When I first started this game, I was almost immediately hooked on the mystery, and thankfully the core mystery remains strong the whole way through. Unfortunately, the mystery is the only thing in this game that remains strong, as nearly everything else is a direct downgrade to it’s predecessor.
Most every single flaw in this game (aside from the abysmal pacing) has a single point of origin. The decision to make a sequel to Ai:The Somnium files, while trying to make it newcomer friendly and make Mizuki the main character, two choices that directly contradict each other.
As a result of not spoiling the original Ai, nearly every character who appeared in the first game is a shadow of their former self. In the best case scenario, they have very little screen-time, and in the worst case, all nuance is drained from their character and they become a hollow shell designed to make perverted jokes.
Mizuki herself similarly suffers from this issue, though in her own unique way, that being that her arc is laughably mediocre in comparison to the original game. Everything in this game is a completely unnecessary addition to her character, that adds absolutely no depth to her character, and occasionally even retcons aspects of the original game just for a cheap twist. As a result, it’s clear that this isn’t a game that was written for Mizuki to serve as the protagonist, rather a mystery that had already been written for another character to solve, only for Mizuki to become the main character.
If it isn’t clear, the character who this game was truly written for is Ryuki, and he’s honestly one of the only good characters in the entire game.
Without spoiling anything, Ryuki is stellar. He has an incredibly strong introduction, and the mystery around his character only gets more interesting as the game continues, that is, until you start the second half of the game and all the screen-time is shifted onto Mizuki instead, a character who’s arc isn’t nearly as interesting.
Nirvana Initiative has a few flaws I didn’t go into detail about as well. The pacing is incredibly repetitive, the script was incredibly weak at times, and the abundant amount of sequel bait is nearly comparable to VLR, but at the end of the day, it’s not a terrible game, just a disappointing one.
And the worst part is that I’ll probably buy the sequel for full price as well.
Most every single flaw in this game (aside from the abysmal pacing) has a single point of origin. The decision to make a sequel to Ai:The Somnium files, while trying to make it newcomer friendly and make Mizuki the main character, two choices that directly contradict each other.
As a result of not spoiling the original Ai, nearly every character who appeared in the first game is a shadow of their former self. In the best case scenario, they have very little screen-time, and in the worst case, all nuance is drained from their character and they become a hollow shell designed to make perverted jokes.
Mizuki herself similarly suffers from this issue, though in her own unique way, that being that her arc is laughably mediocre in comparison to the original game. Everything in this game is a completely unnecessary addition to her character, that adds absolutely no depth to her character, and occasionally even retcons aspects of the original game just for a cheap twist. As a result, it’s clear that this isn’t a game that was written for Mizuki to serve as the protagonist, rather a mystery that had already been written for another character to solve, only for Mizuki to become the main character.
If it isn’t clear, the character who this game was truly written for is Ryuki, and he’s honestly one of the only good characters in the entire game.
Without spoiling anything, Ryuki is stellar. He has an incredibly strong introduction, and the mystery around his character only gets more interesting as the game continues, that is, until you start the second half of the game and all the screen-time is shifted onto Mizuki instead, a character who’s arc isn’t nearly as interesting.
Nirvana Initiative has a few flaws I didn’t go into detail about as well. The pacing is incredibly repetitive, the script was incredibly weak at times, and the abundant amount of sequel bait is nearly comparable to VLR, but at the end of the day, it’s not a terrible game, just a disappointing one.
And the worst part is that I’ll probably buy the sequel for full price as well.