Highway Blossoms: Next Exit - December Developer Update

Hey everyone, Syon here! 

A while back we announced that we, alongside our cousins at Studio Élan, were working on DLC for our hit VN Highway Blossoms. This DLC of course being titled Highway Blossoms: Next Exit. 

As a quick recap, Highway Blossoms: Next Exit takes place one month after the original game. In that time, Amber and Marina have continued to travel the open roads together, hopping from place to place and seeing all the sights that the southwestern United States has to offer. But lately, things have been complicated. Amber is still in the honeymoon phase of the relationship and thinks everything is fine. Marina, however, is having a bit more of a difficult time. She loves Amber, but the more time that passes, and the more Amber teases her or treats her like a kid, the more she feels like she’s not her equal. 

And it’s not just Amber and Marina who are on the rocks. Tess is having new, complicated thoughts as well. Why is she so different compared to everyone else? And why are emotions so hard to express? 

With all this focus on so many different characters, you may be asking yourself just how on earth we plan on accomplishing this. Well, the answer is pretty simple. Unlike the original Highway Blossoms, Next Exit is going to employ shifting perspectives. 

For example, in various scenes you’ll get the choice (I guess we aren’t that kinetic anymore) to read it from either Amber’s perspective or Marina’s perspective. Other times, some scenes will just  be from Marina’s perspective by default because we feel like it’s important narratively. Marina isn’t the only new perspective we’re getting either. Sometimes, specifically during scenes involving the Trio, we’ll be shifting gears and switching to third-person, past-tense. 

This is a pretty big leap compared to the original HB, which was all from Amber’s perspective. We think this is vital to HB’s continued growth as an IP, though. We want to continue exploring these characters and developing them in personal ways. Besides, pretty much since the day HB was released, people have been asking for Marina’s point of view, so this is a fine way to make good on that, I think. 

You’ll notice some differences between narration styles. Marina is more in-tune with her emotions, so her narration will be geared more towards that rather than sprawling purple prose and big words. Meanwhile, Amber has chilled out a bit since the events of HB (and mine and Josh’s writing styles have changed in the last five years, so there’s that too), so while she’s the same character you’ve come to know and love, she isn’t as grumpy this time around. Third-person is an exercise in how sarcastic we can get without irritating the audience. Wish us luck. 

Moving on from writing, we have some nifty new art assets to show off. I guess I should probably start this off by telling you that we’ll be adding cut-ins to both the original Highway Blossoms, as well as Next Exit. These are going to be used to place more emphasis on certain items. Gramps’ cassette tape, for example. Or all the delicious diner food that Amber and Marina chow down on over the course of the story. We hope this adds a pop of life to the story and visuals. All of these were drawn by Studio Elan’s graphic artist, Adi, so be sure to give her a follow! We’ll remaster this thing as many times as it takes, I suppose. 

And finally, I’ll leave you with a work in progress draft of one of the several new CGs that will be appearing throughout the DLC. This one is actually the first Tess CG (second in the entire DLC), and I believe it’s also the first time Tess has made an appearance in any CGs. Like I said, Highway Blossoms is expanding its scope. 

We’ll be seeing you down the road!

- Syon