So, TL;DR: I love Kotodama for the great story with lots of brilliant plot twists, interesting characters, eye-catching artwork, pleasant music and voice acting. However, I absolutely hate this visual novel for its repetitive minigames that cannot be skipped, and they became my nightmare in some chapters. In the end, would I recommend Kotodama to my friends and readers? Yes, I would. Just bring some sedatives; you will need them a lot at some points, trust me.


Fujisawa Academy has seven mysteries every occult-focused person would be ecstatic to investigate. You, as a new transfer student, were forced to join an Occult Research Club, a bizarre group of two girls on their quest to find the truth behind all these mysteries that sound nothing more than the usual school rumors. But you are no ordinary person: you have actually signed a contract with a fox spirit and can use special magical powers to see through people’s lies. And…undress them in the process?!

It seems that the quiet life you have been looking for is not in today’s menu, right? But remember: behind each school mystery lies someone’s personal tragedy.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1756738138


When I first saw Kotodama, I could not but think that it seemed to be a mix of Danganronpa and HuniePop. It takes the twisted plot line from the first and the minigame from the second. Is it a good thing? Yes, it is, because Kotodama turned out to be a pretty unique game in the end. Not without flaws, unfortunately.

Let me describe the good features first: the artwork, the music and the story. The presentation of this game is lovely. Characters’ sprites are partially animated – their eyes blink and mouths move when the character speaks. However, I should also mention that there is hardly any lip sync. The backgrounds are hand-drawn and look great; CGs are amazing and you will remember all of them…oh, you will remember some all right! And do not forget about the cute fox spirit who is said to be gorgeous in her true form (but nobody has seen it so far…). Talking of music, there are many interesting tracks that create just the right atmosphere, and I definitely liked the opening song.

So, what about the story and its promised mind-twisting mystery? It is quite difficult for me to describe the plot without any spoilers, but there are several things that I can safely tell you. Do not be tricked by the seemingly friendly and daily atmosphere of the game. It seems like your typical slice-of-life at first and you might even think that there is a logical solution to all problems and questions. But should I remind you that your character has a literal fox demon as a partner for investigation? Magic beings of Fujisawa Academy will not let you off the hook that easily.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1756738716

There will be a major plot twist somewhere half through the game, which will cause a time loop . You will have to go through several endings, as your character will try to find out the truth, and each time you will see something new; and keep in mind that not all chapters are unlocked from the very beginning. By the way, do not try to quit the game when you see end credits – they are part of scenes and you will not be returned to the Main Menu after them because each time a time loop will take place instead. The sad thing is that you cannot always influence the order of endings or how your character acts/responds.

Speaking about the endings, I will be quite honest here: the second plot twist caught me off guard. I did not expect it at all – as an avid fan of detective books and series, I had at least three theories by the end of the sixth chapter, but none of them turned out to be true. And this was not even the full ending, as I found out later! The True Ending is tricky to get to, but definitely worth your time and effort. So, if you are looking for a good story with some brilliant plot twists, then Kotodama is a great choice – it will lull you in with simple daily interactions between students and fan service minigames and then hit you on the head several times.

And now, let me tell you about the biggest flaw of this visual novel (in my opinion), the main reason why I almost quit playing it at some point and was seconds away from writing a negative review and just forgetting about Kotodama for good. The minigames. Oh my God, those damn match-3 minigames… Do not get me wrong: I thoroughly enjoyed Kotodama up to chapter six. I like match-3 games and have several of them on my smartphone. The ones in this visual novel are quite entertaining, too. They also bring more interactivity to the gameplay. I do not really think that these fan service-focused elements were necessary at all, mind you, but there is no reason to hate them either. Or so I thought.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1756736159

*taking a deep breath* Ok, let me vent a bit: I am a choleric, so it is very easy to make me lose my cool. I finally moved to chapter 6 after several playthroughs and was quite happy about it. ‘Woo-hoo! I will see the true ending in about an hour or two!’ I thought. The story progressed at pleasant pace, two minigames took place and I easily completed them in next to no time. Then the developers, for some unknown reason, decided that hey, we need a third minigame in one single chapter to spice things up! And you know how long it took me to complete it? Two and a half hours! TWO AND A HALF HECKING HOURS, Carl! I was fuming after the first hour; by the end of the second one, I wanted to close the game, uninstall it and smack developers with a negative review – what fun is it to get stuck for so long almost at the end of the story because of a useless minigame that does not bring absolutely anything plot-wise?! I know some people love a good challenge, but I am definitely not one of them by any means.

