Part 24: Yuina, Chapter 3: One Crazy Summer

Yuina, Chapter 3: One Crazy Summer

Let's see, where were we..


Oh, right. So, back here in Tales of Easy Mode, we've pretty much fulfilled every game requirement by the time one year has completed. We only have two or three Yuina events left to get, and so it should be easy!

Except for the part where I started getting bored.

4/22: Yumi happens to have a pair of tickets to the baseball game.

Pretty convenient, so sure, let's say yes.

4/28: Baseball game with Yumi

It's totally normal to take your 6-year-old daughter to the park, right?

5/10: Saki wants to walk home together.

There shouldn't be any harm to it.

5/16: Meet Ayako

This can't possibly backfire!

5/16: Might as well walk with Megumi


5/19: DEAR GOD WHAT HAVE I DONE

It's fine. This is fine. It's just... time to reload a little bit, that's all.

RELOAD COUNT: 1

5/12: A walk in the park with Saki

Saki: It'd feel really good to run down a path as picturesque as this, don't you think?
Goon: Option 3: Yeah, it does seem like it'd feel great.
Saki: Right? We should run it together some time!
Goon: (Looks like I made a great impression.)

I'm not going to report every single date, since many of these are repeats, but this one does show a different Saki outfit, so I'll allow it.

5/19:

Ahhhh, much better. Still need to watch out for Shiori, though. Being able to ignore her for 3 months is convenient, but I can't just go randomly saying yes to a ton of things anymore. It was a good wake-up call. Time to say no to, like, pretty much every walking-home event and date offer now.

5/21:

Sorry, Saki.

5/23:

You too, Yumi.

5/25: Praised by Yuina for a perfect week of engineering and saying no to other girls

Yuina: This is what you have for me? Well, keep it up.
Goon: Th, thanks.
Goon: (Next time, I'll wow her for sure.)

We've upgraded from dismissive disdain to begrudging respect. Gettin' there!

6/1: Sports festival: Don't Stand Out Edition
In order to keep all 6 girls at a manageable level of affection, it's time to do badly at sports!


All according to plan. And then, the post-race folk dance!


Yuina: Consider yourself one of the rare few to whom I grant the honor of being close enough to touch.

Uhhh, thanks Yuina. Importantly, her coming first in line is a very good sign. She's very far ahead in the affection rankings.


Shiori: Lead on.


Megumi: Uh, uh, um...

Sometimes, I wonder if Megumi is not stuttering at all, but in fact casting some kind of nightmarish spell on Goon. The thought keeps me awake at night.

6/2: Bomb prevention date with Shiori.

Nothing new here, let's move on.

6/6: Yumi invites Goon out on a date
Normally, this would not be notable enough to point out. However...


HOLY CRAP YUMI WHAT DID THEY DO TO YOUR HANDS

6/17: Saki invites Goon to watch pro wrestling with her
6/23: Pro Wrestling with Saki

You have to admire the kind of girl who wears a cherry-patterened sleeveless pink blouse to a wrestling match. That is all.

8/4: Beach date with Yuina

Mystery Girl: Sorry! Did I keep you waiting?

Goon: Huh?
Mystery Girl: Whoops... sorry, I thought you were someone else.
Goon: That's the same girl who keeps tackling me at school...

By pure RNG, we have achieved an event that many gamers in the '90s would have KILLED for. KILLED. Miharu's route is incredibly luck-based, where you may not meet her at all in a 3-year run-through. And sometimes, like this, she decides to horn in on someone else's date, as befits her stalker status. I... I really have no idea why she's popular, other than her Last Boss difficulty. Anyway, she runs off and leaves things to:


Yuina: I will go and change.


Something about this picture really disturbs me. The shadows on her arm make her seem really muscular, and it just doesn't look right overall. I'll... I'll get over it.

Yuina: I have something I want to investigate.
Goon: Option 1: Should I help?
Yuina: Probably. But that will not be necessary.
Goon: (Looks like I made a pretty good impression.)

8/12-8/17: Computer club summer camp


Yuina: I took a look at the software you gave me yesterday.
Goon: I'm not very confident in it, but what did you think?
Yuina: It is far below my standards.
Goon: What wasn't good about it?
Yuina: The part that stands out the most is its user unfriendliness.
Goon: I didn't think about the user at all... I'll start over.
Yuina: Well, do the best you can.

