The Thirteenth Pearl

 「美しさは人の心惑わす月のように

あの夏の朧月夜煌めき続ける」

「儚い珠のように・・・」(星守紗凪)

Beauty is like the moon that deceives the hearts of people

It keeps on shining like the misty moonlit night in the summer

"Hakanai Tama no You ni..." (Hoshimori Sana)

In general, I don't really mind from what time period my mystery fiction hails, as long as it entertains me. It's a reason why I don't bother with period tags like "Golden Age" for my reviews. Of course, it can be harder to obtain older material in general, but age itself is not a factor that plays a significant role when I pick the next in line. The same with videogames actually. Obviously, there's an extra hurdle here compared to for example books: a book from 1900 will function exactly the same as one published in 2019 and does not require other objects to work, while you do need to find the proper hardware for each videogame, and it's definitely harder to find older videogames, and the corresponding hardware. That's why the reviews of mystery videogames here on the blog do have a slight bias for newer hardware, as it's simply easier to get hold of them, but again, in general, I just play whatever seems interesting, as long as I have the right hardware.

Unlike books however, videogames have changed a lot in a relatively short period, especially in terms of visuals. When I open De Geheimzinnige Japanees, which is probably the oldest book I have at the moment, it's not that different from any book I purchase now in 2019, even though there's close to a century between those two releases. But if you compare for example Super Mario Bros. (1985) with Super Mario Odyssey (2017), you'll see an immense difference in terms of well, everything, but the graphics are probably the most obvious changes. And of course, these two games don't even run on the same hardware. The graphical style of the original Super Mario Bros. is of course also a product of its time, as the available hardware (the Famicom or Nintendo Entertainment System) then obviously couldn't even dream of rendering something like Super Mario Odyssey. Heck it is likely that nowadays, even one single music track from Odyssey will take up more storage than the Famicom can handle.

The mystery videogames I discuss here are, obviously, all games in the broader adventure genre, where you solve puzzles in order to progress in a story (yes, that is like a mystery story in general, where a puzzle/mysery needs to be solved to reach the conclusion). Broadly speaking, I usually discuss two kinds here. First are the novel games, which are like digital Choose-Your-Own-Adventures: you are mostly just reading yourself through a story, but occassionally you are confronted with a story-deciding choice, which influences the further outcome of the story. Usually you'll be exploring all kinds of branching storylines (and going back) in order to find the correct route to the end. Examples of these games are Kamaitachi no Yoru, 428 and Machi. The other type I usually discuss is the command-style adventure. Here you use set commands like [TALK], [MOVE], [USE], [LOOK] etc. do interact with the characters and environment in order to proceed in the story. These games are basically an offspring of traditional Point & Click adventures on the PC (for example Monkey Island), but with an easier control scheme for home consoles. This particular genre basically originated on the Famicom game system, where games like the first Tantei Jinguuji Saburou (1987), Nintendo's own Famicom Detective Club (1988-1989) and Portopia Renzoku Satsujin Jiken (1985) really solidified the genre and nowadays, games like Gyakuten Saiban/Ace Attorney are still mostly based on these older games.

This is why I was so excited when the game Ise-Shima Mystery Annai: Itsuwari no Kuroshinju ("The Ise-Shima Mystery Guide: The False Black Pearl", Switch) was first announced. While this game was released in January 2019 for the Nintendo Switch, it was developed as an adventure game in the spirit of those old Famicom adventure games. In fact, the developers Happy Meal even noted that they could really just print the ROM on a cartridge and have it run on an actual Famicom if they wanted. As one can see from the graphics, the game really looks like one of those three-decade old videogames. The game looks especially a lot like Okhotsk ni Kiyu, an adventure game developed by Horii Yuuji (creator of the cultural phenomenon Dragon Quest). Horii developed three mystery adventure games for the PC in the 1980s, being Portopia Renzoku Satsujin Jiken, Okhotsk ni Kiyu and Karuizawa Yuukai Annai, and the first two titles were also ported to the Famicom. What makes Ise-Shima Mystery Annai: Itsuwari no Kuroshinju visually interesting is that the character designs are made by Arai Kiyokazu, who also made the character designs for the Famicom port of Okhotsk ni Kiyu. So the game really looks like a Famicom adventure.