Finally, I managed to win and move on to chapter seven. And you know what happened next? Right before the final revelation when the culmination was so close I was almost able to touch it? Right, my dudes! The match-3 minigame! An even more difficult than the previous one. Hello, Darkness, my old friend, damn it!!! Another two hours later, and I saw the ending (which, as I have mentioned above, turned out to be incomplete). After the usual end credits sequence and the time loop , I was sitting in my room at almost 4 a.m. and the only thought in my head was, ‘I will have to go through chapters 6 and 7 at least one more time for sure. And they will be waiting for me again…the minigames…’.

Boys and girls, if you do not mind challenging gameplay at all and love torturing yourself for hours, then my rant above will be meaningless to you. Just skip it and buy the game for all its amazing features. BUT! If you are like me, then you can understand why I was so infuriated by spending over 4 extra (!) hours on two minigames! I just wanted to find out how the story ends; I have zero interest in popping bubbles and undressing girls when the final mystery is waving its hand at me two steps away, for God’s sake! Oh, and should I also mention that you will have to go through EVERY minigame over and over again in each chapter during each playthrough? There is no way to see the True Ending without going through the game at least five times. So at the end of the day, the cute and seemingly simple fan service minigames may become a major turning point for some players; at least the ones that are as short-fused as I am.

The problem with Kotodama is that well it just isnt good. The biggest "twist" was quite predictable if you have any kind of genre knowledge and the fact that... well they advertise that not everything is as it seems. I do give PQube some credit for trying to produce/make/develop their own products instead of localizing but I cannot recommend this game. I wish it was good but sadly it ends up just being mediocre.

Now the biggest offender of actually being outright horrible is the gameplay. Not only is it very luck reliant(most of the mechanics are luckbased) meaning that the 2 final puzzles/fights in the game can quite literally be impossible to win, this visual novel loves to repeat it without giving you an option to skip even if you already beat it once before. And since the game *forces* you to replay the chapters it can get tedious.

The story outside of the twist being meh is also kind of meh, the characters arent very memorable because they are mostly cliches and badly developed. And yeah the true ending will make you feel like what the point was because there was no mystery if you paid any sense of attention to the beginning. The art is not bad but I would certainly not say it is good.

On the technical side there arent alot of glaring issues but saving takes a few seconds to register even quick saving and that is a minor annoyance when you want to save before every puzzle because, hey who needs a restart button when you can just make the player lose progress if they dare not save before hand. And a lack of skip read text button and in this game you will want it.

If I had to give a number to rate this game it would be like 5/10 maybe even 4/10.

Oof. Hard to say where this lies.

So, I got this game for a dollar, bundled with some other games. Based on THOSE expectations, it exceeded them. The game did manage some directions to its story I didn't expect, and anything that throws me off guard like that is certainly worth congratulating.

Some things I have to say upfront because they affect the review; this is the variety of VN that involves finishing once normally, and then being allowed a sort of "Second run" that lets you fast forward through old content and change choices. Hard to say much more about how it works without spoilers. BUT, while this has been done before, Kotodama is pretty brutal about making you get the right "flags" compared to others.

- It's possible to "fail a flag" very early and get no warning until you've progressed multiple chapters
- The network of consequences for succeeding certain events can feel disconnected; once in a while there is logic to it, but only if you knew what would occur if, say, you went to a certain hallway during a chapter.
- The game can't be fully fast-forwarded; there is match-3 gameplay that, while fun, does mean that repeating a prior chapter is not a 1-minute affair as it would normally be thanks to fast-forward features.
- Some newer VNs will sympathize with you by visually displaying all branches of decisions. This does not.

