Natsumon is the new Boku no Natsuyasumi game.
10-year-old Satoru and his family run a traveling circus, setting up their tent in the tiny town of Yomogi for the summer of 1999. Among meeting the locals and getting wrapped up in events and activities, Satoru has virtually unrestricted access to the region, able to run, jump and especially climb all around the environment, collecting items and discovering secrets for what hopes to be -- as usual -- an unforgettable summer.
Natsumon is not the new Boku no Natsuyasumi game.
Of course it’s not. To say otherwise would be deranged. Granted, it has the same conceit and the same basic gameplay structure, but It’s an open-world action game with a different art style, publisher, development team and name. The only constant is Kaz Ayabe/Millennium Kitchen on story and design, and that just proves he is the “natsuyasumi game” maestro, not solely the “Boku no Natsuyasumi” maestro.
Yet feeds and forums and Discords are dotted with people calling Natsumon -- and Shinchan before it -- “the new game in the Boku no Natsuyasumi series.” And, um, why? Why do this? Why would people who I know should know better do this? And why is it happening to these games? Okay, yes, I am aware Boku no Natsuyasumi is not a worldwide gaming phenomenon, and most people on my side of the world have only heard of it, so maybe some are playing it safe, figuring that since the new game looks like the same kind of thing and the coverage they read said it was the same creator… ah, just call it the same thing. (Even though it has a different name ahem). No one keeping track of video games would call Death Stranding a Metal Gear game, because we all know who Kojima is and where he’s at. Yet Ayabe’s games are invoking the opposite. Basically, it doesn’t make sense and don’t do it.
I can’t say I don’t understand the temptation, though. 13 years after the last Boku no Natsuyasumi game, none of us have really figured out what to call this group of similar games from the same creator, and I believe we’re on the precipice of many more arriving from the indie scene. I used “vacation sim” way back when, but that’s just derived from the equally inaccurate and deprecating “dating sim.” Who’s going to be the one to coin a term that a bunch of people start using and a bunch of other people who don’t like it will be really annoyed every time it’s used? Is it me? Am I going to be that guy? Fine, it’s me, but I already wrote “natsuyasumi game” above, so there’s one. or natsuvania
Natsumon takes the Bokunatsu formula to a 3D open world, just like other, bigger game franchises before it. So, that stopped being new a while ago, and Bokunatsu had a version of openness to begin with, but there is something to be said about Natsumon’s overall approach to adapting Bokunatsu's adventure game trappings: conflict is rare, dialogue is plentiful, and we don’t talk about the tedium. Yet even compared to Bokunatsu, and even as an open-world game, Natsumon has more of the sharp edges filed down. For example, in Bokunatsu 1 you can be attacked by bees and pass out, or in the sequels go swimming and “drown,” and just wake up back at the house and lose time. But Natsumon’s Satoru might as well be from Krypton, as he has no health meter, thus no actual way to be hurt and no way to be actively punished. If you’re looking for a “traditional” gameplay loop, then keep an eye on the clock.
In other words, the only thing holding back Satoru is time. Time passes steadily in Natsumon (realtime instead of on every screen flip, of course; open world!!), and eventually he’s called back home for dinner, followed by some more playtime at night. Normally, once it’s dinnertime, he’ll be stopped immediately by the voice of Tokotoko, the circus’ trapeze artist and Satoru’s de facto guardian during the summer. This will happen on the dot at 5:00, but even time can be subverted in this game -- Satoru’s caught if he happens to be on a trafficked part of the map. Otherwise, he can hang out at the top of a mountain as long as the player wants, and the sun will wait patiently to go down until Satoru returns to an area where he can be found.
Oh, and just why is the trapeze guy responsible for Satoru? It’s part of the silliest story setup yet in an Ayabe game: While Satoru’s family runs the circus, and mom and dad are ready to be around all August, it’s barely the second day before they’re told that the town hosting the circus next month suddenly canceled their contract. News got out that the Maboroshi Circus skipped out on paying the previous town -- which isn’t entirely accurate, but Tokotoko says it “was on the news,” so mom and dad leave to put out this fire, which apparently takes four weeks. I don’t have any better idea than you why “small business accused of fraud” is apparently big news, but this game is mostly for kids, after all. Anyway, the rest of the circus crew goes on with the show while looking after Satoru, and he’s also made the interim circus director -- leading to some mini management gameplay where you can set up which acts and in which order are presented during the nightly shows.
This not being a Boku no Natsuyasumi game, nor for that matter a Crayon Shinchan game, Natsumon has its own unique art style. Part of Bokunatsu’s artistic appeal is closely associated with both anime-caliber painted backgrounds and Mineko Ueda’s character designs. That in mind, we don’t get luscious backgrounds in a full-3D game -- and Ueda, like other post-Bokunatsu games, was simply not involved (though does get special thanks in the credits). Instead, character design is the work of HYOGONOSUKE, best known for illustrations for the Pokémon card game. The style is as friendly as Ueda’s, but cartoonier and more expressive, with people coming in various shapes, sizes, and sometimes Muppety heads. Complementing this is the style of the world, which like the characters is made of mostly flat colors and not a lot of texture detail.
I do think it all comes together and helps Natsumon make a name for itself (sorry, that’s a pun referring to a story detail), but at the same time, the overall look -- and a few other points regarding the open world -- somewhat waters down the impact that Bokunatsu games were better known for. Put simply, when happening upon a new area for the first time, I didn’t get the nice little surprise of a new set of luscious backgrounds. Don’t get me wrong; there are several nice, well-composed set pieces on the Natsumon map, like the sunflower garden right as you enter the neighboring town or the lighthouse keeper’s cottage at the edge of a cliff. Plus, some of these areas will cue music tracks as you cross their invisible marker, suggesting to me that the developers are trying to get you to slow down and appreciate them. In all honesty, I only did that at the sunflowers. The open-world approach is fun in many ways, but also biologically at odds with delivering the small surprises of the Bokunatsu games. And having been wrapped up in that series as long as I have, I can feel where Natsumon pushes harder to deliver.
