Palette is a Japanese language freeware adventure game that was made with RPG Maker 95 by Nishida Yoshitaka. The game was highly acclaimed in the Fourth ASCII Entertainment Software Contest, awarded a Grand Prix of 10,000,000 yen, which resulted in remaking the game for PlayStation by Enterbrain. That version, entitled Forget me not -Palette-, saw the release on April 26, 2001 exclusively in Japan.
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since i knew about how difficult it is to get this game running, i made the decision to play the ps1 release while watching a playthrough of the english patched rpgmaker original version on youtube at the same time. yes it was a hassle, no i don't regret it.
palette is a great title, considered an rpgmaker classic in japan for good reason. it's still very unique even 20 years after its release. though it definitely has its jank, the puzzle gameplay is so unique that i never minded having to deal with it.
i loved the nonlinear delivery of its narrative, and how it deals with a topic i've rarely seen discussed at all (the trauma and stigma that come from being related to a famous criminal). and it's pretty neat to see a "person must overcome manifestations of their psychological issues to recover their memories" game that predates silent hill 2
i wish i could just recommend it to everyone, but i can't. if you can read japanese, play the ps1 version. if you can't.... well. i wouldn't necessarily recommend My method, but it's definitely a game worth seeking out, even if you have to settle for watching a playthrough
palette is a great title, considered an rpgmaker classic in japan for good reason. it's still very unique even 20 years after its release. though it definitely has its jank, the puzzle gameplay is so unique that i never minded having to deal with it.
i loved the nonlinear delivery of its narrative, and how it deals with a topic i've rarely seen discussed at all (the trauma and stigma that come from being related to a famous criminal). and it's pretty neat to see a "person must overcome manifestations of their psychological issues to recover their memories" game that predates silent hill 2
i wish i could just recommend it to everyone, but i can't. if you can read japanese, play the ps1 version. if you can't.... well. i wouldn't necessarily recommend My method, but it's definitely a game worth seeking out, even if you have to settle for watching a playthrough
Fair warning to any interested parties, this game can be a pain to run on modern systems, which is why I haven't gotten too far into it yet. But I'm really interested in what it has going on, so I'll go back to it eventually.
played oct 12th for rpgmaker october (finished oct 13th)
maybe not a surprise since i think this has a light cult status in japan, thanks to it winning one of those old ascii contests, but this game is legit so incredible to me. re-remembering as a disorienting and painful process, not just narratively for having to piece the story together on your own from the memories shown out of order, but thru gameplay goals shooting so far above any other story-centered no-battles rpgmaker game, maybe even adventure games in general. the mental gauge system adds such a cool dimension to exploration; carefully thinking out each route for how much damage youll take before you do it is key, every failure and reset driving home BD's fragile sense of herself. this is a game that will make you DRAW A MAP (try to add more detail wrt the inactive nodes and interactables in each scene than i did) and DO THE MATH and i fucking love it for that. on top of this such a confident sense for direction n really compellingly airy writing style for this time!! still thinking abt that ending too and how much ironically isnt said. having to figure out which of the many inactive nodes suddenly got turned on was a bit of a pet peeve n i didnt feel bad defaulting to the walkthru for those, but that feels so minor. sightly disappointed at how few imitators this seems to have inspired over the last couple decades, simply one of the most inventive showcases ive seen for what is possible in this engine. no doubt one of my favs for this month.
maybe not a surprise since i think this has a light cult status in japan, thanks to it winning one of those old ascii contests, but this game is legit so incredible to me. re-remembering as a disorienting and painful process, not just narratively for having to piece the story together on your own from the memories shown out of order, but thru gameplay goals shooting so far above any other story-centered no-battles rpgmaker game, maybe even adventure games in general. the mental gauge system adds such a cool dimension to exploration; carefully thinking out each route for how much damage youll take before you do it is key, every failure and reset driving home BD's fragile sense of herself. this is a game that will make you DRAW A MAP (try to add more detail wrt the inactive nodes and interactables in each scene than i did) and DO THE MATH and i fucking love it for that. on top of this such a confident sense for direction n really compellingly airy writing style for this time!! still thinking abt that ending too and how much ironically isnt said. having to figure out which of the many inactive nodes suddenly got turned on was a bit of a pet peeve n i didnt feel bad defaulting to the walkthru for those, but that feels so minor. sightly disappointed at how few imitators this seems to have inspired over the last couple decades, simply one of the most inventive showcases ive seen for what is possible in this engine. no doubt one of my favs for this month.
Recommended by ludzu as part of this list.
The funniest thing about Palette to me is that is shows that even as far back as the year 2000 (22 years ago, oh how time flies!), the biggest successes made in RPG Maker have basically never been RPGs. Not only did Palette sweep the awards at the Fourth ASCII Entertainment Software Contest, it managed to get a publishing deal and a full-blown remake for the Playstation, which means its rousing success despite a lack of any traditional gameplay probably set the Arthouse RPG Maker scene in stone for the rest of time. But I'm getting ahead of myself here. What is Palette, first and foremost?
