パラノマサイト FILE23 本所(ほんじょ)七不思議(ななふしぎ)(PARANORMASIGHT: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo)^A) is a bit deceptive in how it presents itself versus how it really is.

It presents itself as a horror game but…well, it’s a mystery game/visual novel with horror elements. This might sound like a who cares difference, but it is key.

If you’re expecting to be spooked for big chunks of the game then yeah, no, that ain’t happening. On the VN/game spectrum, it leans more on game, but is still quite linear.

Let me give you an idea of the structure. The first half of the game takes place at night. It’s also far more exciting and tense than the second half of the game. The second half takes place during the day and is much calmer and focused on investigation.

One reason for the difference in tone has to do with those cursed objects I mentioned in the opening text. Those can only be used at night and they accounted for about 70% of the tension in any given scene.

Yes, this is another situation like Cross Ange or Koutetsujou no Kabaneri where the story is split into two distinct halves. However, the transition here works quite well. It helps that it’s split along the time of day (or night), which helps with the tone.

The first half of the game is basically you, as the player, having to figure out what people’s curses are, while not getting hit with them yourself. It’s pretty thrilling solving this ‘puzzle’.

I feel this is a decent place to pivot into the gameplay. Primarily, this is a point-and-click style puzzle game, where you’re presented with a puzzle and, well…you solve it. The solutions to the puzzles are not difficult to land at, but they are creative and not immediately apparent in many cases.

However, this is also where PARANORMASIGHT falters: it doesn’t make full use of the mechanics it establishes. Among these mechanics are: recalling information; using items; using curses during parts of the game. Basically, it’s very railroaded and that’s a bit frustrating.

Going back to the tone and the first half/second half stuff. The second half is the majority of the game, so for most of it you’re calmly investigating and solving puzzles. The first half, the tense bit, is much shorter. Would PARANORMASIGHT benefit from having more tension besides the night segment? I’m leaning on ‘probably’.

I think it would have made sense to include a third part, which takes place during a second night, where the climax would occur. But…let’s keep a few things in mind: by that point, you (the player) already know what all the curses do, what their limitations are and so on. The tension in the first half primarily derived from the fact you didn’t know what those curses did. It wasn’t just the fact you were in danger. As a result…I’m not really sure if more tension could be injected into PARANORMASIGHT. It’s kinda…yeah. Although, while playing, I did feel anxious during the second half, because there was a deadline (the night) that I was getting worried about. That’s partially why I think a second night might have been a good idea…it’s what I was expecting to happen anyway.

Another thing to consider is that those tense standoffs primarily take place during the Prologue which, y’know, is even shorter. There is tension in the other parts of the night, but it’s primarily concentrated in the Prologue. PARANORMASIGHT kinda unintentionally screws itself, because the Steam discussions I’ve read indicate a decent number of players found the lack of ‘thriller thrills’ in the rest of the game disappointing. Though, again, considering the circumstances, it would have been difficult to inject more tension into it.

パラノマサイト FILE38 伊勢(いせ)人魚(にんぎょ)物語(ものがたり)(PARANORMASIGHT: The Mermaid’s Curse)^C) is the entirely unexpected sequel to The Seven Mysteries of Honjo. Seriously, I thought there would never be a sequel…at least in game form. I also found out that there is, indeed, a manga sequel…but I haven’t read it yet and probably won’t for a while.

Unlike with the first game, I did my best to avoid looking at a walk-through. Unfortunately, I succumbed when I wanted to get the true ending. No matter what I tried and thought of, I just couldn’t figure anything out.^D) So I glanced at it and…I don’t think I would have figured it out.

Let’s start with the story. I think the story this time is much improved over the previous game, but it has fewer horror elements. Like, significantly fewer. So this game is a little more honest in its presentation as being a mystery VN game with horror elements, rather than a horror VN game with mystery elements. That’s overall better.

I think the story itself doesn’t have any real issues. Unlike the first game, where the ending is kinda off. The ending this time is pretty unambiguously good.^E)

The story this time was also just generally more cohesive. Although it was told in a non-linear fashion, it wasn’t too hard to keep track of most stuff and you could figure it out no problem.

Now for the gameplay.

I think the gameplay is about the same as the last game…though it, again, has the problem of not taking full advantage of the mechanics it itself sets up. At least this time there are fewer overall meta-mechanics…making it a bit less annoying.

Both games rely on the player manipulating the game via some meta mechanic. Whether that be in the settings, save files or other such stuff. But these mechanics are so rare and needed so little that you, as the player, can’t really figure out that you’re supposed to rely on these solutions.

I think that they’re clever, sure, but I don’t think the games do a good enough job at guiding the player towards the solution. The games just don’t really give any hints or indication that the solutions to the puzzles rely on these mechanics…which means that the player doesn’t even realize that they exist most of the time. It’s just kinda assumed they’ll figure it out.

I like the artstyle, just like I liked it last time. The music was mostly reused from the previous game, which isn’t an issue, since the music is great. Honestly, if it means getting the new game out faster, I don’t mind.

I’ll note something about the music that I realized recently. I decided to listen to the soundtrack of the first game (which I own) again and that’s when I noticed that the music is actually different between the two games. Some of the music is re-used, but I can’t definitively say how much of it is (the main theme definitely is). There’s also plenty of new music. So I’ll have to wait for the soundtrack to release before I can make a proper comparison.