Movie Madness

"The show must go on." 

(English saying)

Last week, I reviewed Van Madoy's FGO Mystery - Hirugaeru Kogetsukan no Kokkai - Kogetsukan Satsujin Jiken, a novelization of a quest originally written by Madoy for the highly succesful mobile game Fate/Grand Order. The Fate franchise is a fantasy series about the Holy Grail Wars, fought between Masters and their Servants, spirits based on historical and fictional figures from all across the world like Sherlock Holmes, but also Murasaki Shikibu and Ozymandias (Ramses II). While most (limited time) quests in FGO obviously revolve around battles, Madoy's first FGO Mystery event (held in May 2018) was different as Madoy used the FGO characters to tell a traditional closed circle murder mystery story set on a remote island, with next to no battle gameplay. It was a battle of the wits, as players were challenged to correctly guess who the murderer was and Madoy offered a very classic whodunnit story, where you could arrive at the identity of the murderer through the simple (but actually not very simple) process of elimination.

In May 2019, a second FGO Mystery event started in the game with the title Murder at the MEIHO-SOU. This event too was written by Madoy, and novelizations of this event, as well as of the 2018 event, were released right after this second event ended near the end of May. This second volume too has an insanely long title: FGO Mystery Tomadou Meihousou no Kousatsu Meihousou Satsujin Jiken ("FGO Mystery - The Examination of the Puzzling Meihousou - The Meihousou Murder Case", 2019) however luckily also uses the far shorter alternative English title The Meihousou Murders inside the book. The story starts with the discovery of a small anomalous temporal singularity in the Caribbean sea by the Chaldea Security Organization. Strangely enough, the singularity appears to have the form of a film set, dubbed a 'virtual drifting Hollywood' by Chaldea. While the unstable singularity is likely to disappear within a few days on its own, it's still deemed wiser to fix the temporal singularity and that is by having the film set fulfill its role as the setting for an actual film. Murasaki Shikibu is asked to write a story to film inside the temporal singularity, and she quickly comes up with a story and get the people (Servants) she wants as her cast.

The film story is set in the fictional Republic of Nadai Nada. After the fall of the royal house and the kingdom of Nadai Nada, Miguel Cortez (a role played by Professor James Moriarty) had become the first president of the Republic. When he passed away, he left behind a young widow (and former adopted daughter) Gabriella (played by Murasaki Shikibu). A small private gathering in memory of Miguel has been organized at the Meihousou, a former royal holiday palace which had become the residence of Miguel and Gabriella. The guests at this gathering however aren't all what they seem to be: from former court composer Antiono Jovin (played by Antonio Salieri) to Roma Kureishi (played by Sakamoto Ryouma) and Vargus (played by Ozymandias/Ramses II), all the characters in the film seem to have come to the Meihousou with ulterior motives. As they have little time before the temporal singularity will collapse on its own, Murasaki Shikibu never had time to tell all her actors how the whole story would go and what their characters were like exactly, and that results in a major problem when Murasaki Shikibu herself is knocked out due to a too powerful medicine which was 'supposed to have her feel more relaxed'.  As none of the people involved with the film production know what Murasaki Shikibu's intentions were with the story, they are left with no choice: each of the actors tries to come up with their own version of the story, based on the clues left in the first half they had already filmed.

Oh, I have to say, I had not expected Madoy to come with this story, especially not after reading the first FGO Mystery novel. For that was really a classic whodunnit story set in a mansion on a remote island complete with a Challenge to the Reader, where you needed to follow a tight elimination process to arrive at the identity of the killer. This story however follows the less common unfinished movie trope. Trope, I say? Yeah, because funnily enough, I have read several mystery stories now that are about an unfinished mystery movie, where the actors themselves then have to guess what the solution was based on the hints already filmed, and everyone arriving at a different solution. Abiko Takemaru's Tantei Eiga is exactly about this theme for example, and a funny one too, as every actor wanted their character to become the killer (because that's the best role in a mystery movie). Yonezawa Honobu's Gusha no End Roll too is about an unfinished mystery movie filmed for the school festival,with again everyone coming up with a different solution to the locked room murder that occurs there.

Readers of classsic mystery fiction will definitely recognize the influence of Christianna Brand and Anthony Berkeley here, as those two writers too loved their multiple solutions. Berkeley's The Poisoned Chocolates Case is of course famous example of the detective story with multiple solutions, but Brand's novels too are always brimming with characters who come up with, well, quite plausible solutions for the matter at hand. In hindsight however, I have to say it shouldn't surprise me that Madoy came up with this. His Revoir series is about a private court set in Kyoto and in those trials, it's less about the truth, but about convincing the others/judge in accepting your "truth". The characters there are always coming up with new theories that suit their stance in the trial based on the evidence in front of them, so both defense and prosecution often come up with completely different interpretations based on the same facts. The Meihousou Murders does exactly that, as the five main actors come up with five completely different conclusions to the film based on the same first half of the film.

