Mechanically frustrating and the plot spins around at the end but it’s so damn charming for most of it.

Edit: Revisiting my thoughts years later: I'm spoiled by a skip feature in vns. I get anxious waiting around when I have other things to finish. I have so much stuff to do! I need to skim sometimes.

But the character work is just incredible. You have your sharp rookie detective, who fits out a general charming archetype. You have your overeager young punk who gets in way over his head. You have the cynical, deeply broken scientist struggling between his morals, his love for his family, and his own detached nature. You have perky amnesia girl getting through her day job.

But the true highlight is Minoru Minorikawa, the arrogant journalist. Minoru buys into his own hype. He's the greatest writer the world has known. He doesn't waste his time on pointless stories. But, he'll also write anything on anyone and anywhere. That's where the nuance appears. Minoru will write about every topic. He doesn't waste his time on pointless stories. Thus, every person he interviews or topic he covers is something he considers the most important subject ever crafted. Minoru believes in himself so much, he believes in everyone. He's the most interesting man ever conceived. Utter delight of a bastard man and the 25 hour runtime is worth it just for him.

Simply the best visual novel I've ever played, hands down. Unique due to the live action CGs alone, but due to the characters, settings and "jump" mechanic.

The many characters you jump between during the course of the game all have their own arcs and nuances, providing interesting insight to the events that intertwine them all. One character might do something that affects another, so your choices actually do matter. It's the domino effect, but implemented really well.

The CGs are the best part of this game. Very rarely do you see a visual novel or game shot completely in live action, and 428 does it well.

I can't exaclty formulate my thoughts into words yet I still love this game so much. Fanastic plot, characters, music, settings, twists, and much much more.

Una obra rebosante de pasión con una de las historias más sinceras y llenas de humanidad jamás contadas en el medio.

428: Shibuya Scramble es una novela visual con una estructura de múltiples perspectivas que te atrapa desde el primer minuto gracias a la absurdez de su comedia y el carisma de sus personajes, quienes se ven envuelto en distintos dramas relacionados a un secuestro, un terrorista internacional y un virus mortal, y por si estos no fueran suficientes problemas, cada protagonista tendrá que resolver sus propios dilemas personales, desde las complicaciones de un periodista tratando de ayudar a su antiguo jefe de las garras de prestamistas por medio de escribir una revista entera en un solo día, o la paranoia que siente un científico al ir descubriendo la extraña conspiración que atenta contra él, su familia y su trabajo… y si la suma de estos conflictos suena un tanto caótico, es por que lo es, y ese es el encanto de la escritura en Shibuya Scramble: ES UNA MALDITA LOCURA DE INICIO A FIN. Dotado de un veloz y muy atrapante ritmo, la obra es capaz interesarte por múltiples medios al estar atrapada en un ciclo constante de conflicto, comedia, drama, acción, introspección, misterios, revelaciones, etc.

Todos estos eventos hilarantes, emocionantes y tristes que veras a través de tu visita por Shibuya rebosan de humanidad, una humanidad reflejada en sus excelentemente construidos personajes, y el tema central de la obra que comenta sobre nuestra conexión con la gente -sobre este sentimiento de pertenencia y afecto humano que encontramos en las comunidades de nuestro día a día-, reflejado en el altruismo de un individuo por cuidar de alguien en peligro, la motivación de un oficial de la justicia por defender a los más débiles, la empatía de un trabajador con sus colegas del oficio, el deseo de un padre por conectar con su familia, o la simpatía de una persona por sí misma y por alguien en peor posición que ella. Y esto no queda en sus protagonistas, quienes no son los únicos en estar tremendamente caracterizados y desarrollados, si no que los secundarios (e incluso los que aparecen por una sola escena), siempre tendrán algo relevante que contar sobre ellos mismos, algunos hasta resultando ser más interesantes que los protagónicos. Este tratamiento resulta coherente con su temática, al ser esta una obra sobre personas y su capacidad de conectar con otros, era lógico que incluso los personajes más pequeños tengan deseos, ambiciones, y un pasado que los defina como humanos.

Y por si esto fuera poco, la temática también se ve reflejada en sus elementos jugables, que trata la estructura de rutas y múltiples perspectivas como si fuera un gigante rompecabezas a resolver (reflejando la curiosidad e intriga que sienten los personajes), limitando tu progreso con bloqueos en la ruta que te forzaran a buscar soluciones y aperturas en los otros personajes quienes a su vez afectan a las demás tramas, siendo así armónicos con el tema de conexión entre individuos. Esto termina por crear un juego más que complejo sobre estar consiente de cada pequeña decisión que tomamos, llevando las consecuencias del efecto mariposa a su límite interactivo y logrando un total entendimiento sobre las mecánicas jugables de una novela visual, teniendo siempre en cuenta la relación entre entidades más relevante en el medio: la que existe entre estas personas ficticias y el jugador, o mejor dicho, entre los personajes y el destino.

