THE SILVER CASE
Doesn’t get more metal than this
Years before he was warping our minds with the likes of Lollipop Chainsaw, Let It Die, and Killer7, cult game designer Suda 51 made Japanese gamers’ brains hurt with The Silver Case. Released on PlayStation in 1999, this remaster is the first time it’s been made available to English-speaking audiences.
Like Suda’s other games, it’s got a unique feel. For the most part it’s a visual novel (so be prepared for a lot of sitting there pressing q to flick through reams of text), but the story is told in a stylised way with lots of little picture windows and dialogue boxes popping up all over the shop in all manner of shapes and sizes. It’s the sort of thing that would have been considered achingly hip at the turn of the millennium, and 18 years later it still holds up surprisingly well.
Sadly, the same can’t be said for the parts where you actually take control. 1 The interface is truly horrible, with an odd wheel you rotate to choose actions and a bunch of other bizarre control choices ( uiand to look up and down, for example). The puzzles are also punishingly difficult: while this is very much a sign of its era, modern gamers may really struggle with some of its more obscure and poorly explained stumpers.
Fight your way through the hideous mechanics and there’s a fantastic narrative tucked away in there, a typically Sudaesque yarn that’s equal parts compelling, unpredictable and offensive. 2 Its slow start and its primitive controls initially make it feel like the entire game’s fighting against you, but if you can grit your teeth and get past this the resulting adventure is a rewarding one.
FOOTNOTES1 The game even makes a point of telling you that you may struggle with the controls. 2 There are also a couple of new chapters that were created exclusively for this remaster.