This is basically the bad part of the game, and it's bad enough to override some forms of enjoyment. BUT, if you're the type to be enticed by a very unusual match-3 game (I did find it fun, most of the time! Sometimes even felt more strategic than Bejeweled, since it uses different "swap to top" rules) there's still a mystery to enjoy that goes in some directions I didn't anticipate. Plus, of course, the reward system of unlocking new underwear for the victims of your truth-powers (even including a male one; a small point for equal treatment)

If you find the game on sale and feel enticed, I would recommend AFTER one "restart" (you'll get what I mean), start following a guide. Be aware you don't want to finish a chapter until you've "truth bejeweled" that chapter's focal character *twice*, and have a full list of all "Words" from that one chapter. Make use of the many save slots. The game is not at its best when you're trying to figure out the choice paths on your own, and it's not good at indicating your saves are safe.

Imagine someone getting you to read a Choose Your Own Adventure book. You do so, the plot isn't stellar but not bad either, and it's a good read for a couple of hours. You finish the book, and return it to the one you borrowed it from.

Now imagine that person saying "No, you've missed something" and forcing you to read it again from the beginning, without telling you what it is you've missed. That's pretty much what playing this game felt like.

There's also an unskippable minigame (visible in screenshots) that is entirely RNG reliant that you will have to play about 15 times per playthrough. Once it starts you can't save, and if you lose you go straight to a Game Over screen without the option to restart (a function which, oddly enough, is present in the unlockable Puzzle option on the main menu). There's also no option to rollback to an earlier choice.

This title feels like it was supposed to be a Visual Novel, and then someone decided to artificially lengthen the playtime by adding pointless stuff as "Game Over-traps".

Lastly, the game has three (well, four actually) endings: Bad, Good and True (and Fake, which sends you back to the beginning). If you're gunning for all trophies, here's something you will need to know (spolered just to be sure:

in order to get all the Words from Chapter 7, you NEED to get a Chapter 7 Fake Ending (to unlock Mizuki's SP) and Good Ending (to unlock Minori's) WITHOUT getting the True Ending, as the True Ending ends the game. Once that happens, you can only start a New Game, and unlike getting sent back, that has you start out from scratch with nothing.Fake End and Good End both send you back to Chapter 1, but you get to keep your stuff, which is what you want if you're after trophies.

You have been warned.

So, had i known about the spoiler above, i could have finished this game some 15-20 hours earlier. At a regular pace, i predict about 3-4 hours of playtime before Luke starts getting on your nerves and you're either Googling the walkthrough that is available on the Kotodama fandom wiki, or likely uninstalling the game and never touching it again.

Full review (including score): https://youtu.be/3LWz17ATfbg
Written review below!

Cons:
- Tacked-on gameplay elements
- Extremely repetitive story design
- Quality of life problems
- Visual issues

What happens when you cross a visual novel like Doki Doki Literature Club with a lewd Bejeweled game like HuniePop? Well, you probably would get something like Kotodama, except that Kotodama seems to forget what made those two games work.

NOTE: Had to trim this review to fit Steam's character limit. Check the video for the full version!

• Honestly, I had a hard time coming up with any sort of pro for this game. One thing I always try to do with my reviews is to find at least something worth praising, even in the worst of games, but I just couldn’t do it here. If anything, I liked the story concept that it went for, but it was executed so poorly here that I don’t even think it deserves its own spot as a pro. So with that said, let’s move right onto the cons.

• Awful, tacked-on gameplay elements. One thing you should understand about Kotodama is that it is a visual novel first and foremost. Despite how the game may be advertised, the gameplay elements definitely take a backseat to the story. The vast majority of your time will be spent reading, so do try to go in with the right expectations there. However, if you are playing for the gameplay segments, be prepared for disappointment. Not only does the entire gameplay side of the game rely heavily on RNG, but it just doesn’t feel like it fits in a story-focused game like this.
  