The various 'solutions' (conclusions to the movie) are fairly simple, but entertaining enough. Usually they're based on one single contradiction, or odd point in the first half of the movie, which is then the starting point to an idea that encompasses also a lot of imagination and fantasy. This story is definitely less 'rigid' in terms of mystery plot compared to the first, as a lot of the solutions proposed in this book are more in the spirit of  'Hey, this character acted odd in the first half of the movie, what if he was actually X and that his real goal is to...". It's an entertaining book, as you see all the characters coming up with widely different interpretations of the same base story, but as a detective story, it's not exactly fit for a Challenge to the Reader, which is strangely enough included in the story. As so much of the plot hinges on "I reject your reality and substitute my own", it's strange to be asked in a direct way to arrive at the one-and-only solution. The Challenge to the Reader is admittedly about a different problem (eventually Murasaki Shikibu wakes up, only to find everyone has come up with their own version of the story), and I think the final solution to save the movie is reasonably clever, especially on this scale and fits well with the theme (there's a weirdly specific hint that doesn't really work that well I think, but the base idea is something that a reader could definitely think of), but I don't really see the added value of a Challenge to the Reader for this story.

I think the first novel is more satisfying as a classic whodunnit mystery story, but FGO Mystery Tomadou Meihousou no Kousatsu Meihousou Satsujin Jiken is probably more enjoyable to readers as a piece of entertainment. This story was originally a quest in the game Fate/Grand Order (which is obviously not a mystery game at the core) and I think it's better in that regard compared to the first story, which can be far more difficult than this story. The Meihousou Murders is funnier, has far more character interaction with familiar faces (rather than "the original characters with borrowed graphical assets" from the first event), moves at a far more satisfying pace and is less 'precise' regarding its mystery plot, making it far more accessible.

Original Japanese title(s): Type-Moon (原), 円居挽 『FGOミステリー 惑う鳴鳳荘の考察 鳴鳳荘殺人事件』

Mystery By Moonlight

運命のルーレット廻して

アレコレ深く考えるのはMystery

「運命のルーレット廻して」（Zard)

Turn the roulette of destiny

Thinking deep about this and that is a mystery

"Turn the Roulette of Destiny" (Zard)

The Fate series is a long-running multimedia franchise, which started with the fantasy game Fate/stay night in 2004. Since then, it has seen numerous installments in various forms of media, from games, to anime, manga and novels. Some of these installments are direct sequels/prequels in the same chronology, some involve alternate universes/retellings, but in general, the series revolves around a series of events called the Holy Grail Wars, with persons called Masters fighting each other with the help of Servants, spirits/familiars based on figures from history, mythology and fiction from all across the world like King Arthur, Ramses II and Sherlock Holmes. This is in fact basically all I know about the Fate series: while I naturally knew of its existence (it's really popular), I had never consumed any part of the franchise yet. At least, not until this week.

The most popular incarnation of the Fate series these last few years has been the smartphone game Fate/Grand Order, which started in 2015 and ranks amongst the most popular mobile games in the world: in 2017 it became the sixth highest-grossing mobile game, leaving titles like Pokémon Go and Candy Crush Saga behind. I don't play the game myself, but my interest was piqued when in May 2018, a special limited quest event started, with the title Murder at the KOGETSUKAN. What first caught my eye was that the event was penned by Van Madoy, who since a few years has been chiseling out a niche for himself by writing original mystery novels for existing game franchises (like Gyakuten Saiban/Ace Attorney). While gameplay of Fate/Grand Order generally revolves around battles (by selecting a team of Servants) coupled with dialogue events, this event was presented as a pure, fair-play mystery story, based solely on the dialogues between the various characters. Players were also challenged to actively participate with the mystery solving: the event took over a week (daily updates), and polls were held on the official website: players were rewarded with in-game currency if the correct answers managed to pull in the most number of votes.

As I don't play the game, it ended with me just thinking 'Oh boy, this sounded neat', but in May 2019 a second FGO Mystery event commenced within Fate/Grand Order and novelizations by Madoy himself of both the first and second event were published right after the conclusion of the second event. The first novel (based on 2018's event) has the insanely long title FGO Mystery - Hirugaeru Kogetsukan no Kokkai - Kogetsukan Satsujin Jiken ("FGO Mystery - The Confession of the Trembling Koketsukan - The Kogetsukan Murder Case", 2019), but it also carries the alternative, shorter English title of The Kogetsukan Murders. The story starts with a strange experience happening to Fate/Grand Order protagonist Fujimaru Ritsuka, as he loses consciousness one night, only to find himself waking up in a completely different body! He learns that he is now inhabiting the body of "Rikka" a friend of Juliet Violet, oldest daughter of the Violet clan. The Violet and Goldie clans are two gangster families in the United States with a long history of rivalry, but their wars have left them in a weakened state and easy targets for foreign gangs. Family heads Aaron Goldie and Adamska Violet both realize a fusion of both clans is their only chance on survival, and in order to silence the voices of protests in their respective gangs, they decide to have their eldest children marry to seal the deal. The Violet and Goldie families are now gathered in the mansion Kogetsukan on a remote island to confirm the engagement of Morris Goldie and Juliet Violet.

