Those Who Submerge Like the Water Spirit / 水魑の如き沈むもの

And so one we come once again to a spooky murder mystery with Genya Toujou. I find it funny how for both series I review on a set schedule—this and Lychee Kamiki—both series ended up with a snake-themed entry during the Year of the Snake. Coincidence, or something more...?

(Alright, so as far as the Chinese zodiac is concerned, the “water spirit” corresponds more to the dragon rather than the snake, so hopefully the previous paragraph wasn’t blasphemy. But still a funny pattern!)

The Perfect Outsider / 有限と微小のパン

They say don’t meet your heroes. Maybe that applies to books, too.

I always knew I’d read The Perfect Outsider, the finale to Hiroshi Mori’s S&M Series. Well, “always” is a bit of an overstatement. After I finished The Perfect Insider, the first book in the series, I knew I’d read The Perfect Outsider. I wasn’t sure about the intervening books, but the next two passed my test, so I dutifully proceeded through the series until we arrived here, and… I wouldn’t say I wish I hadn’t, but it was certainly a disappointing ending. For most of the book I thought it was fun and plot-focused with an interesting scenario, but Mori’s bad habits started creeping up again in the final third until the book culminated in an anti-climax letdown.

As a warning, the premise of The Perfect Outsider (and thus this review) has general spoilers for The Perfect Insider. I think it’s a bit of an “open secret” if you look at Mori’s works, but you’ve been warned!

The Poisoned Chocolates Case

The Poisoned Chocolates Case is a fun trick novel by Anthony Berkeley. The premise is simple: the six members of a club called the Crimes Circle (a bit like the real life Detection Club) decide to investigate a real murder, and each present their theory in turn. Naturally, each member comes to a different conclusion, and each member’s theory seems to disprove the previous member’s. The Poisoned Chocolates Case is a wonderful examination of how shaky detective novel solutions can truly be, in the vein of the Late Queen Problem.

One Outs / ワンナウツ

If it isn’t already obvious from the blog, I’m a nerd. I don’t care for sports. So if you haven’t heard about One Outs before, it might seem odd that I watched (and loved!) a baseball anime, but One Outs isn’t really about baseball. It’s a psychological/gaming anime right up there with the best of them, and it just so happens that it’s about baseball rather than a series of bespoke games.

Crystal Pyramid / 水晶のピラミッド

Crystal Pyramid is a grand, larger-than-life mystery that is perhaps a bit too grand and larger-than-life. Souji Shimada’s recurring detective Kiyoshi Mitarai investigates a murder that occurred at a full-scale recreation of the Great Pyramid of Giza on the shore of the Gulf of Mexico, and this mystery works really well, but there’s a lot of extraneous flak that comes with it.

AI: The Somnium Files - nirvanA Initiative / AI：ソムニウムファイル ニルヴァーナ イニシアチブ

When I first finished AI: The Somnium Files - nirvanA Initiative, my feelings were a lot more positive than those for its predecessor, AI: The Somnium Files, which is admittedly not a high bar. (Boy are those names a mouthful.) But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that pretty much no individual component of NI was better than TSF… except for the fact that the main characters weren’t absolutely insufferable. So NI may not be more well-crafted than TSF, but the fact that we don’t play as Date still makes it way better in my book.

Icewind Dale: Enhanced Edition

Icewind Dale is the final game created in the Infinity Engine using Dungeons & Dragons 2e rules, after Baldur’s Gate and Planescape: Torment. Despite being made after those games, it doesn’t stack up to any of them. Baldur’s Gate provided a balanced experience and Planescape: Torment focused heavily on story. Icewind Dale, on the other hand, is a combat slog, and that descriptor should tell you what I think of it.

Numerical Models / 数奇にして模型

Numerical Models is the penultimate entry in Hiroshi Mori’s S&M series and features a model (person) murdered at a model (toy) convention, but unfortunately falls quite short of being a model (paragon) murder mystery.

Planescape: Torment: Enhanced Edition

While I enjoyed Baldur’s Gate I & II and understood why they made a big splash when released, they were notably dated and I didn’t think they rose to the level of a masterpiece. Planescape: Torment, the next game developed in the same Infinity Engine, is a masterpiece. It’s also notably dated and far from perfect, but it explores weird, interesting and unique ideas with intelligence and well-crafted writing.

Baldur's Gate (I & II)

In discussions of CRPGs, Baldur’s Gate is often held up as the holy grail. It was celebrated by its fans for being expansive and deep, and maintained a dedicated fanbase through its modding community. Release of the Enhanced Editions in 2013 helped maintain modern interest, and Baldur’s Gate 3 proved to be a massive hit. By how well do the original games hold up now, especially without any nostalgia to view the games through?

Murder in the Crimson Manor / 紅蓮館の殺人

Murder in the Crimson Manor is lit. Actually, I think it’s just okay, but “Murder in the Crimson Manor is lit” seemed like a snappier opening, and obliques references the massive fire that occurs in the story. It’s competently plotted, has a decent premise, and employs some fun tropes… but these various elements don’t reinforce each other, and there was nothing that wowed me. So while I liked Murder in the Crimson Manor, my feelings are admittedly lukewarm.

The Surge

The Surge is a sci-fi horror Souls-like that does everything competently but not memorably. The game takes place several decades in the future when Earth’s atmosphere has gotten too polluted to support life, but a company called Creo has developed several marvelous technologies in response, including Resolve, which is able to cleanse the atmosphere, and exo-rigs, which are basically personal mecha suits that can enhance a person’s strength, agility and stamina.

We play as Warren, a wheelchair-bound man and new Creo employee. He goes through the process of receiving an exo-rig (which involves having the suit grafted onto him without anesthetic in an absolutely brutal cutscene), and when he wakes, the Creo facility is a wreck, and the other employees appear to have essentially become zombies that attack everything on sight. Warren needs to fight his way through and out of the Creo facility and discover what caused all the mayhem.

Druidstone: The Secret of the Menhir Forest

The only reason I bought Druidstone: The Secret of the Menhir Forest is because it’s by the same people that made Legend of Grimrock. (I’d do anything for those guys.) Druidstone is not Grimrock—which I knew going in. It’s a puzzly tactical RPG that takes place in a Tolkienesque fantasy forest; a competent-built challenge with a fun aesthetic.