ROOT DOUBLE: BEFORE CRIME * AFTER DAYS – XTEND EDITION
A pick-your-own disaster game
Fan of disaster movies? Then this might be for you. It’s a Japanese visual novel stuffed with gruesome bad endings you have to navigate as you guide characters to survival. Set in 2030, it’s split into two halves: in the first you play as the amnesiac captain of SIRIUS, an elite firefighting squad helping survivors escape a nuclear meltdown; and in the second you follow telepathic students butting heads with a terrorist group (which despises telepaths) in the week leading up to the disaster.
Naturally both routes are connected, and getting the true endings for both unlocks a third route. It’s a fun sci-fi disaster romp, especially the first half of the game, where all the disaster genre tropes come into play. With a killer trapped inside the lab with the rescue squad, there’s some gory imagery. But more gruesome are the descriptions of the dead-end routes. Expect graphic descriptions of flesh burning, brains splitting, and impalements, just for starters. It’s done with a glee horror fans will get.
At various points you need to choose how you feel about the other characters using the star-chart-like Senses Sympathy System, rating them on a scale. This is the only way you make decisions and branch the narrative. 1 It’s a nice idea that works for the most part, but also feels a little clunky. For a visual novel that released in Japanese in 2012 it still holds up well, and it’s a mature story that relies on sci-fi disaster thrills more than romance, which leaves it on top. 2 Oscar Taylor-Kent