"Rikka" had been invited to come along as Juliet's friend, but even to Ritsuka inhabiting the body of Rikka, it's clear that Morris Goldie is not the kind of person you'd want a good friend to marry and the arranged, political marriage will absolutely ruin Juliet's life. Meanwhile Juliet seems to have accepted her fate, as she doesn't want her younger twin sister to become the 'sacrifice' in her stead.  It seems however there is another person who wants to prevent the engagement, as threatening letters were sent that warned the clans to stop the engagement, which is the reason the deal is being discussed on a remote island under the protection of three agents of the Marble Trading Company, an organization of highly respected "fixers" acting as both witnesses to the engagement and bodyguards. On the first day, a shady detective calling himself Sheringham makes his way to the island, claiming he knows of the threatening letters and that he can solve the case, but that very night, that same Sheringham is killed. It seems a murderer is roaming Kogetsukan, and that they first got rid of the nosy detective. But who will follow, and can Rikka/Ritsuka make it out alive from the island?

When I bought the novel, my main worry was of course whether I'd enjoy the story without knowing anything about Fate/Grand Order. I was fairly confident that Madoy could deliver on an entertaining mystery story, but how much would it rely on me knowing the Fate series. The first few pages were therefore slightly worrying, as they were clearly meant for someone who somewhat knows the characters. As a defense mechanism in Ritsuka's brain for suddenly inhabiting a different body, every person he meets in the Kogetsukan takes on the form of a Servant he knows within his brain. In reality, this is of course because the game uses existing character art to portray "new" characters (the people Goldie/Violet/Marble Trade Company). But an explanation that Juliet takes on the form of the Gorgon sister Stheno in Ritsuka's mind doesn't tell me much of course, as I don't know how Stheno looks like in Fate/Grand Order. Some others were more easy to imagine though. The Violet family doctor is called Dr. Hawthorne for example, who funnily enough takes on the form of the Servant Professor James Moriarty. Meanwhile, the shady detective Sheringham is definitely the spitting image of the Servant Sherlock Holmes. What's also funny is that Ritsuka occasionally returns to his own body, and there he discusses the case with both Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty, who actually work together to figure things out.

Once you get past the character introductions of "X has the appearence of Y" though, I'd say the novel is fairly accessible even if you don't know Fate/Grand Order, and it's a pretty decent mystery novel on its own too. One can definitely tell it's written by Madoy, who was a member of the Kyoto University Mystery Club when in college, as the core is a classic guess-the-criminal set-up, with a proper Challenge to the Reader. While you can arrive at the identity of the murderer by simply guessing the motive in this particular story (as it's also aimed at people who usually don't read detective stories), the 'correct' way of reading this story is of course by arriving at the murderer by the process of elimination: identify what characteristics the murderer must comply too (for example, being at a certain place at a certain time, or being left-handed or something like that), and crossing off the people who don't fit that characteristic. To be honest, the elimination part of the story is on its own somewhat straightforward and not very exciting, as it mostly revolves around one single characteristic, coupled with an interpretation of a dying message which is basically 'given' to the reader. But Madoy wouldn't be Madoy if he didn't have some other tricks up his sleeve though: one point of misdirection is particularly well thought out. The trick makes excellent use of the presentation of the story and while people who do know Fate/Grand Order might be more inclined to fall for it, it still (kinda) works for non FGO-players, I think. These traps make the route to the identity of the murderer a far more entertaining trip and are nicely done. At least, in general. I do think some of the hints stood out a bit too much: some parts of the story seemed so blatantly weirdly worded at first, I actually thought it was an editing mistake in the text, rather than a hidden clue. I wonder whether Madoy intentionally made those parts stand out a bit, because the main audience were Fate/Grand Order players, and not mystery readers in general, as I have the feeling those parts could've been hidden in more subtle ways, without losing their functions as proper clues.

Depending on how much mystery fiction you read, bits and pieces of The Kogetsukan Murders will certainly feel somewhat familiar, like the motive or some of the 'traps' in the elimination process, but the manner in which these familiar elements are combined are good, and show how how an author, even with the same bricks, can still make an original building. Overall, I think Van Madoy did a good job at presenting a very classic mystery story to an audience (Fate/Grand Order player) that doesn't necessarily consists out of readers of mystery fiction, while still offering a story that is fairly complex in terms plotting.

Taken completely on its own, FGO Mystery - Hirugaeru Kogetsukan no Kokkai - Kogetsukan Satsujin Jiken is a decent mystery novel and can be enjoyed too even if you don't know Fate/Grand Order, but it definitely earns some bonus points if you are familiar with the source material and some elements of the mystery plot too work better with some knowledge. And while this was originally written to be experienced in the game, I'd say the novelizations works quite well too. While designed for a more general audience, this novel will also please regular puzzle plot readers and it's also just funny to see the Servants Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty working together to solve the murders at the Kogetsukan. I have the novelization of the second event too, and will probably review that one soon too.

Original Japanese title(s): Type-Moon (原), 円居挽 『FGOミステリー 翻る虚月館の告解 虚月館殺人事件』