Summer Pockets is a relatively straightforward game. Even with the additions made in RB, getting on a particular heroine’s route is quite easy, and there are very few choices that can ruin a playthrough.

That said, we’re also well aware that some players prefer to have the right choices laid out for them, which is fair enough! As such, to accommodate for all the playstyle preferences I can manage, I’ll be dividing this guide up into three sections: one for general info that I believe everyone who plays the game would benefit from knowing, one for broad advice for each heroine’s route, and finally one for specific, choice-by-choice instructions on how to reach each ending.

As a side note, I’ll be tagging anything that’s even remotely spoilery, but I’m to understand that said tags might not work on all browsers. If the text below looks like a mess of HTML instead of a single line you can expand by clicking on it, watch out for spoilers below!

Spoiler Tag Test!

If you had to click to reveal this text, the spoiler tags are working for you!

General Advice

-Probably the most common question I hear about this game is ‘what’s the recommended play order for the routes?’ My answer: any order you want. A lot of people have well-considered rationales for recommending particular orders, but in my opinion there’s no wrong order to play the routes in this game in.

There is, however, one exception to this rule, which is important enough that I feel the need to put it right at the top of the guide: if you want to play the Umi route before playing through the true ending routes, you must do so before you play your fifth heroine route. In other words, Umi’s route must be one of the first five you play, or else you’ll end up locked out of playing it until you’ve beaten the rest of the game. See the Umi route section below if you’re concerned about missing it—the way you get on the route is slightly unusual, but it’s still pretty hard to miss.

-Shimamon and Shimapong are both accessed by visiting the Candy Store on 7/29. When prompted, choose ‘One of what Umi-chan had.’ For the next choice, ‘The watch one’ will start Shimamon, while ‘The wristband one’ will start Shimapong. See the sections on both modes below for further details!

-Though the detailed guides below won’t tell you to read many non-heroine events, I highly recommend checking them out! This game has a metric ton of side content, most of which is hysterical. Some of them have special scenes toward the end of the common route that only unlock if you’ve visited that particular location enough times, so experimentation is very rewarding. Also, the Diner scenes you can pick on the map are also RB-original content, and definitely worth seeing.

-Generally speaking, to get on a heroine’s route, just keep clicking on them every time they come up on the map, and don’t focus on any one specific other heroine too consistently. That’s just about it, though some routes can get impacted by the choices you make in the scenes leading up to the route proper—see the route-specific advice sections for more specific advice if you’re having trouble with one of them!

-Though nothing you do in the prologue (that is, everything that happens before the OP) has any impact on which route you get on, the choices you make there do change stuff around throughout the rest of the game! There’s no harm in skipping the prologue once you get the option to do so, but there’s also a lot of fun to be had in seeing all the ways those early choices can change later dialogue.

Shimamon

Shimamon hasn’t changed much since the original game! There are already a bunch of great guides and I have absolutely no interest in re-inventing the wheel here, so instead of writing an original one I’ll just link to a really good one that I myself used over the course of reworking our translation of all the Shimamon content which can be found here.

There are some slight differences in translation between this guide and our version, since the guide’s based off the original game’s official translation, but it should be totally comprehensible. The one thing to watch out for is that some of the rankings are thrown off by Shiki’s presence in the tournament, so some of the bait acquisition methods that tell you to ‘defeat rank #’ are one off from what they should be.

Shimapong

To start Shimapong, visit the Candy Shop (Umi icon) on the morning of 7/29, then pick ‘One of what Umi-chan had,’ ‘The wristband one,’ and ‘Take the racket.’ The next choice also matters—pick ‘Take the shaved ice’ for hilarity and ‘Don’t take the shaved ice’ if you want your Shimapong matches to be slightly easier.

From then on, you can engage in Shimapong matches by chosing the icon in the lower-right corner of your map! When you beat a character in a Shimapong match, you earn the ability to use them as your partner in the final tournament, which happens on 8/4. Then you pretty much just have to win your way through the tournament!

There is, of course, a stupid amount of variant dialogue that can come up over the course of the tournament depending on who’s on your team. Bringing Shizuku in particular changes a whole lot of stuff—I recommend experimenting around and seeing all the weirdness that different partner/opponent pairings can cause! The difficulty level you play on can also change things a little—if you play on the easiest difficulty, the tournament ends a little earlier than it otherwise would.

The last point to keep in mind is that your title can have an impact on Shimapong. Specifically, the ‘Legendary King of Ping-Pong’ and ‘Ping-Pong God’ titles can cause some pretty interesting stuff to happen, so it’s worth going out and getting those from the base ping-pong game before giving the tournament a shot!

