Pon the Tanuki is a Cool Guy (and You Can Be Too!)

Last week marked the end of June’s Steam Next Fest, an event promoting hundreds of free playable demos that has run three times a year since 2021. It’s a time for developers to update and polish their demos and put out the best representation of their game so far and if they’re lucky, rack up some wishlists. One demo that really caught my attention this time around was Tanuki Pon’s Summer, a game where you play a BMX-loving tanuki who has a big job, and it’s not delivering mail.

Tanuki Pon’s Summer is the first title by Kyoto-based independent game studio Denkiworks, a relatively young studio formed in 2023 by three former Q-Games developers. Horror fans may recognize indie publisher CRITICAL REFLEX as the label behind games such as No, I’m not a Human and Mouthwashing, so a game as cute as Tanuki Pon’s Summer may come as a surprise!

Tanuki Pon’s Summer is not just a game where you bike around town delivering mail as a cute little raccoon dog. I mean, you do do that, but Pon wears a lot of figurative hats (in addition to his literal mail carrier hat). Between delivering packages, he is a sumo wrestler, a photographer… and even sometimes a lumberjack? This list only scratches the surface of the minigames on offer, and they all control differently and work great to break up the mail delivery sections. The characters are unique and memorable, and when they see Pon flying over rooftops, down rails, or maybe just politely riding up (for once), they will often find extra work for him. “Why would a tanuki need one or more jobs in the first place?” you might ask. Well…

The demo starts with Pon waking up from his nap on a bench, where it seems he has spent all day lazing about with his junk food and manga. After being awoken by an omnipotent voice, Pon bikes through town to his home-sweet-home, Tanuki Shrine. This is where he decides to “call it a day and relax after a hard day of doing nothing,” as the all-knowing voice scolds. The next morning brings a different schedule, as the voice (AKA Great Tanuki God Danzapon) fills Pon in on the upcoming Great Tanuki Matsuri festival, a celebration that happens every 50 years. But the Shrine is in rough shape, because instead of upkeeping the shrine and its sacred fixtures, the Shrine Guardian has been drinking ramune and backflipping off houses on his BMX.

It’s time for Pon to earn his keep. After all, you don’t get to live in Tankuki Shrine for free! With just a month to go, he’s on a time crunch to get the Shrine festival-ready, so when he’s offered a job delivering packages, he has no choice but to accept. The full game will feature four major towns inspired by real life locations Kyoto, Aomori, Sapporo, and Beppu, and they are promised to offer unique quests and characters in each new location.

Through his work ethic and interactions with the townsfolk, Pon demonstrates that he’s a surprisingly well-rounded and multi-talented tanuki! Underneath it all though, he’ll always be a stuntman and a Cool Guy, and he’s gonna shred all through these cozy towns to save the Tanuki Matsuri Festival.