Palette is, put simply, a game about memories. A psychiatrist being held at gunpoint has to walk a girl known as B.D. through her mind palace in order to help her piece together her fragmented psyche and unravel the mystery of her tragic past. This is not just simple set-dressing mind you, it's part and parcel of the whole experience: the visual and mechanical fundamentals of Palette are built directly on top of this foundation.
Visually, the rooms are framed as vignettes, snapshots of locations and events that you only see the relevant part of, people rendered as loose outlines only marked by their most prominent details, loosely connected by thin threads of logic and feeling, just like trying to recall a childhood memory. True to its name, the color palette is the star of the show here. The psychiatrist's office (the real world) is rendered in color, but the mindscape you explore is a stark black-and-white, with the important objects you need to interact with always rendered as a bright, contrasting red. As you step into memories, it seeps into either a warm sepia or a cool monochromatic blue to represent the tone of the memory and the events wherein. It's constantly shifting to set the mood with little effort for maximum results, pushing the engine to its limits as the game struggles to handle its artistic vision.
Mechanically, the gameplay centers around a Gauge on the right side of the screen. It's split into chunks, and moving to another room or clearing obstacles in your path consumes a chunk of the Gauge. You hit 0, and you're booted back to the psychiatrist's office to try again. You must find mementos scattered around your mind palace in order to increase the amount of Gauge you have to work with, as well as unveil more and more information about B.D. and her situation. In a great bit of story and gameplay integration, you start off very weak-willed, and it takes a while just to remember basic information, but as you gain more mementos, you're able to access more traumatic memories and power through the mental roadblocks preventing you from uncovering the truth of the situation. It's remarkably subtle storytelling that helps the mystery naturally build up towards its climax.
Speaking of, the mystery at the core of Palette is an intriguing one, constantly presenting questions and drip-feeding you information at the perfect rate, motivating you to continue playing and powering through admittedly tedious backtracking and pixel-hunt puzzles just to see how these pieces connect and intersect, but it kind of crashes into a cacophony of nonsense near the climax as twist upon twist is cascaded on top of each other like a 7-lane pileup, but that's not a negative, and I walked away both shocked and thoroughly satisfied with my time. If you don't mind jumping through a few technical hoops to get this game running, it's a landmark piece of RPG Maker history and a mystery story that's worth checking out.
The funniest thing about Palette to me is that is shows that even as far back as the year 2000 (22 years ago, oh how time flies!), the biggest successes made in RPG Maker have basically never been RPGs. Not only did Palette sweep the awards at the Fourth ASCII Entertainment Software Contest, it managed to get a publishing deal and a full-blown remake for the Playstation, which means its rousing success despite a lack of any traditional gameplay probably set the Arthouse RPG Maker scene in stone for the rest of time. But I'm getting ahead of myself here. What is Palette, first and foremost?
Palette is, put simply, a game about memories. A psychiatrist being held at gunpoint has to walk a girl known as B.D. through her mind palace in order to help her piece together her fragmented psyche and unravel the mystery of her tragic past. This is not just simple set-dressing mind you, it's part and parcel of the whole experience: the visual and mechanical fundamentals of Palette are built directly on top of this foundation.
Visually, the rooms are framed as vignettes, snapshots of locations and events that you only see the relevant part of, people rendered as loose outlines only marked by their most prominent details, loosely connected by thin threads of logic and feeling, just like trying to recall a childhood memory. True to its name, the color palette is the star of the show here. The psychiatrist's office (the real world) is rendered in color, but the mindscape you explore is a stark black-and-white, with the important objects you need to interact with always rendered as a bright, contrasting red. As you step into memories, it seeps into either a warm sepia or a cool monochromatic blue to represent the tone of the memory and the events wherein. It's constantly shifting to set the mood with little effort for maximum results, pushing the engine to its limits as the game struggles to handle its artistic vision.
Mechanically, the gameplay centers around a Gauge on the right side of the screen. It's split into chunks, and moving to another room or clearing obstacles in your path consumes a chunk of the Gauge. You hit 0, and you're booted back to the psychiatrist's office to try again. You must find mementos scattered around your mind palace in order to increase the amount of Gauge you have to work with, as well as unveil more and more information about B.D. and her situation. In a great bit of story and gameplay integration, you start off very weak-willed, and it takes a while just to remember basic information, but as you gain more mementos, you're able to access more traumatic memories and power through the mental roadblocks preventing you from uncovering the truth of the situation. It's remarkably subtle storytelling that helps the mystery naturally build up towards its climax.
Speaking of, the mystery at the core of Palette is an intriguing one, constantly presenting questions and drip-feeding you information at the perfect rate, motivating you to continue playing and powering through admittedly tedious backtracking and pixel-hunt puzzles just to see how these pieces connect and intersect, but it kind of crashes into a cacophony of nonsense near the climax as twist upon twist is cascaded on top of each other like a 7-lane pileup, but that's not a negative, and I walked away both shocked and thoroughly satisfied with my time. If you don't mind jumping through a few technical hoops to get this game running, it's a landmark piece of RPG Maker history and a mystery story that's worth checking out.