Harsh... but fair.

The Ayako Tangent

Ayako is another of the girls who really stood out from the cast back in the day - she hovered in the top half of the popularity polls, and was able to get her own side game because Miharu's voice actress was busy recording the lead role for True Love Stories, a game that was being made to capitalize on Tokimeki Memorial's success. Again, this game came before the reign of moe - Ayako's popularity was mostly based on her sense of humor and general quirkiness, not on her representation of a particularly well-known archetype. Although I could be wrong - maybe English-speaking artists with a love for H.R. Giger was a thing back in the '90s. I wouldn't judge.


This is Ayako's sprite for when she tags along for an art activity, which she did for a few days after Goon met her. She blows a little kiss on successful days.

Months later, it took me 4 tries to get her to go to the beach - she has a special event there in spite of her... aversions.

8/18: Ayako at the beach


Ayako: The weather's pretty brisk today.
Goon: Y, you think so? It feels really hot to me.
Ayako: Hontou? I don't think it's hot at all.
Goon: Hey, Katagiri-san, let's go for a swim.


Ayako: Um, I feel kinda cold, so I'll pass.
Goon: You say you're cold, but you're sweating. C'mon, let's go.
Ayako: Uh, no, I'm not sweating because it's hot.
Goon: Then why're you sweating?
Ayako: Th, this is a cold sweat.
Goon: Huh? Why cold sweat?
Ayako: I'm scared of the water. Please, don't make me.

Goon: If that's the case, you should've just said so.
Ayako: Well, it's pretty embarrassing to be afraid of water.
Goon: Not at all. Everyone has stuff they can't handle.
Ayako: Arigatou, thank you. But I do want to swim with you.
Goon: You don't have to be in hurry. Just get used to it little by little.
Ayako: Yeah, I'll try that.


Ayako: Today was really exhausting, but we should do this kind of thing again.

Ayako also has one event that comes with the school trip - you have to go to Okinawa, though, which has a high English-speaking population thanks to the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security - Okinawa houses almost 30,000 military personnel, plus support staff and family. If you invite her along with you...


Goon: ......
Ayako: What's wrong, Fudou-kun?
Goon: I think we're lost.
Ayako: Shinpai shinaide, there's someone right over there.
Goon: Huh? But Katagiri-san, that's a foreigner - oh, she's already talking to him.


Ayako: Sumimasen, but can I ask you a quick question?
Foreigner: "Yo, whaddaya want?"
Ayako: Onegai, do you know the way back to the hotel?
Foreigner: "Yo man, I have no idea what you're saying. What're you trying to say? You better go to the information booth, there's one of them if you turn right and keep straight. Get it?"
Ayako: Arigatou. It looks like if we turn right here, then head straight, we'll be fine.

Translator's note: The American is voiced in somewhat accented but decent English, and his lines are written in Japanese. Meanwhile, Ayako speaks in her usual singleton English words and phrases, mixed in with Japanese. It's just as confusing as it sounds.


Goon: That's amazing, you can talk to foreigners like that.
Ayako: I guess it is. I feel like we really connected there.
Goon: Well, let's head back.
Ayako: Yeah, let's go.
Goon: (We made it back to the hotel just fine. Great job, Katagiri-san.)

End Ayako Tangent

9/3: Walk home with Yuina


Yuina: The class trip is coming soon.
Goon: Oh yeah, huh? (I forgot where we're going, though.)
Yuina: It will cut severely into my experiment schedule.


9/9-9/14: Class Trip, Yuina edition



Pretty much all of this already happened in my Shiori run because it kept me from getting bored. So, please refer to Chapter 11: Fall 1996, Bear Territory Part 1 for the run-through. The main difference this time is that Yuina is in permanent blush mode.



Well, there is one more difference: since the Computer Club necessitates tons of rest if you don't want to stress out and get sick, Goon's stamina stat is truly disgusting in this run. So the alien fight also took 6 fewer minutes than last time, because attacking speeds up Yuina's build time.



The most important thing does not change: light years still measure distance, not time. Yuina gets corrected for the first time in the game.

Next time: Yuina cheats at games.