is a

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

developed by Millennium Kitchen and published by

Sony Computer Entertainment Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE), formerly known as Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE), is a multinational video game and digital entertainment company wholly owned by multinational conglomerate Sony. The SIE Group is made up of two legal co ...

for the PlayStation in Japan on June 22, 2000. It is first game in the ''Boku no Natsuyasumi'' series, which also includes sequels released in 2002, 2007, and 2009. A PlayStation Portable port of the original game was released on June 27, 2006, under the title . The port features updated graphics and several new characters.

Description

The game revolves around " ''boku''" (a Japanese first-person pronoun associated with young boys), a nine-year-old boy sent to his aunt and uncle in Japan's wooded countryside and the daily adventures he encounters there. ''Boku'' is there because his mother is in her final month of pregnancy. The player controls him for the 31 days of August 1975 as he enjoys his summer vacation. You explore the game's area and can catch bugs and pit them against each other, collect bottle caps, fly a kite, or just relax.

Development

Game creator Kaz Ayabe said that he wanted to create a game that simulates the real world. When development began, Millennium Kitchen handled everything about the game except for programming and sound design. According to Ayabe, ''Boku no Natsuyasumis setting was inspired by the town of Tsukiyono, in the

Yamanashi Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshu. Yamanashi Prefecture has a population of 817,192 (1 January 2019) and has a geographic area of 4,465 km2 (1,724 sq mi). Yamanashi Prefecture borders Saitama Prefecture to the ...

of the Chūbu region. The team took many pictures of clouds during the staff's time collecting references for the game, some of which would go on to appear on the box art for the Japanese version of '' Everybody's Golf 3''. Ayabe stated that originally, the game was planned to be released in the summer of 1999, but Sony's producers asked the team to add in a fishing

minigame A minigame (also spelled mini game and mini-game, sometimes called a subgame or microgame) is a short game often contained within another video game. A minigame contains different gameplay elements, and is often smaller or more simplistic, than t ...

, which delayed the game to 2000.

Sequels

''Boku no Natsuyasumi'' spawned three sequels and two ports to portable consoles as of 2016. An

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also include ...

game was announced as part of a 2017 Sony foray into smartphone development. Apart from the series proper, other games in the same style have been developed by Millennium Kitchen. These include ''Bokura no Kazoku'' ( "My Family"), a family simulation game, '' Attack of the Friday Monsters!: A Tokyo Tale'', developed for Level-5's ''

Guild A guild ( ) is an association of artisans and merchants who oversee the practice of their craft/trade in a particular area. The earliest types of guild formed as organizations of tradesmen belonging to a professional association. They sometimes ...

'' series and the first Millennium Kitchen game with an official English-language release, and '' Shin-chan: Me and the Professor on Summer Vacation'', a game where, instead of ''boku'', the player takes on the role of the comic-strip and animation character Shin-chan as he spends his summer in Kyushu with his family. This game was released with Japanese voice-acting and text in English and other Western languages by Neos Corporation. On February 8, 2023, a new title in the series, ''Natsumon! 20-Seiki no Natsuyasumi'' was announced for Nintendo Switch.

References

External links

Official website (SCE)

''Scroll'' Issue 10: Summer
{{DEFAULTSORT:Boku No Natsuyasumi Single-player video games Adventure games Japan-exclusive video games Sony Interactive Entertainment games Sony Interactive Entertainment franchises 2000 video games PlayStation (console) games PlayStation Portable games Video game franchises introduced in 2000 Video games about children Video games about insects Video games developed in Japan Video games set in 1975 Video games set in Japan Works about vacationing Millennium Kitchen games Contrail (company) games