Paranormasight Is A 4th-Wall-Breaking Masterpiece

As someone who loves games with a heavy emphasis on narrative, I do love a good visual novel. But once you reach a point where you’ve read as many as I have, you reach a point where you become keenly aware of how formulaic the genre can be. While hybrid visual novels do exist and are increasingly on the rise, it’s rare that a visual novel will offer a genuinely inventive take on the overall genre.

There is nothing wrong with a formula that works, of course, but formulas can stagnate. Just look at the state of Metroidvania, for example, or the Soulslike — anything on repeat, no matter how good it is, can eventually tire you out.

When Square Enix first announced the visual novel Paranormasight: The Seven Mysteries Of Honjo during the Japanese leg of last month’s Nintendo Direct, I, as a fan of visual novels, was obliged to play it. Although it did surprise me that the JRPG powerhouse Square Enix was releasing a visual novel, of all things, out into the world, I still went in with a tempered set of expectations: that Paranormasight would probably play out the exact same way the majority of visual novels do.

Or so I thought.

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Paranormasight opens to an analog television and a Storyteller standing beside it. Wearing a half-mask that reveals only a knowing smile, the Storyteller takes a bow and welcomes me to his tale. I’m taken through a quick tutorial — covering the game’s save system, voice settings, and UI — and then the Storyteller asks me what I’d like to be called. I enter my gaming tag, proper case and all. My gaming tag, not my name.

The music cuts. “I see,” says the Storyteller, a hand to his chin. “Audrey, is it?”

My breath stops. It’s a brief moment of bewilderment — I never typed in my name! — but its brevity makes it all the more powerful.

In the span of five words, the game had not just broken but completely and iconoclastically demolished the fourth wall. I was all of one minute into the game, and immediately the tone was set: Paranormasight needed me to engage with it. Me. An inkling crept in: perhaps my involvement in this visual novel would not be limited to rote clicking of the mouse, after all?

From here, Paranormasight kept finding new and increasingly inventive ways to ask me to engage with it. A total of five different characters became playable as the game continued, but despite taking on their roles, I as the player never stopped being a separate force of my own, able to do things the characters I played couldn’t do, guided by knowledge the characters themselves did not have.

For instance, when the detectives Tsutsumi and Erio hit a snag in their investigation, I had to jump into skeptical high schooler Yakko’s shoes, obtain information which only she could obtain, and use my omniscience as the player to share this information with the detectives. With this, the detectives were able to advance their investigation — even as they questioned where on earth this sudden fount of intel could have come from.

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In Paranormasight, the cast constantly reacts to choices and actions you make, further stressing that you’re your own entity within the story. When I occupied the role of factory worker Shogo Okiie, it became clear to me that Shogo had to dispose of the cigarette lighter he was carrying on his person. Shogo, however, had no idea that he needed to do so — and so when I opened the inventory and selected the lighter for discarding, Shogo’s immediate response was bafflement. Why did he suddenly have this urge to throw the lighter away?

I had to select the option to discard the lighter a second time — this time with more emphasis: Yes, really throw it away — before Shogo felt compelled enough to fully part with his precious lighter.

In another scene, Yakko’s friend asks Yakko to never forget her, and Yakko says she will, but words aren’t enough. The only way you can help Yakko reassure her friend that she’ll always be remembered is by making a save state — a literal save state — during that very scene. The game wouldn’t advance until I had done so. It was a touching moment, made all the more emotional by my own involvement.

In another moment — my personal favorite — Shogo is affronted by a spirit whose wailing voice would kill him if he heard it. Covering up his ears wasn’t enough to block out the sound — Shogo still hears the voice and dies. At this point, the Storyteller takes you aside and asks you to try again. ‘Try doing something that only you can do,’ he suggested. There’s a smile on his face as he says this. A knowing smile.

It reminded me of his smile at the beginning of the game, when he was explaining the game’s features and functions: save at memorable moments, open the Menu for the file system, adjust the brightness and voice volume in the Options screen — hang on a second; this entire game is unvoiced. There is no voice acting. So which voice exactly would I be turning up or down?

The moment this seemingly useless setting becomes useful is nothing short of inspired. When, traditionally, the voice setting in the Options screen is used in visual novels to change the volume of the voice acting, here in Paranormasight, the audio setting has a direct, palpable effect on the characters: I turned the volume all the way down and Shogo could no longer hear the spirit’s voice. He had no idea as to why he couldn’t hear anything, which of course he didn’t. He wasn’t the one who muted the volume. It was me.

Through its creative manipulation of long-established visual novel conventions, Paranormasight elevated me from passive observer to active participant. Telegraphed as it is from the very beginning of the game, Paranormasight’s use of its audio settings, save data, and standard UI functions never feels gimmicky or cheap — but satisfying and, dare I even say it, clever.

Paranormasight is a clever visual novel. Where historically visual novels are known for being one of the more passive video game genres, Paranormasight invents gameplay — staggeringly immersive gameplay, at that — without having to reach for the support of another video game genre, as so many hybrid visual novels tend to do. Paranormasight, as a result, retains its identity as a visual novel, while also being the most inventive visual novel I’ve played in years.

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