Route-Specific Advice

(Click to expand! Warning: vague spoilers)

Shiroha

Shiroha’s route is extremely easy to get on! Just pick her on the map every time you get the option, and choose options that involve staying around/interacting with her. The only notable feature of her route is a missable CG—to ensure you get it, when you get to the map on 8/7 pick Umi, the Main Street and the Harbor, choosing ‘Take it’ after each option.

Ao’s route is fairly easy to get on—just pick her on the map whenever given the chance. There’s one actual choice that really matters for getting on the route, though: on 7/31, choose ‘Observe her’ when given the choice, and then shortly thereafter choose ‘Ask about her family.’

Tsumugi

Tsumugi’s pretty much the same as the other routes: just keep picking her and choosing options that extend her scenes, and you should be good! The one mandatory choice is in her scene on the afternoon of 8/5 (or potentially 8/6, if you put it off, which you can do) where you must choose ‘Look for something to do with Tsumugi.’

Kamome

As always, just keep choosing Kamome on the map! You have to choose ‘Help her’ on 7/30 and ‘The most dilapidated birdhouse’ on 8/6, but those are the only mandatory choices. Note that you’ll get a bunch of options on 7/31 and 8/3, only one of which is correct, but you can keep choosing until you get the right option. I’ll put the correct answers in a mini-spoiler below, in case you want to know them in advance so you can see all the wrong answers first! Also note that choosing anything other than ‘The most dilapidated birdhouse’ on 8/6 will lead to one of the game’s very few bad endings! Could be worth a look, if you’re curious.
It’s also worth noting that you’ll get an extra CG on 8/8 by picking ‘Help me change,’ and that in that same scene there’s a very hard to get CG that only comes up if you’re playing Kamome’s route immediately before the true ending routes! It’s easy enough to go back and get after you beat the true ending if you want to 100% the game, though, so no need to stress about it.

Kamome mini-spoiler

The correct answer on 7/31 is the Shrine, and the correct answer on 8/3 is ‘A chimney.’

Nomiki

The Nomiki route’s exceptionally simple to get on! Just choose her on the map, don’t pick the options that involve leaving her alone and when given the chance on 8/1 choose ‘Help Nomiki.’

Shizuku

Shizuku’s route is very easy to get on. Just keep picking her, help out when given the option, and that’s really all there is to it. There’s just one complicating factor in her route: there is a potential bad ending. It’s pretty easy to tell that the choice that leads to it is significant, and the bad ending itself is pretty interesting, so personally I’d recommend giving it a try first and just saving before every important choice you make in the route proper! If you want to know which choice leads to the good ending, though, click the mini-spoiler below.

Shizuku mini-spoiler

The choice comes on 8/26. Choosing ‘She’s been trying too hard, hasn’t she?’ will take you to the remainder of the route, while choosing ‘Hey, don’t worry about it’ will take you to the bad ending.

Shiki

All the routes in this game are easy to get on, but Shiki’s might just be the easiest. Keep picking her on the map, don’t walk away in the middle of a scene, and you’ll get on her route just fine! No CG weirdness or bad endings in this route, either.

Umi

To get on Umi’s route, all you have to do is not get on any of the other routes. Hang out with the boys, watch a bunch of random events from a variety of heroines, do side-area content, literally just do anything other than focusing on a single heroine. Finally, when given the chance on 8/8, pick ‘Reconsider’ and you’ll be on the Umi route! No further choices make any difference in terms of ending, so do whatever you want to.
There IS a slight variance to the route that’s determined before you get on it, though! Certain scenes in this route will be slightly altered if you see Shiroha’s event on the afternoon of 7/29. Both versions are great, but if I had to pick one over the other I’d say go for the Shiroha event before you get onto the route.

Step-by-Step Walkthroughs

NOTE: Although following these walkthroughs will get you onto the heroine in question’s route, 100%, they are very much not the only way to get onto the various routes. Many of the choices you make throughout the game have no impact on the route you end up on, so while I’m specifying each choice for the sake of 100% certainty and clarity, the majority of those specifications are completely arbitrary on my part! I’ll be bolding the choices that I think might be necessary for the sake of getting on the route, so if a choice isn’t bolded you can pick something different and will almost certainly still make it onto the route just fine! It’s very possible that some of the bolded choices are optional, too—I’m just being extra-careful with them. You’ll miss a lot of fun content if you adhere to these guides too strictly, and I highly recommend experimenting yourself before resorting to following one of them to the letter!

Tl;dr: I’m writing these guides for those who want them, but unless you’re absolutely positive that you’re one of those people I highly recommend against bothering with them! The vague guides above will give a much better experience overall, and should still take you to the routes no problem.

All that said, these guides start on 7/29, after the prologue has concluded.

(Click to expand! Warning: less vague spoilers)