toku fans!! visual novel fans!! people who like great narratives, characters and media with a hopeful outlook on life (despite the horrors)!!! i have a video game suggestion for you that is heavily discounted (90%) until march 19th!!! Steam Link
I love love love this game, I play a lot of video games and this is easily my favourite. It changed my life massively, like introducing me to my fav musician, getting me into Kamen Rider, aaaand tbh, it kept me going when my mental health was at its worst.
I'm tucking the rest of my rambles below, but pretty please, if you've any interest in visual novels, check this one out!!
428 is group of people collectively experiencing the worst day of their lives. Everyone has their own timeline with their own choices, that intersect with each other, and you work to unravel everything so they can all make it out okay.
Each character has a different core tone and approach to prose, from Tama's off-kilter humour and surreal plotline (ft Nasubi), to Osawa's psychological thriller with a warped self-perception, I found it so easy to fall in love w this cast. (osawa my beloved. my babygirl. the things i would do to make this depressed dad happy..... oh and btw? semi canon middle aged man yaoi with him. he's a homoerotic magnet??? no i don't just mean the bathroom scene, i mean the constant banana metaphors too)
Despite some grim stuff being able to happen (some of those bad endings are very, very bad), the tone is optimistic and human. It's a story of people finding love for their world and community, a place to belong, and that maybe sometimes it is okay to explode a guy if he was being a creep.
It's able to hop between exsistentially miserable and silly absurdity so easily?? that's a rare talent haha
for my toku people, this is a photographic visual novel. (do not be deceived by the trailer, this doesn't have much video) You might recogise people, especially from 2000s shows. Kousei Amano (Tachibana - Blade, Hayami - Fourze, Glodi - King Ohger), plays a lead character, here he is getting drop kicked :')
And Aya Kamiki, singer of KR W's theme song, did one of 428's main themes!
for my visual novel people, this is the spritual successor to Chunsoft's earlier sound novels, from writer Jiro Ishii. One of the characters, Minoru Minorikawa is actually in a couple of older games as well!
I was suggested 428 from Zero Escape! It doesn't have that franchise's puzzle rooms or death games, but they're tonally similar and the timeline weaving feels reminiscent. If you love Zero Escape's weird mentioning of IRL scientific principles etc (which I do lol), you'll love 428's bizarre embedded facts and commentary from a very opinionated and unseen narrator.
I'm still surprised we have an official version of this in English, apparently some staff had to fight to ensure a global release. Sadly, i think voting with our money is the only way to encourage Spike Chunsoft to release more of their older catalogue, which have become inaccessible.
The soundtrack is also sooooooooo good. Cartridge is everyone's underused fav and the other main theme is incredible. Characters have their own sets of music too!! I've got a soft spot for Osawa's tracks, he's got some great wonky pieces, like Lost in Thought, Presentiment and Ua Virus.
If anybody does get into this game, or already knows about it, I have a collection of 428 videos on YouTube! And I'm decently knowledgable about this game in general if anybody wants to chat or has questions.
The anime Canaan is... loosely based on 428. But they're tonally very different, and Canaan retcons several of 428's plot points and all of the characterisation (Alphard, Canaan and Maria are unrecognisable from their game counterparts). Best to not consider them related imo, their relation just damages their individual cohesion. I remember Canaan being semi popular in the early 2010s so it feels worth mentioning.
There's also a spiritual successor releasing (currently no ties w Spike Chunsoft so idk how close they'll be) called Shibuya Scramble Stories in development for 2028.
Note to readers who can read English and Japanese - there is no language selection. Only Japan's Steam store stocks the Japanese language version, any other Steam stores use the English language copy. Please check Steam DB's details to ensure you're buying the version you want if this is an issue.
I really did want to post literally anything else as the first 428 art I ever upload but unfortunately, the heart wants what the heart wants which is for osawa and kajiwara to kiss. apparently.
okay so like.. 428: shibuya scramble is my favourite game ever actually and y'all should have the playlist I've been hoarding with all the lil bonuses and behind the scenes stuff i can find