The story of Ise-Shima Mystery Annai: Itsuwari no Kuroshinju is also quite similar to Okhotsk ni Kiyu. The game starts with the unnamed protagonist, who is a police detective, receiving a call from his young and energetic subordinate Ken, with the report that a body was discovered in Ueno Park in Tokyo. It is not clear whether the man had had an accident, or was killed, but initial investigation is also troubled by the fact the man was not carrying any identification. Eventually, the duo of police detectives manage to track down the man's luggage in a station locker, where they discover he was in the possession of a kinchaku bag (a kind of small pouch) with a beautiful black pearl inside. The faded writing on the kinchaku bag lead the detectives to the region Ise-Shima, a popular tourist destination thanks the Ise Grand Shrine, Meoto Iwa, the fresh seafood and of course, pearl farms. The kinchaku bag seems to originate from a pearl farm of which the name starts with "Hama..." and the detectives this to be a hint to the identity of their corpse, but as they conduct their investigation, they slowly realize the murder might have to do with the luxury pearl farm Le Bijou, which has singlehandedly driven several traditional pearl farms to bankruptcy and is now slowly taking over Japan, and the foreign market with their newest black pearl.

The first murder in Tokyo and then a hint that leads to a tourist destination in Japan, and the detectives also become friends with two women who are somehow connected to the case? Yep, Ise-Shima Mystery Annai: Itsuwari no Kuroshinju is paying a lot of homage to Okhotsk ni Kiyu. The game really does play as an old Famicom detective adventure game, and people who enjoy games like Famicom Detective Club should really play this game. As a mystery game, you won't be doing much thinking of yourself (like those older games) and the story is more like a stereotypical two-hour suspense drama show, but that is of course exactly what this game is trying to be, and it succeeds really well in that sense. The game is more about following all the leads and being surprised by the sudden story developments rather than giving the player a chance to figure things out themselves (it's not like there are proper hints to who the murderer is) but it does a good job at dangling all kinds of mysterious events and suspicious characters in front of you. I wouldn't recommend the game to people really looking for an adventure game where you have to solve a case yourself, but man, I really, really want people who like Famicom adventures to play this, but it feels exactly like how it should. And that's even including the small annoyances: I never really liked the faux 3D mazes in Portopia Renzoku Satsujin Jiken or the first two Famicom Detective Clubs and they weren't really fun here either, but yeah, it's part of the experience.

While the game looks like a game from the eighties though, the game is set in contemporary times. In fact, you'll be using a smartphone command quite a few times over the course of the game to for example take pictures, search for directions to your next destination and even play minigames to pass the time. A nice touch to mix the "modern" with the "old". At one point, you even check online reviews of the local restaurants! Another great touch is the digital manual: in the pause menu you can find a manual like you used to get with videogames, even complete with empty pages for you to take down some memos! It's also here where you can listen to the deliciously eighties theme song of the game (also used in the trailer).

By the way, I know sometimes (translations of) novels are delayed etc. after the initial announcement and release dates are shuffled, but I don't think I've ever seen it as bad as with this game. Ise-Shima Mystery Annai: Itsuwari no Kuroshinju was originally supposed to release in Fall 2017, on the Nintendo 3DS. Fall came, and went. After a long silence, the game was then supposed to release in early Spring 2018. And then it was announced it wouldn't be released on the 3DS anymore, but on the Nintendo Switch, but still within the year. And then a few days before 2018 would end, it was announced it would finally release on January 24, 2019. So that's like a fifteen month delay, and it was moved to another system too! That's like having a book announced, it releasing more than a year later and also only as a book you can only read on VR glasses or something like that.

Anyway, you don't have to expect anything more but a 1980s Famicom adventure from Ise-Shima Mystery Annai: Itsuwari no Kuroshinju, but nothing less either. It feels exactly like one of those old games, including the somewhat simple story, but the game has a lot of charm (great music too!) and for those who enjoy those old Famicom mystery adventures, which have definitely left their mark on mystery videogames in general, Ise-Shima Mystery Annai: Itsuwari no Kuroshinju is a no-brainer.

Original Japanese title(s): 『伊勢志摩ミステリー案内　偽りの黒真珠』