A Mystery Of Max Potential? - Root Letter

Hello beautiful people of the Internet! And not so beautiful ones... hehe. Wait, what is this!? Could it be!? We're back!? Oh calm down, it's not like anyone actually cares that we're doing this. I'm only here because YOU got bored and were so sad without all your 'adoring fans'. Oh be quiet Sin you were practically begging for us to end our long hiatus and go back to reviewing. I-I was not! Ngh... Just shut up Ren and get on with it! Whoa hey! There's no need to push!

Enough fooling around! Let's get right into this! Root Letter is a recently released visual novel mystery game for the PS4 and PSVita. You play a 30-something male protagonist who sets out on a long trip from his hometown of Tokyo to Shimane in search of his penpal from 15 years ago, in the hopes of finally meeting her and maybe even more... The entire premise of this game actually really pisses me off. he exchanged like eleven letters or something with the girl 15 years ago and only now all of a sudden he's had this urge to go see her? If it were me I'd be more than a little creeped out. How do girls usually react when you're like that Ren? Hey I'm not some kind of creeper guy cut me some slack! Oh yeah...? Then will you now tell me what exactly you were doing in my room the other day? Th- That was... research! For this review! Yeah! ... Sure it was...

I'll make one guess as to what those other things are...
For God's sake Sin... Really?

M-Moving on! In his search to find his penpal, our protagonist... (We'll call him Max from now on, because it doesn't matter what name you enter at the beginning he's going to be called by this nickname Max for the ENTIRE FREAKING GAME). Ahem... Max only has a couple of clues to help find the whereabouts of Aya: her letters, they each explain details of some of her closes friends from her school days, who you try and track down looking for your answers. Just one catch though, she only ever referred to her friends with their nicknames, and with fifteen years of change behind you, who knows how accurate those descriptions will be. It's a great thing to add to the mystery by hiding the names of the people you're investigating, wouldn't be much of a mystery if you could just track them down by name would it? I just wish when you actually do learn one of the classmate's real names it was actually used for once. But no, everyone, even the classmates amongst themselves, after 15 years, do nothing but call each other by their nicknames. It's pretty infuriating honestly, I feel like the continued use of the nicknames really detracts from the realism of a game which prides itself on being realistic. You know Sin it's probably to make the characters be more memorable and give them more personality, after all, the point is they're just normal people after all. ... Even so...

This game is all about realism though, a realistic story (although at times you certainly wouldn't believe it), and all the locations featured in the game are real parts of Japan's Shimane Prefecture. There's even a handy little guidebook within the game that will teach you about the places you visit if you're interested. In that regard it feels more like a game for people interested in learning more about Shimane than those looking for a good mystery story, but honestly this game could have been set in the fictional land of Dundledooseldorf and little would be different. Real places is cool and all, but it doesn't actually mean anything in the context of the game.

At least it can be said that every aspect and place in this game looks absolutely stunning.

Progression in the game is also very linear, it takes you by the hand and tells you which locations to go to to progress the story pretty clearly, and there's a handy 'think' option in the menus that will be really specific if you're stuck. While there are a lot of locations in the game to visit, going anywhere that isn't the one place that will progress the story just means you've gone to a place and nothing happens. You can't really do anything at the other places, nor will anything you do accomplish anything. There are some little side quests which you can do by going to other places, but they're also pretty meaningless and not worth the effort.

The most fun from the game takes place in little interrogation sections as you use the clues you have gathered to reveal the identity of the former classmates. There's dialogue and you get to present evidence in a largely Phoenix Wright style gameplay sequence. Slapping evidence in someone's face feels equally impactful and the voice over dialogue does a great job of adding to this effect, however there's little punishment for being incorrect and other options are so un-obvious you'll be lucky to be right without some trial and error.

 

I know if I were there confronting this guy I'd be saying a lot more than just that the way these characters are.
Control yourself Sin, I thought we were past the days of making the postman cry every time he comes...

Without going into too much detail and spoiling the game for anyone who does want to pick it up, the initial mystery of the game is amazing. You want to find the penpal you were talking to 15 years ago? Shame she died 25 years ago isn't it? Yeah try figuring that one out. The mystery itself wraps up and it is pretty satisfying to find out the whole truth across the 5 different ending the game has available. At the same time there's a certain disappointment there, as you get to the end and find out that the classmates were being all ominous and secretive over something that feels pretty petty. That's not to say the game or the mystery itself is bad, but there was potential to be so much more.

Overall the game is probably a bit too realistic and winds up coming off a bit mundane. The setup, while I disagree with a lot of the extremely convenient circumstances surrounding getting your information, is good; just executed somewhat poorly. Couple that together with an occasional translation error, max-cringiness protagonist and a cast of characters which seem to have kept an embodiment of teenage angst with them for 15 whole years and everything just falls a bit flat. Well hey at least the music is relaxing, they got the soundtrack down perfectly, so there's a small plus. There was so much potential here. Try harder next time Kadokawa Games.

... I mean I actually really enjoyed the game you know.
Oh come on you'll sit through anything and say it's great.
I do not!
... ET on the Atari.
... Shut the hell up.

Until next time friends!
We love you all!

Ren Score: 6/10
Sin Score: 3/10