Bokunatsu is known for its prettiness, but since you can move the camera in Natsumon, you will see some not-pretty parts. Being a [✓] full-3D, [✓] open-world [✓] Unreal Engine game on [✓] Nintendo Switch is going to bring some limits that Ayabe’s previous games didn’t have to worry about. Yes, the framerate is uneven, worse docked, and textures are generally low quality. You will reach many spots where you can see further out in the horizon and the terrain looks muddy and with sporadic trees. If you’re the exploring, climbing, stamina-maxing player (like I am), you’ll be looking at drab walls and beelining through the same strips of grass and spotty excuses for forests most of the time. It’s exacerbated with the cartoonier style -- but maybe that’s a good thing, because it could've leaned too hard towards photorealism. Just put me first on the list for a PC port.
And just because we get “open-world Bokunatsu” doesn’t mean we get all the conventional quality-of-life features of the genre. According to Ayabe, the entire development happened over a year and a half -- no doubt he jumped into it immediately after Shinchan. So, it’s not surprising that Natsumon has a fair share of flaws. Of them, my “favorites” involve the map: Natsumon’s idea of fast travel mimics the Like a Dragon games: pay for a ride, in this case the bus. This I’m fine with, but you must “discover” the bus stops so you can travel to them later. Again: fine and normal, but you must go up and check the signpost, which then adds it to your list of stops, and it’s only a list. At least in Like a Dragon they bring up the map screen along with it! (I see recently that Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is doing something similar with chocobo stops, replete with a slow animation of Cloud standing the signposts back up. Suddenly, Natsumon has become more tolerable.)
Actually, I fibbed, because Natsumon does have more “instant” fast travel, just in one direction: if you find one of a few portable toilets in the more remote parts of the map, they will magically (including squash-and-stretch effects) transport you to the bathroom at the inn -- should you want or need to. Satoru is initially baffled, but he’s soon back to action.
That acceptance of the unreasonable is all over Natsumon, and that does help you enjoy it despite the flaws. There’s the acceptance that a small boy can latch onto any vertical surface and climb to great heights, limited only by his stamina. When Link does it, it’s believable, but this kid is just in a shirt and shorts! He can also fall from those great heights and survive, suffering only some stunned legs for a couple of seconds. He can swim out to the middle of the ocean and grab the fish there with his bare hands instead of a rod. Cars will stop immediately if Satoru gets in their way, and amazingly, so will the train. About the only thing you’re barred from touching are the backhoes at construction sites, the freeway, and the tops of transmission towers.
Natsumon maybe should have been the new Boku no Natsuyasumi game.
For a game supposedly made in a year and a half, I can’t blame the developers for concentrating on the minimum viable product when the assignment is as new and daunting as an open-world natsuyasumi game. At the same time, there are just enough steps taken in the right directions that Natsumon deserved much more time to create a real paradigm shift or two.
Despite some mushy graphics or lack of surprise, I consider Natsumon’s open-world freedom as a swing of the pendulum back to what made the Bokunatsu games great. Partly because -- and I’m really putting on my “adult fan of these games” hat on now -- there was some slippage towards the end. Bokunatsu 4 included a huge number of beetles and bugs in an apparent Pokémon-ing of the series, and more notably, it introduced a “hunger” meter that if left unchecked, would once again punish the player with an incapacitated Boku waking up at the house, and given an emergency onigiri -- otherwise, you have to buy them. This system was retained for the 2021 Shinchan game -- which needed more things in its favor, not less. But in Natsumon, I don’t deal with any of that. There’s 200 insects and collecting them is firmly incentivized with achievements that increase your stamina for every 25 or 50 or so, and thanks to regular selling of plastic bottles and geodes, I’ve had more cash on hand than I ever did in a Bokunatsu.
On the flip side, Satoru doesn’t add a whole lot to the characterizations of the other “Bokus” we’ve played. Like all little kids, he’s inquisitive and a little silly, but nothing terribly distinctive. And as an open-world game, a segment of games increasingly overrun with RPG-style progression, I think it should’ve been time to be able to play as a girl. It’s unfortunately not surprising, as so much of the Japanese summer vacation stereotype is about “boy things” like fishing and collecting beetles. Still, as I mentioned, these games are as much for all sorts of kids as they are for nostalgic adults, and I see this as the opportunity to finally lend an option for gender. I don’t lay this entirely at Ayabe’s feet, though, as he had the idea for a “winter vacation” game starring the older female cousin from Bokunatsu 3, has cited A Short Hike as inspiration for Natsumon’s gameplay, and is more than capable of writing a variety of characters. It’s simply past due, and should we reach “Natsumon 2,” I hope this improves.
I may not be surprised by playing the game, but nonetheless stunned we got to the point where the natsuyasumi game became open-world-ized, not to mention pleased that after 13 years, the 2020s are about giving Kaz Ayabe more work. (I remind you there’s a new Shinchan adventure on the way, as well.) And of course, I’m surprised I can talk about these game with you and watch people show real interest in them… and I promise I won't harp too much on your franchise literacy. Natsumon is a “wholesome,” “cozy” open-world-ish game that’s not as fenced in as Animal Crossing and not constrained by pixel art or prerendered backgrounds. And, no, it's also not the new Boku no Natsuyasumi game, but the next and most interesting step towards one.