  Given that the gameplay is based on Bejeweled, it is understandable that there would be at least some RNG involved. However, Kotodama‘s gameplay doesn’t operate entirely like Bejeweled. Instead of being able to move tiles up, down, left, and right, you’re only able to move a tile to the top of its column and earn matches that way. This seems like an interesting twist on the formula, but in reality, it just takes a lot of control away from the player and makes the whole ordeal a lot more RNG-dependent.
  
  And as if that wasn’t already enough, you’re limited with the amount of moves you can make. The game provides you a way to get more moves while in a puzzle, but that mechanic is also straight RNG. By straight RNG, I mean that you actually click on buttons that tell you your percentage chance of getting a certain number of moves back. And of course, in order to be able to use this mechanic in the first place, you have to string together chains of matches in the field. It’s pretty much RNG that leads to even more RNG. Because of this, a lot of the late-game puzzles take multiple attempts to clear, which really isn’t all that fun considering that they can take upwards of ten or so minutes to get through each.
  
  So it comes back to how exactly this gameplay fits into the story, given that this is a story-focused game after all. Well, Kotodama tries to provide a story reason for this gameplay, but in the end, it’s obvious that it could have been written without. The gameplay is tacked-on and it shows. It was like the devs knew that they couldn’t sell the game purely based on its story, so they decided to jump on the HuniePop train and throw in these cheap gameplay elements just to make a quick buck off of that audience. The fact that there’s a “fantasize” mode which is unlocked for each character as you clear their puzzle is evidence enough to back up this claim.
  
  However, what they failed to understand is that there is a reason why the gameplay in HuniePop works so well: that being that the game is built around it, rather than the other way around. As someone that generally enjoys games like HuniePop, all of this came as a massive disappointment.
  
  
• Extremely repetitive story design. Given that the gameplay side to the game is awful, you would at least expect the story to redeem it a bit, but unfortunately Kotodama fails there too. I could go on about the bland characters, boring tropes, and twists that aren’t really that well-written, but the story’s main problem is just how repetitive it is. You may be thinking, “how does a mystery story like this become repetitive?”. Well, that’s actually rather easy: by forcing the player to replay entire sections of the story over and over again with little difference. If you’ve ever seen Haruhi Suzumiya‘s Endless Eight, that’s pretty much what they did here, but at least Haruhi had a good story going for it.
  
  In order to get Kotodama‘s full ending, you’ll have to replay the story several times, going through all of the puzzles and such along the way to reach the point that you were at before. At first, I had thought that perhaps they could do something interesting with this, but by the fourth time I was replaying the game’s first several chapters, I had completely lost interest in whatever the story was trying to convey. If anything, it makes a game that should have been maybe five or six hours double that time, but it’s honestly just a waste of time at that point.
  
  
• Quality of life problems. Unfortunately, Kotodama also has a bunch of other quality of life issues plaguing the experience. Most of them are rather minor issues, but when combined, it becomes pretty apparent that the game was not entirely polished before release. One such issue is the game’s inability to hide the mouse cursor. Like most other visual novels, Kotodama automatically moves the mouse cursor to choices and other HUD elements during play, so as to make it easier to select said elements. Normally, after you do this and then advance the text, the cursor is supposed to disappear. In Kotodama however, it does not. Combined with the inability to toggle automatic cursor movements and you’re left with a cursor stuck on the screen until you move it away. As someone that plays with a keyboard during the VN segments, this did become a bit annoying.
  
  A bigger issue would be just how slow the game’s skip feature is. Given that the story repeats itself so often, I made heavy use of this feature, to skip all of the text I had already read. It’s definitely faster than spamming enter, but compared to how fast other visual novels can skip through text, it’s actually really slow here. What makes it worse is that it doesn’t even skip most of the animations, further slowing down one’s attempt to skip past read scenes. The game could really benefit from a “skip to choice” option or at least some form of faster skipping.
  
