Oct 042024
It had to come up, right?
Back when Emio was first teased, most of us thought it would be a new horror game from Nintendo.
It turned out to actually be a dark new entry in the Famicom Detective Club series, which was a pleasant surprise to me after I’d played the Famicom Detective Club remakes just this past May and wished the series would continue.
We discussed it a few times leading up to launch, but not since the full game has come out. So let’s talk about Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club.
I would not actually call Emio a horror game or even a horror visual novel, despite the expectations when it was first teased. It’s very much a mystery, albeit one with dark and disturbing elements, and I’d even say most of it has less tension than the first two games in the series. However, when I say most of it, that’s very important to why we’re still talking about it today.
Now, I wrote a full review of Emio over at MonsterVine, so be sure to check that out for my thoughts on the game as a whole.
Instead of repeating all my thoughts here, I’ll just say that I definitely recommend Emio as long as you don’t mind a strangely-paced story that feels like it saves almost everything for the very end. That end does make it worthwhile, but it left me wishing some of the reveals had been woven through the earlier parts of the game too. Meanwhile, as I’d hoped from the demo, the new function of the “think” command to give a hint means you’re much less likely to get caught in a loop of trying every action without knowing what to do, so it feels like the most player-friendly game in the series. There are also a lot of fun optional scenes, like I mentioned in my review.
Getting back to the matter of Emio as a horror game and the fact that most of it is not, that ties into my comment on the unusual pacing. The final segment of Emio gets much darker, delves into some very disturbing scenes, and earns its M rating right there.
I would say the final part of Emio is basically a short horror story in its own right.
I have a theory about why they handled the game this way – that last part is so much darker than the rest of the series that I think they wanted to keep the bulk of the game more in line with the previous ones – but it does make it an odd experience.
In short, Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club is a great choice to play in October, but mainly for the payoff at the end.
Well I have this game now, so it will likely end up being my next Switch game after I finished Ace Attorney Investigations! I guess I will have to keep the odd pacing in mind, especially as I haven’t played the prior games in the series so I expect I’ll miss some references.
There are only a handful of references, so you probably won’t miss too much. The games mostly stand on their own. I hope you enjoy it!
Well now that I’ve finished Ace Attorney Investigations Collection, this is my next Switch game! Though I may also dive back into Baldur’s Gate on my PS5 before Metaphor comes out, or else I might never go back from the way my backlog grows…
Haha, that’s true… like how I really need to go back to Xenoblade…
I’m curious to know what the distinction between a mystery game and a visual novel is, but maybe that’s because most of the mystery games I’ve had contact with played like visual novels (Phoenix Wright, Danganronpa being the first that come to mind). Or maybe I’m just confusing the two because both visual novels and mysteries have a ‘dialogue heavy’ style.
I mean, a visual novel can be any genre. Horror visual novels, romance visual novels, comedy visual novels… mystery visual novels are just one type.
And a mystery game doesn’t have to be a visual novel. You could have an RPG about solving a mystery, for example.
Now, the distinction between an adventure game and a visual novel has to do with the gameplay. Needing to interact with the environment, move to different locations, solve puzzles, etc. usually means it’s an adventure game, even if there’s some overlap (Famicom Detective Club, Phoenix Wright, and Danganronpa are all examples of what I consider to be hybrids of the two genres).
Ah, right, that reminds me of Another Code: Recollection, which is a mystery game I wouldn’t call a visual novel. Nearly forgot about it! (I also need to finish it… oops.)
Oh yes! I enjoyed that collection. It was nice finally getting to play the second game.
Oh man I remember everyone was going crazy on what this game was during its brief tease. Knowing it’s in the same series at Famicom detective makes me want to play the other games, so maybe i’ll do that first!
They’re a little tedious, but they’re quite good!
Well hopefully I like them, then I can finally expand my genre of games :’)
I do want to like them
Yep, play more visual novels!