Shibuya Scramble es una obra universal: puedes resonar con sus personajes y temas facilmente gracias a su excelente escritura, su atrapante trama y ritmo la hacen llevadera de inicio a fin, su manejo de tonos y estructura crean situaciones que apelan a distintas personas, sus visuales live-action y genial banda sonora lo abren a todo el público, y sus elementos interactivos lo vuelven un rompecabezas desafiante para aquel que busque lo lúdico. Este es un trabajo que puede ser apreciado por todo tipo de gente, en cualquier parte del mundo, y en cualquier tiempo futuro, llevando el mensaje del juego incluso fuera de su ficción, puesto que más allá de este Japón virtual, y al igual que sus personajes, podemos conectar con otras personas a través de nuestra experiencia y diálogo sobre esta singular obra, todo gracias a esta coincidencia que nos llevó a las calles de Shibuya.

Awesome game. Jack, Tateno and Kano are sigmas, Minoru and Kenji were kino, and the rest of the cast is extremely enjoyable. The way everything in the game is used and comes together, from sol to plot, is so amazingly well done and there's almost nothing to nitpick about the game. Absolutely recommend this as a must read vn.

Awful gameplay though so use these walkthroughs for the love of god https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/ps4/206712-428-shibuya-scramble/faqs/78896/introduction https://knoef.info/trophy-guides/ps4-guides/428-shibuya-scramble-trophy-guide/ and the speed patch as well https://pastebin.com/uiScdsNy. Though note the speed patch crashes in the Canaan scenario so swap it back out with the original exe during that part.

an unforgiving masterpiece of making you lose time. you can't speed-up text in a decent way? who's the evil mastermind who design the 100% run requisites?

that's about it. best visual novel ever made

Tama is cute.

Amazing game with an awesome plot,outstanding characters and a charming writing that got a 10/10 localization.You will learn so much about Shibuya's culture and its people. This is also probably one of the few VNs with a postgame: it's almost as long as the main campaign,and can be annoying sometimes like collecting every bad ending in the game for an extra scenario,but all of these extras are so good that it's worth the hassle imo.
10/10 Kajiwara in the bathroom has been my wallpaper for almost 3 years now.

Ok this game is bonkers in the best way. It's a choose your own adventure game in which you can reselect scenes for characters and make different choices to change the paths of other characters. It can be a little trial and error but I absolutely love the idea and how it plays.

The characters are all interesting and very different and it all comes together surprisingly well in the end though I found it a little abrupt.

What really stands out though it that the entire game is made from photographs of real Japanese actors. It almost felt like I was choosing the path of a tv show in a way.

I really enjoyed this a lot and I didn't have high expectations. It's quite long too, took me over 30 hours to see through to the end and has some secret extra stories, one of which is really heart wrenching (I thought the other was terrible) as well as an anime spin off film (which was also terrible). So not perfect but they are optional extras.

All in all this is one of the best visual novels i've played and I highly recommend it.

+ Love the choose your own adventure timeline gameplay.
+ Great characters.
+ The real life photo aspect is wonderful.

- Some of the extras aren't great.
- The ending felt like there should have been a bit more.

A very very fun journey from start to end. 428 handles the constant switching between the main characters excellently and it makes for a very dynamic and enjoyable story with frequent tone shifts and twists. The story doesn't end up being particularly impactful or anything but it's a ton of fun with a lot of likable characters and surprisingly good presentation. Osawa's sympathetic parental plights, Tama's scam hi-jinks with Yanagishi and Chiri, Kano's buddy-cop action with Stanley, and Minorikawa's overflowing charisma mesh better than I could've hoped and made for a large variety of quality scenes. At first I was perplexed by the lack of proper mouse support and manual saves but I quickly realized it doesn't really hurt the experience at all. The lack of text speed options did get pretty grating though and honestly the game probably would've been about 2 or 3 hours shorter if I could properly skip through text I've finished reading or scenes I've already viewed. The music is pretty good, particularly when it's bombastic like in Tama's scenes with Yanagishita though the somber tunes in Osawa's story fit very well too. Each story brought something to the table and was enjoyable in its own right, though Achi's could be pretty weak at times with his shonen-ish personality and typical romance scenes. I was very happy with how each character played a significant role in ultimately saving Shibuya, including best boy Minorikawa. I also appreciate how the Keep Outs and bad ends forced me to go through each story together instead of just going through one story at a time in its entirety which helped me get engrossed in the bigger picture and how everyone's actions tied together.

the visual novel genre has peaked twice:

first in 2008 with the release of 428 Shibuya Scramble on the Wii

it peaked again whatever year the english version came out