Some Some Store: Love Convenient Store (Soohee)

 Some Some Store: Love Convenient Store Soohee the Part-Timer

I normally stick with Japanese-based Visual Novels, however every so often a Chinese or Koren made Visual Novel will spark my interest and I will see what it is like. I also was fortunate enough to participate in a Curator preview for a Russian-based group Visual Novel which was also well done. 

From what I have gathered this is actually a Koren-based game though I could be wrong. Regardless this game plays differently than a Visual Novel in the sense that it has some added features that make it more interesting I think than a standard read along with a Visual Novel. The game has a 'management' aspect that is based on the classic dating sim games you would see from time to time on websites like "Albinoblacksheep" and "Ebaumsworld" and yes I know I am showing my age. 

This game allows you to customize the name of the Protag making him your own personal character which is kind of nice. The small backstory for our protag is that he is 21 and works in a Convenient store as the "Assistant Manager". From what little bit is spoken of his history his father left him and his mother when he was young, he also left the store to him. For the rest of his years apparently, his mother who didn't want him to have the store anytime soon had allowed her boyfriend to run it, though, in all honesty, the protag does most of the work. 

During one of his shifts, he gets on his phone to find an app in the store that popped up first. It was simply called "Some Some App" and after downloading it he started getting messages. It stated he would be meeting his interests soon and the app was right. 

Later three girls named Soohee, Yena, and Adela come in seeking to purchase some things, during their conversation they speak of how Soohee just lost her job after the ice cream shop she worked for went out of business. So after some discussion, Soohee decides to apply for a position at the Convenient store for part time work. Of course, the Manager, who is the protags' mother's boyfriend leaves it up to him if he hires her or not. 

He hires her and they start working together. This is where you also start to see another side of the game. After each story plays out you are taken to a screen where you can upgrade your store, offer promotions, and take special requests. Each of these earns you an increased number of customers and how much you make per customer purchase. The better items bring in more money and people but can get expensive. Every 4 weeks (1 turn in-game) you get a paycheck you can use to buy gifts for the girls and to take the girls out and go deeper into the storyline. 

Soohee the Part-Timer is a girl that keeps her past to herself and tends to be way too trusting of people. She is very selfless and plans her entire day and life around others including her friends. She is about as close to a shut-in as you can get without actually being one. She usually goes to work then back home or to the internet cafe where she will play games well into the night. She only breaks this routine if she plans on hanging out with her friends Yena and Adela. She chose to work at the store because it is close to her home and close to where her friends work.

Soohee seems very positive and stern on the outside but on the inside, she is extremely fragile and tends to over worry and overthink everything. This personality trait of hers tends to cause her a great deal of anxiety and depression and her only coping mechanism is to emerge herself into gaming. She also has a weak spot for animals including a cat she later gets that her and the protag name "Store Kitty" as they found it at the store.

 As you go through her missions and get her gifts you slowly learn more and more about her and her friends, but any discussion about the past is stopped before it gets too far. You of course eventually do learn a few things, though not before going through some drama-filled events. These events lead you to realize that you do have feelings for Soohee and that despite her friends' warnings of how hard she will be to handle because of her personality you will accept her no matter how hard it is. 

During a moment of weakness on her part due to her being sick, which she apparently doesn't get sick often but when she does she is down for several days. You learn more about her past as well as her personality that helps you better understand why she is the way she is.

At a certain point in her life, she realizes that her mother and father are not actually married and eventually he leaves her and her mother to marry into a rich family. She spends a great deal of time dealing with the emotional scars from this fact and growing up without her father being in her life. However, she opened up an account at a bank, and soon after it was open she found large amounts of money being deposited in it from an untraceable location. 

It took her some time but she eventually figured it was her father sending her money in a way to show he still cared about her. At first, she used the money to buy anything she wanted and to live a life she wanted to live indulging in the better things that life had to offer. But eventually, it hit her what she was doing, she was accepting a bribe from her father for all the years he wasn't in her life, furthermore, he was basically buying her love. This led her to decide she wasn't going to spend as much of his money as she had been. She decided to get a part-time job and work on her own. 

She only used the money at times to help with paying for her rent, all other money she made was used for her bills and other needs such as food. This set of events left her fragile and guilty at how she had acted prior to making the change. She would also later learn that Yena her friend who worked as a personal security guard through a firm was being paid to keep an eye on her. This led her to wonder if they were ever really friends. 

Eventually, Yena told her the truth or at least of what she knew, and because of this action, she was removed from Soohee and would get jobs that would take her all around the country and other nations. Her other friend Adela who had wished to be a pop idol eventually lost her trainee contract and because of that, she decided to go overseas and study. This meant that Soohee who relied on her friends to keep her from falling into a pit of despair was going to be leaving her behind. 

She tells the protag that after they leave her reason for staying and working at the store will also be gone and she will most likely quit. It is at this point that the Manager asks our protag a question, "do you want to run the store?" and the protag thinks he kidding but the manager is honest. He has gotten a new gig and wants to hand the store over to the protag, plus he thinks that it will help him in his future. Events click into place and our protag confronts Soohee about her past and the fact her friends are leaving, at first, she doesn't know what to say or how to react but after some back and forth he makes it clear that he will be with her from now on and wants her to be with him. 

There isn't much in the way of what happens afterwords which I guess can be good and bad at times. The dating sim feel is a bit nostalgic for me as I can remember playing them all through High School and even somewhat in college. The graphics are crisp and decently designed, the characters all have their unique talents and with the help of the Some Some App you can keep track as to what girl likes you the most and so on. 

On the downside, I found out recently that you are limited to how much time you have to get with one of the girls. Apparently, 302 days is all you get, and each turn is 7 days long. So learning a strategy needed to get one of the three girls within the time limit is crucial.