A Summer's End: Hong Kong 1986 (2020)

For those who enjoy the occasional “spicy” game, to borrow a term from one of our most beloved Grouvee members, or for the newly “spicy” curious among us, I want to highlight an article that Polygon published on a series of interesting adult games as selected by Annie Whitacre of Sex Positive Gaming. There are a number of titles here that look quite interesting, so check out the list if it tickles your fancy:

The best adult video games according to an expert: Annie from Sex Positive Gaming recommends the top 8 sex games for folks who have never dabbled

Side note: I really don’t think the “box” art for A Summer's End - Hong Kong 1986 above does the rest of the game’s art justice. Not at least from the promotional stills I’ve seen.

I was a little apprehensive about this game as--full disclosure here--my politics are diametrically-opposed to those of the developers and most of the characters. I haven't really dabbled much in the visual novel genre, but the style seemed nice and I can see Yuen Long from my window as I write this so I thought it would be interesting to explore a game set so close.

In terms of interactivity, there isn't a great deal of what feels like meaningful choice in the game (with one large exception right towards the end). As such, it often felt like I was constrained by the kind of character that Michelle already is. This isn't a great criticism, really; I was quite happy to click through just to find out what happens next. The writing isn't bad, and it captures the on-off stages of developing romances accurately. The translation into English isn't always spot on so there's the odd error here and there but nothing that distracts too much. The art style is one of the game's biggest strengths: the neon streets of 80s Hong Kong feel very evocative. There are a fairly limited number of static backgrounds but it's hard to be nitpicky when they're illustrated so well.

I was surprised at how little the issue of Hong Kong's handover and its current issues impeded on the story. I'd read a few articles about the game that bigged it up as a bit of protest art and there's a post-credits message from the developers but it's vague and aside from one conversation about moving away before the handover in 1997 the issue doesn't come up much. What I thought was far more interesting was the exploration of parent-child dynamics in modern China and the slowly changing attitudes towards LGBT people; A Summer's End has interesting things to say about balancing one's personal happiness against the expectations of parents and colleagues.

It's worth playing through twice to get both the endings. I dipped in and out of it quite a bit as the internet has ruined my concentration, but coming back to it repeatedly and seeing how the story developed kept it reasonably fresh for me. I'm not converted to the visual novel cause but I liked the game and I'd consider playing other games in the genre.

A Summer's End - Hong Kong 1986 is splendid, lovely, and real. Appropriately, I wanted it to just keep going. This was made all the more poignant by the final words, post credits, reminding us what is at stake right now in Hong Kong.

Its most beautiful moments are in the ideological dialogue between Michelle and various characters, especially Sam. Love and passion is made so much more real when grounded by beliefs. These conversations really elevate the game as art. Prepare to be moved!