Road to Guangdong is a first-person Driving Game released by Chinese indie company, Just Add Oil note with a storyline penned by acclaimed Chinese author, Yen Ooi, and a gameplay format rather loosely "borrowed" from fellow driving game, Jalopy.
Set in the 1990s, you're a young Chinese woman who goes by the name "Sunny", recently inheriting her family's restaurant after her parents' passing. Volunteering to collect her only other closest living relative, her "Gu Ma" (grandaunt) from the outskirts of an unspecified Chinese city (presumably Hong Kong), Sunny and Gu Ma prepares for a road trip to Guangdong, where the wake is being held in three days. Problem is, having arrived in the outskirts by train there isn't a transport available, but luckily Gu Ma has a rickety, old 1980s automobile to spare, with Sunny driving Gu Ma all the way to Guangdong - while picking up friends and relatives along the way.
Are we there yet?
- Car Radio Dispute: Sandy (the name Gu Ma bestows on her precious automobile, see below) plays two (yes, two) radio channels by default, a local channel with traditional Mandarin / Cantonese songs, and a Western channel that plays rap. Gu Ma prefers the former, and if Sunny flips to the Western channel Gu Ma will switch it back moments later. Players can keep screwing around with Gu Ma - she even grumbles audibly if they drag it out for too long.
- Character Development: Ultimately, Sunny's road trip to Guangdong with Gu Ma isn't just an errand, but it's a loosely-disguised journey to self-revelation - by the time she reached Guangdong, Sunny had helped her Uncle Graham Wong confess his feelings, convinced her cousin Min Suk to come to terms that he's adopted, delivered her Ba Ba's message of pride to her father-in-law Si Fu, and repaired the bonds between the two sisters, Guu Guu and Loi Loi, which reflects in Sunny helping herself grow as a person at the same time.
- Companion Cube: The rickety old automobile Sunny spends the whole game driving belongs to her grandaunt, which Gu Ma affectionately refers as "Sandy". During conversations between all the driving Gu Ma will bring up the old days where she and Sunny's granduncle (since deceased) will go out on long rides in Sandy, seemingly referring to the car as a child.
- Driver Faces Passenger: There's several moments during gameplay where Sunny turns her head 90° aside to converse with Gu Ma while in the middle of busy traffic. Somehow she doesn't get into any accidents no matter what.
- Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Sunny's Grandaunt is simply called "Gu Ma", or Mandarin for "grandaunt". Her real name isn't revealed at any point of the game, and Sunny only refers to her as "Gu Ma" (though in this case it's done out of respect).
- Intergenerational Friendship: Sunny doesn't really know her Gu Ma / grandaunt that well, compared to her deceased parents and grandparents, but once their journey to Guangdong kicks off they form an easy friendship. It helps that Gu Ma doesn't seem to have any children of her own and Gu Ba (granduncle) had died years earlier.
- Nice Girl: Sunny, who is equal parts friendly (to other civilians), obedient (to her Gu Ma) and devoted (to her duties for the family's seniors).
- Non-Standard Game Over: The one thing that could end your game, running out of gas in-between two destinations. You'll need to constantly keep an eye on the petrol gauge and set aside some extra cash for refueling purposes.
- Road Trip Plot: The whole game revolves around a roadtrip, with the player in control of Sunny chauffeuring her grandaunt to Guangdong city so the two can attend a funeral.
- Writers Cannot Do Math: Even within the 1990s pre-inflation setting, starting a road trip with 400 Chinese Yuan (equivalent to USD55.62, roughly USD300 in present-day) leading from Hong Kong to Guangdong, without extra cash, is near suicidal. Sunny and Gu Ma's journey would likely fizzle out and backfire within less than a day of driving, regardless of Sunny's money-saving efforts.
