Thanks to Kody and Hamada for helping with edits.
In January, I set sail aboard Parascientific Escape Cruise in the Distant Seas, a small-scale Nintendo 3DS eShop title by INTENSE. It was deeply indebted to Kotaro Uchikoshi’s Zero Escape series, though it never approached the highs its inspiration attained. Cruise laid the groundwork for a compelling narrative, a foundation it then let down with a poor script and short length. Ultimately, I left the passenger ship feeling unfulfilled yet somewhat optimistic; supposedly, INTENSE learned from Distant Seas’ shortcomings for its 2015 sequel, Parascientific Escape – Gear Detective. Not long after I published my critique of the studio’s first adventure, I started playing their second, hoping for a more polished experience.
Gear Detective assumes familiarity with Cruise, although its story is reasonably self-contained. (Image: INTENSE/CIRCLE Entertainment)
Anyone comfortable with Cruise will be equally at home here; Gear’s user interface, hint system, and soundtrack were lifted wholesale from its predecessor. Controls are still primarily handled through the touch screen, an efficient input method. Likewise, Distant Seas’ gameplay was preserved, meaning players will escape from locked rooms, solve brainteasers, and read through droves of dialogue. The core experience is of a comparable length to Cruise, although Gear encourages replayability. Conversations were straightforward in the previous title, offering zero variation in how they progress. This facet is given greater prominence in Gear; players are now periodically given multiple dialogue options (some of which are added upon beating the game) when confronted with a question or task. The dialogue branches periodically yield a vaguely amusing exchange when protagonist Kyosuke Ayana gets flustered, but only rarely do they supply deeper looks into the characters’ perspectives. However, they tie into another Gear innovation, the inclusion of multiple endings. Depending on how you resolve these inquiries, you may be awarded a gold or pink star for each chapter. Which and how many stars you procure determines which of the three endings you receive.
Set a few months after Distant Seas, schoolgirl and “double psychic” Hitomi Akeneno’s heroics have catapulted her into international stardom. Nevertheless, Hitomi and her social circle are nowhere to be seen in Gear, off-screen cameos notwithstanding. Although some of Cruise’s story threads are elaborated upon, Gear Detective stars a new cast centered on detective Kyosuke. His backstory is a tragic one per the Parascientific Escape standard, having lost his father years ago. Struggling to cope, he sought aide from Yukiya Ousaka, his childhood friend and an influential force within the IXG corporation. Utilizing IXG’s resources, Kyosuke underwent surgery, affixing himself with a mechanical arm and eye – a life-changing metamorphosis that granted him PSI abilities. Consequently, Gear jettisons the slider puzzles that utilized Hitomi’s PSI powers, a loss Kyosuke compensates for with a new gimmick: chronokinesis. When investigating an area, Kyosuke can select any time up to five days ago. Then, his perspective changes to reflect that of the appointed timeframe. Through these examinations, players can discover long-discarded clues and manipulate the present; should Kyosuke hide a key in the past, for example, its current location is altered accordingly. Unfortunately, these segments rarely deploy any creative uses for the private eye’s time manipulation, save perhaps for one in the final investigation.
Kyosuke’s personality varies slightly depending on your dialogue choices. (Image: INTENSE/CIRCLE Entertainment)
Gear Detective’s stoic lead begins the game in a financial slump, struggling to bring in clients. That swiftly changes when Yukiya and a woman named Tsukiko Nagise request his distinctive talents. Yukiya asks his pal to investigate a series of murders haunting the usually quiet Camellia Hills, while the aloof Tsukiko asks for his protection from a serial killer. Sensing a connection between the cases, the sleuth takes on both with Tsukiko and his assistant, Mari Sasamine, in tow. The light-hearted, eccentric Mari is faintly reminiscent of Ace Attorney’s perky Maya Fey. Unlike Maya, however, high schooler Mari is infatuated with her boss, routinely proclaiming her love for him. It’s an underdeveloped, occasionally grating quirk and Mira suffers for it; she can otherwise be fun to have around. Nevertheless, this does exemplify Gear’s biggest improvement over its predecessor: whereas the monotone Cruise girls largely blurred into one another, Kyosuke and his cohorts sport defined personalities.
Regrettably, the ameliorations don’t go far enough. While the localization efforts were considerably stronger for this episode, the stilted sentences and grammatical faux pas that plagued Cruise sporadically resurface. And as with Distant Seas, Gear can easily be cleared in mere hours, a short length that staunches its potential. Before the midway point, Tsukiko abruptly abandons Kyosuke and Mira. It should’ve been a poignant scene, one where I shared in the heroes’ feelings of hurt and confusion, yet all I felt was indifference. Someone I barely knew is scheming something? Okay, where was the build up? Zero Escape grants you time with its casts, fleshing them out and sufficiently foreshadowing future twists. No such luxury exists within Parascientific Escape, where life-changing events can happen without prognostication.
Gear’s sequel is primed to bring Ritsu, Tsukiko’s longtime companion, out of hiding. (Image: INTENSE/CIRCLE Entertainment)
Gear Detective is an indisputable improvement from Cruise in the Distant Seas, owing to its sharper script. Regardless, my feelings towards the sequel echo those of the original: Parascientific Escape’s universe is interesting, but the shortcomings cripple that potential. They’re diet Zero Escapes and are, thankfully, priced accordingly, though I’d hesitate to recommend either. Nevertheless, the series’ third entry, Crossing at the Farthest Horizon, successfully captured my curiosity. Gear’s conniving mastermind never physically appeared in the game, though her backstory was intriguing and tied into Cruise in a satisfying way. Crossing likely won’t prove itself as a genre-defining classic, nor do I expect it to provide a rewarding conclusion to its trilogy. But I’m eager to see the final phase of Ritsu’s plan unfold.
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