  Aside from those issues, I did notice a number of typos and grammar issues throughout. It actually wasn’t as bad as some of the other visual novels that have come out this year, but still an issue worth noting regardless.
  
  
• Visual issues. Slow UI animations, lazily done facial animations, blurry art when played in fullscreen.

Kotodama tries to tell a decent story, it really does. However, a series of bad design choices, quality of life issues, and visual problems combined with the awful tacked-on gameplay just make this one not worth the time. There are far better games out there that do the gameplay and story elements better, some that even do both at the same time. Being PQube’s first development project, I really hope that they can learn from it and bring us something cool later down the line.

Follow my Steam Curator Page for more reviews + videos!

Fastest "no" in the West

Firstly, performance. This visual novel makes my laptop overheat. This is because of all the extra cosmetic effects there are in the game, for example the background moving when I move the cursor. You can't turn them off, which means that you need a better computer to play, again, a visual novel.

Secondly, gameplay and general feel of the game. The cosmetic effects issue is big here as well - clicking a button to get to the menu (which you can't do by pressing ESC for some reason) takes a second, which makes the experience very unsmooth and annoying to play. Especially since you need to click a duck sometimes in order to progress in the game. Then there's the match-3 gameplay, which is 100% luck and 0% skill. It's repetitive and boring, and when the difficulty of the puzzles increase at the end of the game (where "difficulty" means worse luck essentially) I spent an hour just replaying the same puzzle over and over until my luck finally gave in to finish the game. Not to mention that the match-3 puzzles are based on making the characters strip when there are no other fanservice elements in the game.

Now, thirdly, the story. You have to solve the 7 mysteries this school has. Except that they're not much of a mystery, the truth to them is glaringly obvious from the beginning of the chapters so you just talk to some people to make them say the obvious and then the chapter is done.
But !!!! The game introduces time loops. Make a slight single wrong choice and you get a bad ending and have to start from the beginning to start the loop over again, and then read the text from the chapters you've read over and over again until you eventually get to the true ending. And, the true ending has so many tiny choices that you have to get exactly right so when you finally think you're done, the game hits you with the wrong ending again and oh boy, time to get through 7 chapters I've already read with the same match-3 luck based puzzles one more time.
Does this pay off, at least? Does the reader get that satisfying ending they would want from a Doki Doki-clone? Nope. After the final puzzle (which, again, took me an hour due to bad luck), you quickly get the explanation to the last obvious twist and the credits roll, and the biggest satisfaction the reader gets is that they never have to play this atrocious game again.

To be honest, the first screenshots of the new project from PQube intrigued me. The game looked quite interesting and promised to be a pleasant adventure with a touch of mysticism. And then PQube showed the trailer, and it turned out that this is another match-3, only this time with a serious element of the visual novel. Don't get me wrong, I love a good match-3: my 30 hours in HuniePop are proof of that. And I love VNs.

Unfortunately, Kotodama is far from being a masterpiece. Weak characters, setting and plot, unbalanced gameplay and a HUGE amount of repetitiveness. This game has everything.


Simply put, it's a pretty basic match-3, but with some twists. You can only move one gem to the top line and pray that you get a row of 3 or more gems of the same color, of which there are 5. If you pull off a big combo, you get Challenge points. Your job is to undress the girl (or boy) to get to the truth. If you run out of turns - game over.

Well, here's the problem.

The gameplay is unbalanced. This kind of match-3 makes the game even more reliant on RNG than usual. Challenge system can mitigate this a bit, but (surprise!) it's also RNG! Challenge system gives you a chance to spend some challenge points to get yourself free turns. If the RNGesus decides that you shall not get turns, the girl will just give you some debuffs.

Now, what's the problem, aside from RNG? One of the challenges gives you 1 turn for 1 point with a 90% chance. If you get some lucky turns at the beginning of the match, you can cheese the system and get yourself plenty of turns, essentially eliminating the challenge factor (haHAA) from the game.

At the end of the game the problem is the opposite: last two bosses (?) have some very cheap difficulty boosts. They are much harder than the rest of the game but still trivial.

