Unlike his short film Voices of a Distant Star, which was largely made by Shinkai on his own, The Place Promised in Our Early Days is a full-scale production, as reflected by its better animation quality and longer running time.

The anime follows the story of three friends living in Aomori, in northern Japan: two boys, Hiroki Fujisawa and Takuya Shirakawa, both child prodigies; and one girl, Sayuri Sawatari.

In 1996, the three are in ninth grade, their last year of middle school, and they are fascinated by the Hokkaido Tower visible across the Tsugaru Strait to the north.

The boys find a crashed Maritime Self-Defense Force drone aircraft and work on rebuilding the plane with the support of Mr. Okabe, their boss at a military plant.

Takuya is working as a physicist at an Alliance scientific facility sponsored by the United States' National Security Agency, researching parallel universes alongside Ms. Maki Kasahara under the supervision of Professor Tomizawa.

Takuya helps to finish the final programming of the plane, as they plan, using the cover of the soon coming declaration of war against Ezo, to fly to the tower and destroy it before its rays affect everything on Earth, which in turn will save Sayuri.

Hiroki manages to fly the plane across the strait to the Tower carrying Sayuri and a missile provided by the Uilta Liberation Front.

Your voice (きみのこえ, Kimi no koe) The Place Promised in Our Early Days was also serialized as a manga in Monthly Afternoon.

The film was adapted into a stage play directed by Yuko Naito, with a script by Shigeki Motoiki and music by Masato Komata.

The cast included Yudai Tatsumi, Shô Takada, Momoka Ito, Kazuyuki Matsuzawa, Wataru Kozuki, Atsuko Asano.