January 8, 2011
Seek A Way Out
If you want to know what game has been devouring my life recently, the correct answer is 9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors.
The visual novel is just not a thing that really has caught on in the west. We want to blow things up and whatnot, not read a novel built into a video game. Still, the DS has created miracles, and I certainly enjoyed games like Hotel Dusk. Therefore, I gave this a try, and I’m really glad I did.
The basic concept behind this game is kind of Cube meets Myst meets Anime. You are controlling Junpei, a young man who finds himself trapped on a sinking ship, playing a game of life or death called the Nonary game. This game is based upon numerology and concepts such as number bases and digital roots. Each player has a bracelet with a number on it, and only certain combinations of bracelets can open the various doors on the ship, requiring co-operation in order to survive… but the way out is behind a door with a 9, and mathematically, all 9 players can’t go through that one single door…
Basically, the game is a sort of “choose your own adventure” novel. There are 7 different endings, and as you read the novel, and help Junpei make decisions, you get to see alternate realities of how the game turns out. The information you gain about your fellow players and the game itself can then be used to figure out the path that leads to the “true” ending, where everything is wrapped up. Along the way, you have to “seek a way out” in what the game calls escape sequences. These put you in a room full of static renders, sort of like Myst, and you have to solve puzzles, usually involving various number systems, in order to open the door in the room and move on.
I really loved this game. It’s clunky in a lot of ways, of course. You have to replay the game many times to get the full story, and while the game nicely lets you skip text you’ve seen before by holding down right on the D-pad, it doesn’t let you skip puzzle rooms you’ve solved before, making you resolve the same puzzles over and over, depending on what paths you’re trying. I solved this by having a walkthrough handy at all times, to help me resolve puzzles in a matter of minutes, but it’s sill not optimal if you were, say, trying to enjoy the game on a trip or something. It also often has the sort of issues Phoenix Wright sometimes has where you, the player, know the solution but Junpei does not, and therefore you have to make him figure it out instead of just solving the puzzle.
Still, the story in this game is pretty great. Although Junpei starts as generic Anime clueless protagonist, his character gets really well fleshed out as you play. At the same time, the other characters have personalities that are also revealed or hidden, depending on which path you go down. There are many mysteries in many of the endings on which characters are doing what, and what characters have motives to do certain things that lead you to bad endings. As such, you’re constantly questioning these characters, and trying to figure out how to pick a path where you keep potentially dangerous characters away from things that could compromise the game. Even better, all the red herrings and clues actually come together in a fairly sensible way. The game manages to wrap up just about everything in its ending, and not feel like it didn’t earn it. This is the most fantastic part, as far as I’m concerned. They could have easily just ignored some things in some of the “bad” playthroughs, but no. It’s all canon; even if some events didn’t really happen, the potential for them happening still existed in the world in the good ending, and that is excellent.
Few games leave me laying in bed, thinking about the possibilities of where the plot is going, and doing math to make sure there wasn’t any plot shenanigans going on. The only other game, off the top of my head, that I can think of that made me think so much was Silent Hill: Shattered Memories. As such, 999 was really a treat for me. I am so glad Nadia made a random Talking Time thread to bring it to my attention. I bought the game from Gamefly, because it was printed in very small quantities and it impressed me enough that I wanted it on my shelf. If you have the opportunity to play it, and are okay with a game that’s more reading than playing, do give it a try.