original, but hey, this seemed pretty damn good. The new art is so beautiful (a far cry from the character design massacre at play in the Yu-No remake which you could not pay me to try)—I have to admit I actually like it more than the original pixel art (feel free to excommunicate me from the PC-98 eroge cool kids club for this)

Anyway, this was way more out there than what I'm used to, but I soon found out that being a sleazebag is actually so fun! I felt like an asshole sometimes (many many times) but man. Being a bad person is fun.

The first thing that happens is that your friend calls you to borrow money to get a gift for his girlfriend. My first plan of action in this game was “I’ll do everything I can to steal this guy’s girlfriend”. We go to the store. He's obviously crushing on the clerk. My second plan of action in this game is “I’ll steal her from him too”. Honestly I don't know what took over me but I wanted to destroy his life and self esteem and everything else like 5 minutes in. Now, in this game there’s some exclusive characters in the sense that if you finish their “route” you can’t finish the other one’s. Sadly his two girls were included in this so I only got to properly steal one at a time. Hmph.

Initially I was honestly surprised that his girlfriend was even an option, but she's not even the only taken lady in the roster. It's adultery summer, it seems (woo!)

The gameplay is basically walking around the map and entering places and talking to the girls (sometimes guys) you find there. Office hours apply everywhere, and moving around costs you time. You can also take the train to the other city, which costs a bit of money. You have to manage this along with the affection bars (yes, bars plural—there are no routes, you have to go for everyone at the same time, and sometimes interacting one character trips the flags for another). The feeling of walking around the town, going in and out of places and hoping you’ll happen to bump into the person you want to see is kind of magical. This is her club. This is her workplace. I’ll kill some time at the park—ah, she’s here. Wait, do I sound like a stalker…

Anyways, the game has several features to aid in finding the characters and easy mode just renders all of them redundant. It's convenient, sure, but the gameplay just loses so much depth like that.

I also liked going to vacant lots to pocket spare change for hours on end

There's such a bright, funny cast of characters, though they skewed way older than I expected for a game named classmates. You had four girls who were around your age at best, I think? The rest were all older, sometimes way older. I know that that's what older bishoujo games tend to be like but it was still a bit surprising to see in person. I'm not complaining either way. The age of 30(and above) is in demand or whatever the young’uns say—

There's also lots and lots of h-scenes, all of them interactive point-and-click game style (except for the “bonus” ones in which you just sort of walk in on two randos doing the deed). Sometimes I wouldn't really know how to proceed and would have to click around a girl’s naked body for like half an hour, which is one of the funniest worst experiences ever, but that’s part of the charm. Besides, I’m kinda used to it from having a hard time with Yu-No(which was made by the same people, so it tracks). Anyway, it's pretty fun. Less so when you don't live alone and don’t have a lock on your door but eh, maybe my family will someday learn the noble art of knocking(⁠٥⁠↼⁠_⁠↼⁠)

When your three weeks are up, god himself tells you to pick a girl, which lets you see their endings. They're super sweet, and it's pretty cool seeing all the different paths the protagonist’s life can take. There's a bit too many girls for me to be able to come up with something to say about each of them, so I picked a top 3:

Mai (who I erroneously thought would be super hard to get due to my Tokimemo trauma) felt like a sort of main heroine. She turned out to be a bit different from what I expected, in a positive way. Her ending had a twinge of bittersweetness, at least to me—it was unexpectedly beautiful.

I initially really disliked The Teacher (Yoshiko), but she ended up surprising me a lot—I did a complete 180 on her, to the point that her ending actually made me cry. I was so happy…!

Reiko’s was my favorite, though. I remember at the start I had all these ideas in my head about her being a reclusive writer living on her own, but y'know what? A housewife whose husband travels a lot is also juuust fine. I’d marry her in real life too if I could. (one time I told a friend about her and her ending, and how I was still thinking about it after months, and a few hours after he went back home he sent me a picture of his computer screen with Doukyuusei installed)

As I played ending after ending, life after life after life, I ended up crying a lot that afternoon…

I started up DaCapo for the first time minutes after clearing this game and now that opening song is forever entwined with the end of Doukyuusei in my mind. A wistful, bittersweet feeling.The last summer of our youth is over—thank you for all the wonderful times we spent together.