And if you somehow manage to fail the puzzle, get ready to load the game. No restarts.


TL;DR: Bad.

The developers boast that the game "intentionally plays on classic tropes and clichés to continually twist the story and surprise the player". Well, it might do so, but plot-wise the game is still really weak.

The gist of the game is something you are all very familiar with: transfer student, 7 school mysteries, yada yada. Of course, those 7 mysteries are not what they seem like, and hoo boy, here we go.. was what I would like to say, but again, plotwise the game is very weak. Characters are borderline irritating, most of the mysteries are able to be solved very easily, the main baddie is spoiled right after the first walkthrough, which removes the mystery factor completely, and the endings suck.

To get to the true ending you'll need to replay the game at least a couple of times. I had to do it 5 times. What adds salt to the wound is the fact that the gameplay segments (even the ones you've already completed) are unskippable.

What about the technical side of things?

PC port is atrocious. Esc closes the game completely WITHOUT ANY PROMPT (I've lost 1+ hour of progress at least a few times), windowed mode is nonexistent.

Localization is alright, but apparently, no QC: a lot of typos, empty lines, and I've experienced plenty of other small bugs.

***

To sum it up: buy it only if you crave some anime-styled match-3. There is no good gameplay like in HuniePop. There is no good art like Sayori's in Tropical Liquor. There is no good plot either. Kotodama is pretty bad or average pretty much on every front, and I can't recommend it to anyone.

Attention:
- this review may contain spoilers, if you don´t mind go ahead and read at your own risk.
- this is an early review, still playing.

Summary: A VN/puzzle hybrid game made in Unity with match 3/thriller/mysteries elements. Features fully VA (excepts MC), good artwork (only the main characters), good soundtrack. This is a 12+ game, but CAUTION is advised.

About:
- The game: This is a VN/puzzle hybrid game made in Unity with match 3/thriller/mysteries elements developed by PQube Limited (their first self-developed), the same publisher of Gal Gun. Estimated playtime: in progress
- Story: you will play as a transfer student with special powers in the Fujisawa academy and will be convinced to join the ORC (occult research club) to solve the 7 mysteries of school. As the store page describes, "Nothing is as it seems!", the main characters have something behind and with MC´s power will uncover the truth, making the twisted plot interesting.
- Gameplay: As a vn, you can choose the MC´s sex, but seems doesn't affect the story, and basically will read sentences, collect the words (you can find already obtained words at the word book) and choose the best way to find the truth behind the mysteries; choosing wrongly will lead to the bad end and the MC will be time leaped until the date he joins the school (chapter 1); while you can´t find the right path, will be bad ending and "teleported"/time leaped to chapter 1 in a endless loop, playing again and again. As a puzzle, is a match 3 type, in horizontal/vertical only, to uncover the truth, you will enter the target´s mind and play the puzzle; during this process, you will be fantasizing and stripping your target, being male or female. Differently, from what described at the store page, the target will not be naked, but at their underwear, however, once you clear, will show from their head until a small part of the chest. About the "Battle key characters using ‘Kotodama’ – the power of words", you will not exactly playing with words, instead this in the vn mode will collect words by reading the dialogues or quacker (how they call twitter in this game) and the system will collect these words and increase your power to be used in the match 3 game.
- Translation/text: not bad, but the term "honor scholar" is strange. I believe the "honor student" might be better for the context.
- VA: present, excepts the MC. In some characters, the VA doesn't suit the characters design. An earphone is highly advised.
- Artwork: good for the main characters; the environment characters is too simple. CG´s are great. This is a 12+ game, so you will not find hcg here, BUT will strip the characters until their underwear.
- Soundtrack/bgm: good. the soundtrack with vocals is very good too.
- Performance: no problems so far.

My cons: Fantasizing and stripping sounds interesting, but unnecessary, I mean, the MC will strip the target in his mind (like a perv), but for which purpose? Or is for some cheap fan service? Besides while stripping, the target will moan, so yeah, better put an earphone or silent some characters, since they (males and females) will keep moaning while you strip them. If you are careless, will fall in an endless loop, playing again and again. The price is overpriced.

