Tokyo Twilight Ghost Hunters (PS Vita) Review

Tokyo Twilight Ghost Hunters tries to distance itself from the standard trope of visual novels being young, with cutesy graphics and often heavy in terms of sexual content. Therefore, in this case, there is a somewhat serious story about ghosts hurting people's lives and trying to hunt them. Between the visual parts, there is a tactical title very much like the Advance Wars series, all of which sounds like it could be a really fun genre mixing product yet, as will be discussed, it goes out of its way so often that it ruins any attempt at fun.

The major problem, to sum up briefly, is an insanely convoluted symbology, no instructions, and endless unneeded depth in a combat system that ultimately is nothing more than swinging wildly, hoping to hit. There is not a single portion that is not affected by these problems, with perhaps the exception of a mini-game that is arguably more fun than the actual adventure, and, strangely, gives more experience than actual battles - almost as if the game itself was saying 'just play this instead.'

The story takes place as the player is a nameless, faceless protagonist who is given a strange inordinate 'background' of the player's choosing, such as what region they are from, or what sports they like - if this affects anything, it is like most of the game and simply not explained. The lead goes to a new high school and is slowly involved in the ghost stories. The plot is told through moving portraits, like most anime-themed titles these days, with the notable exception that they are more on the 'realistic' side here.

At first, their bobbing, hair throwing, and so on, gives the impression that this is some super involved art project, and almost fills those in control with wonder, but as things progress, the truth comes out that they only bounce between 'normal,' 'hair throw,' and 'glare' for the majority of the game, so every beautiful animation rapidly becomes a source of irritation when it becomes clear how often they are reused.

The visual novel progresses with little input from users, except for random times when a wheel pops up with unexplained symbols on them. The first wheel shows, for example, a fist, a tear, and shaking hands, and then the second shows the five senses. This is supposed to be some sort of combo element where if picking the fist and the mouth means wanting to 'aggressively use your mouth,' whereas shaking hands and nose means 'sniff friendly.' It makes about as much sense as what was just read. What this leads to is a girl saying something like "nice to meet you" and then selecting fist and mouth, only then for her to respond "Eww, why are you trying to kiss me!?" It's kind of funny, but it so completely nonsensical as to severely detract from the game when it does in fact and an effect on the ending and other aspects.

The problem continues in that the reactions aren't even the same, despite picking the same thing - like choosing fist/mouth later suddenly has the character licking the wall of concert hall, or a fist/nose elicits that a fellow male 'smells like sunshine.' It is the exact opposite of what a visual novel should do to draw players in, instead ejecting them out of the narrative with a 'what is going on…?' feeling that never leaves.

The narrative never goes anywhere, which is disappointing given how the plot actually has a lot of material to could draw from. Instead, it becomes some weird slice-of-life, slow-paced plot where 15 minutes later they are still talking about a ghost's guitar with literally nothing engaging in the plot occurring. This might have been forgiven if the combat was okay, but it is not. Essentially, there is a map that is dark and the characters are moved around to find the ghosts - so far so good, right? However, movement is simultaneous, despite being turn-based. Therefore, when a ghost is found, there is a need to guess where the ghost will end, having characters truly swing at the air, hoping the ghost moves into range. It is horrendously stupid as it often devolves into characters facing each other, swinging at each other, so when the ghost moves onto one of them, at least the ghost gets hit, otherwise the attacks swing around wildly, destroying objects that only lowers the money reward for the level.

There are skills, there are stat effects, there are perks - all of which sound like they could be cool, yet they are very complicated, never explained meaningfully, and when combat is simply swing and hope to hit, the best strategy is simply to max life and attack and not worry about endless complications. Unfortunately, this is like most of this game - every part simply not being engaging and better skipped.