未春节 Festival of Unborn Spring未春节 Festival of Unborn Spring

Game Information

In the game, you will:
Play as Wang Xinyu, a nostalgic and melancholic contemporary high school student. Follow the story into her inner world and past, and seek a way to untangle her emotional complex; meet companions with vastly different personalities and, in a relaxed and casual atmosphere, join an adventure inspired by Bai mythology; travel to various locations in Kunming and discuss literature, history, and philosophy with your companions along the way.

This is a single-route, single-ending game, with a small number of choices that do not affect the overall plot.
Engine: Ren'Py
Text: approx. 150,000 Chinese characters
Playtime: 6–8 hours
CGs: around 15

*The folklore and legends in the script have all been artistically adapted; please evaluate them with caution.

Character

Wang Xinyu — Koi Skin

Profile: A first-year high school student who is nostalgic and drawn to the occult, internet aesthetics, and East Asian literature. She has a younger cousin named Su Miran. Her mother died in a mysterious accident when she was little, and she was often abused by her father. After entering high school, Wang Xinyu, eager to find kindred spirits, met Yu Guo and quietly developed a crush on her. She feels lost about the future. When winter break begins, she hopes to get to know Yu Guo better, but instead gets swept into Duan Tingqiu’s mythological adventure—and finds herself recalling her wistful junior-high past.

School: Kunyun High School

Three fun facts:

• Even though she goes by “Koi,” she thinks she’s more like a tropical fish.

• The Not-Yet-Spring Festival is also a modern poem she wrote.

• (Back in the day) when she was indecisive, she liked to let tarot cards decide for her.
  “The Spring Festival is still far from coming, so that we may dance away all our sorrows on the joyful night.”

Duan Tingqiu — Sheng He Yu

Profile: A first-year high school student originally from Dali who is obsessed with myths and legends. He looks at everything in the world with curiosity. Guided by occult theories, he searches for the “Molten Eye,” which may be able to change the world, and has pulled three other people into his little crew. He loves classical poetry and traditional culture. Though he never says it, he quietly senses his friends’ feelings.

School: Shifu High School

Three fun facts:

• He does not know the Six Meridians Divine Sword.

• An older bro he’s never met shows up in his dreams and cheers on his adventure.

• He wrote a novel called Green on Repeat, and has produced a huge amount of other work besides.
  “The wind and waves swirl around the rocky shoal, rustling the reeds.”

Yu Guo — Ria

Profile: An easygoing, widely read second-year high school student. She has a serious grasp of German literature and history, and her favorite poet is Heine. In her first year, she founded a philosophy club, but by her second year the discussion sessions she organized had turned into label-pinning sessions, making her doubt the format itself. She is quite interested in a first-year girl she met at the discussions and hopes to use the limited chances during winter break to talk more theory.

School: Kunyun High School

Three fun facts:

• She may wear old East German medals when she goes out.

• Because of her name, she has been teased as a French literary giant 393 times so far.

• Her playlist has both progressive rock and gufeng DJ.
  “No, you can't even enter the eternal torch that burns sinners after the master's death.”

Su Miran — Lenz Has No Rain

Profile: A super anime-obsessed, slightly delinquent girl from Guangzhou. She’s blunt and occasionally has a fiery temper. She put together a flamingo-style outfit herself, has deep anime and gaming knowledge, and is also a cosplay influencer. She has a bad relationship with her parents and was once cut off financially. She comes to Kunming during winter break to find her older cousin—and to escape her clingy ex-boyfriend. But then, of all things, her ex-boyfriend shows up in Kunming too...

School: Yueya High School

Three fun facts:

• She started out as a mildly successful cosplayer, then shot to fame after pivoting to a physics problem-solving channel.

• Her name comes from “几米然,” the god of song in the Bai creation myth.

• Her absolute favorite dessert is soufflé.
  “Even if you want to become greedy/watashi no atachirare katare/chitare darega atachirara te”

Introduction

You never believed in love at first sight—until you saw her, and lost your heart in a single glance. You were never one to hold back from making the first move—until you looked into her eyes and realized, to your regret, that she just wasn’t interested, leaving you grasping for an impossible reversal.

You were convinced that self-interest was the individual’s only purpose. So you meant to use the mysterious boy who appeared out of nowhere during winter break, dressed in strange folk ornaments—the same boy who, in the name of myth, invites you into an absurd adventure. Unwilling to let romance be life’s mere tautology, you placed absurd faith in transference, and ultimately face a situation beyond repair.

You couldn’t care less about the petty things around you. You believe you were never meant for this ordinary world, and that you will one day beat the system. Yet on every lucid late night, meritocratic anxiety takes the pulse of your youthful consciousness.

You hate your bio-dad. Without him, there would be no twisted, suffocating home. You can’t help hating yourself. Even lying on the floor in tears amid the debris of daily life, you still can’t bring yourself to leave, asking whether any of this is right.

You are mature; you are naive. You are romantic; you are cold. You dream; you are pessimistic. You are Wang Xinyu. You are the master of Dream Echo. You are the wasteland where love is sentenced to death. You are caught in a whirlpool from which there is no retreat. You call for the impossible real. You wait for the festival of spring that never comes.

This is not only your story. It is also the story of a team.

Finally, at the end of this warm winter, go welcome your cousin, who has traveled all the way from Guangzhou to visit and has a modest following online. You may notice that her brow is slightly furrowed—but what matters most right now is to smile and open your arms:

—Welcome to the Spring City!