• Price: $19.99 USD
• Developer: Studio Élan
• Publisher: Sometimes You
• Release Date: October 7, 2026

A review code was kindly provided by Sometimes You on behalf of Studio Élan. We thank them for allowing us to cover something they’ve worked so hard on.

Content warning; rated M. Irresponsible driving, trespassing, alcoholism, child neglect, grieving, self-loathing, mental health struggles, yelling at partner, death by drowning (mentioned, DLC)

Studio Élan has contributed several great LGBT+ visual novels to the Switch catalog, with games such as Twofold making their debut in recent months. Last year I reviewed Please Be Happy, which had such a touching story; it’s one of my favorite visual novels. (I still get the ending theme stuck in my head sometimes!) So I was excited to check out Highway Blossoms: Gold Rush Edition, their latest yuri kinetic visual novel about a treasure hunt in the American Southwest.

The game opens with a young woman named Amber driving through the desert in the motor home she just inherited from her grandfather. She suddenly screeches to a halt when another young woman flags her down. Marina ran out of gas in her clunker of a car, and Amber has many concerns about her safety and lack of preparation for traveling. 😱

While Amber is slightly exasperated by Marina, she does have a heart, and drives her to the nearest gas station. While they’re there, Amber discovers that Marina and a lot of other people have gathered in the area to try and find the rumored “Miner’s Treasure.”

Amber is very concerned about Marina’s lack of survival skills, and she has time on her hands anyway. So she agrees to drive Marina to the first location where some of the treasure is supposed to be hidden. Of course, they have to read their copy of the miner’s journal and figure out where that is first…

The pair become closer as they travel through several states in the American Southwest. I’ve heard of the Grand Canyon, of course, but they visit several landmarks that I’d never heard of before (such as the Canyon de Chelly National Monument in Arizona). This isn’t a historical visual novel, but I did appreciate the details about the landmarks – as well as Amber’s ability to narrow down locations because she knows some of the history of the area.

In between their treasure hunting efforts, it was nice to have some scenes with Amber and Marina taking breaks from the treasure hunting so that we could see them together in less stressful situations. One of my favorite places they went to was a themed-establishment (won’t say any more because of spoilers); I’ve been to that place several times before in real life, and I got such a kick out of its inclusion in the story.

When it comes to treasure hunting, there are always going to be others who hope to make a fortune. Amber and Marina meet their own rival team of treasure hunters; somehow the two teams find themselves running into each other again and again over the course of the main story (and in the DLC).

The characters in Highway Blossoms are pretty complicated. At times I found it difficult to like Amber, which is interesting because she’s the main character! She’s not always the most sensitive person, and she can be a bit judgmental. Even though she’s only a year older than Marina, Amber calls her “kid” or “kiddo” sometimes, which seemed rather patronizing. (Okay, Marina may be lacking in “street smarts,” but still!)

That being said, Amber isn’t a bad person. She’s young and grieving, and perhaps undersocialized after spending so much time on the road as a kid with only her grandpa to talk to? Amber does a lot of nice things for people over the course of the story, starting with the major good deed of stopping for Marina in the beginning and driving her around when she didn’t have to. I also enjoyed some of her humor – particularly the puns.

On the flip side, Marina is much more of an extrovert. She’s also much more forgiving (probably too much). I didn’t dislike Marina, but I also don’t know if the writing gave her a strong enough presence or personality to mesh with Amber’s.

For me the romantic dynamic between Amber and Marina didn’t work so well. The conflict in the story made me a little uncomfortable, and I thought it was resolved too easily. I can appreciate that they didn’t give us perfect characters, and I do still think there’s some good writing in other areas of the story. (Those analogies were a lot of fun!)

In the less tense scenes, some of the dialogue can be pretty entertaining. My favorite character had to be Tess, the younger sister on the rival treasure hunting team. Her situation is a little sad, but she’s adorable and often unintentionally funny.

Overall I felt mixed emotions about the story and characters in Highway Blossoms. There were some scenes I really enjoyed, and others that I didn’t. I liked having the American Southwest as a setting because I haven’t seen it used in a visual novel before, let alone in one with yuri. It was neat getting to learn a teeny bit about the American Southwest.

The art in the game is quite vibrant. I liked the character designs, and I loved their depictions of the landmarks they traveled to in order to search for the treasure. They added nice details such as the sky moving in the background (as well as some tumbleweeds), and occasionally the character portraits move around the screen.

As far as the audio is concerned, the soundtrack felt appropriate for the theme and setting, and I was really impressed that all the dialogue was voiced. You can access the soundtrack from the extras section on the main menu, along with the CGs, collectibles accompanied by Marina’s thoughts on them, and some guest art!

Highway Blossoms offers a pretty decent amount of content between its main story (~90,000 words), the DLC expansion (~40,000 words), and the extras. If you enjoy stories about women in love, this may not be a bad “detour.” 🚗 😉