Highway Blossoms: Next Exit

Highway Blossoms: Next Exit

released on Sep 25, 2020

Highway Blossoms: Next Exit

released on Sep 25, 2020

Return to Las Vegas with Amber and Marina in this new Highway Blossoms story! A couple months after the events of the first game, the two girls return to the desert city for an alien-themed convention and to see Tess for her birthday. They also end up reuniting with Cassi, the candy shop girl, who's determined to start following her own dreams.


Released on

Genres


More Info on IGDB


Reviews View More

(My review from Steam)

Listen, I wanted to like this game, especially because I paid $8 on it. But I didn't. I am convinced all the positive reviews didn't actually play the game, and the first one that appears as I am typing this received the product for free but convinces everyone else to pay "for everything."

Note: I am a woman, who loves women, and find the relationship between Amber and Marina not to be healthy in the slightest.

The pros:
- I do find that expanding on Tess' depression that was apparent in the original game was interesting
- Having Marina have more of a voice was wonderful as I was sick of listening to Amber's shit
- Cassi is a cool character

The cons:
- Despite having some Marina insight, it is pretty focused on Amber's voice still, unless we are in the sections that talk about "The Trio" (Joe, Mariah, and Tess).
- There were SO MANY TYPOS AND MISTAKES. The original game had them too, but it was much more apparent in this DLC.
- The worst offender for a mistake was when it was supposed to be Marina's POV, and then after one minute, they switch to Amber's POV without acknowledging it was her POV.
- A minor offender, but an annoying one: The Rainforest Cafe is not in the MGM Casino anymore.
- Amber is borderline abusive to Marina, wondering why she gave money to her family and talks to them? Like girl.
- The fight that happens, the whole buildup, it lasted 5 minutes. I don't like people fighting but they made this a much bigger deal with lackluster results.
- The creators didn't seem to know how to end things or expand on stuff because every storyline seemed to end flatly. Another negative review (the only one at the time of this one) mentioned something similar.
- Marina's inner thoughts just kept ragging on Amber yet she says she loves her. Like girl, that isn't love. Comparing her to the fucking Mariah means you need to RUN.
- Mariah's viewpoint was terrible and I am not just saying that as an avid Mariah hater. Also, Mariah needs to be in jail and the only reason she's not is because of white privilege.
- Amber was so fucking stupid and didn't learn from her mistakes.
- Amber clearly wants to bone the other girl, Cassi. Marina kept saying that she wasn't upset about Cassi but she clearly was.
- The game ends thinking we should support this relationship but we really, really shouldn't. I kind of thought this at the end of the original game after Amber lied about orgasming but I thought things would be different in this game. Nope, they really aren't.

Overall, don't waste your time unless this game is like, $3 and you have nothing else to do.

Everything that made the OG game great, comes again and makes it way, WAY better. I think this is the first time I've experienced any media with characters that goes beyond being tridimentional. Featuring the thoughts of many characters rather than just Amber adds a lot of Layers to the characters, and boy, the drama of this short but amazing DLC just makes it better. Even tho some conflicts might be clichéd, the way the story wraps it up makes me think of the characters as actual human beings due to the amount of layers they have. When you think a character is angry due to a reason, it's actually a different reason, and all of them escalate to something heavier and then hits you like a brick to your face to pour the sour reality flat to the ground. Most of the conflicts hits home way more than I wanted to, like Tess being unable to feel emotions, and Amber being unable to read the room. Alongside with the perfect OST, this is a VN that broadened my horizones, it made me angry, sad, happy, it even made me believe in second chances, it made me believe in a change for the better, it made me feel melancholic. Every time I hear to "Eleven", thousands of emotions are going to flood my heart and make me remember, not only the melancholic parts, but the great ones too. That's how good the musical direction is, and how great the character writing is.