Conclusion: Kotodama: The 7 Mysteries of Fujisawa is a VN/puzzle hybrid game with a decent and interesting plot, good soundtrack, good artwork (only the main characters) with fan service (not 18+), fully voiced (excepts MC) and suitable for both sexes (since you will strip male and females). Is a good game, but overpriced. Recommended buy in sales, or at full price if you like puzzles and is a fan of PQube Limited games.

Normal visual novel but may-be prefer something else first. Got it from a bundle, do not pay full price.
View Quacker tips immediately when those appear. Save before Match3 puzzles.

Graphics: normal
Story: normal
Audio: Japanese
Adult content: no
Match3 puzzles exists: I usually avoid those games, so it's good to solve some here
Focus extra: sometimes some words in conversations are in different color, will give You some extra points

- You can reach to the end and get the story overview but because You didn't select some specific answers in the start chapters You don't get any ending achievements and need to start over

This is kinda frustrating because I think there could be a decent game in here. Parts are good. There's a clear production value, but to put it succinctly this story based vn is brought down a lot by banal gameplay padding. Without spoiling anything, this game does expect you to make multiple playthroughs for different endings. While that in itself doesn't sound offensive, I found it difficult to parse what would put me on track for better or different endings, and so I believe I did 2 full runs after being eligible at a game start to get those endings and failing for reasons I couldn't discern. Even after having gotten the endings I'm still not clear on what made those runs invalid. Text skip also really doesn't remedy this considering how much text there is alongside the minigames and near constant returns to the choose a destination menu.

It's strongest hook is probably the story, and even that sort of flounders around as one of the main gameplay loops has you visit a laundry list of areas doing investigations, talking to people that may or may not have useful or even relevant information, having some slightly stronger story beat, and then rinsing and repeating until the story feels like picking itself back up again or wrapping up the chapter. Also, while I did by and large like the game's smaller mysteries for being charming mini adventures, the overarching story did not leave me wanting more but left me plenty disappointed. The player's Tomboy friend Yukino who's hinted at early on as being crazy and evil turns out to be crazy and evil in a non-twist true ending. You can argue that people who ran with red herrings like perhaps she was possessed or drugged up to be that way would have been thrown for a loop, but either way this reveal is also immediately resolved with her and a demon who seemingly has nothing to do with her teleporting away. To me the ending is very flat and unfortunately lazy.

The music is overall serviceable and fitting, but notably there isn't a lot of tracks and so it can kinda get repetitive. This isn't helped by the game length and padding. Should mention it's fully JP voice acted for everyone other than the MC. I can't exactly rate their performance, but it sounds decent.

The character and cg art is good, except for what's in the ecchi minigames. People's abdomens look kinda weird. Though I imagine everyone else reviewing has already mentioned this, this no patch to change that ecchi to nudity because the art doesn't exist. I'm personally fine with that here because this game doesn't focus on romantic interactions and the whole minigame seems to be padding and ill fitting for what it's supposed to represent anyway (you strip people naked in your mind to reveal their true selves using a WORD BOOK powered by WORDS AND PHRASES you get from talking to people but the minigame is tile matching?).

The gameplay is that of a dialogue path branching vn with tile matching. The tile matching is boring and also later has a higher difficulty curve I'm not really a huge fan of. You can't adjust difficulty in the story or skip them. And you wouldn't really think it, but there is almost no actual deduction drawing expected of the player in this mystery investigation game. There is some very minor problem solving in asking the correct questions and giving smart answers when questioned yourself, but usually you'll just act in response to more immediate things throughout the story. The game even repeatedly pokes fun at the fact that you probably get bored on subsequent playthroughs treading old dialogue and not being able to just blurt out final answers to big mysteries.

Review summary: Not well written enough to save it from all its other failings. Still slightly charming and not bad, but it's often just this generally middling experience of being strung along.