This week, I was afforded an opportunity to give Paranormasight: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo a red-hot go on Nintendo Switch prior to its release this week, and I have been absolutely chomping at the bit to talk about it. I can’t talk about the full game just yet, but I can tell you about my experience with the first chapter of this supernatural mystery.
Paranormasight: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo (or simply Paranormasight, for not-so-short) is a supernatural mystery horror game developed by Square Enix. You might remember it as one of the games that got shown off in Japan’s exclusive Nintendo Direct at the start of February. Despite its non-appearance in western Nintendo Directs of that time, Paranormasight is actually getting a worldwide release, and thankfully so!
The story of Paranormasight starts with Shogo Okiie, an ordinary office worker. Shogo visits Kinshibori Park at midnight with his new friend, Yoko Fukunaga, to investigate a well-known local ghost story: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo. These mysteries are inspired by the real-life Seven Wonders of Honjo, which are a collection of ghost stories and urban legends from Japan’s Edo period.
It’s on this very night that a myriad of unlucky strangers suddenly find themselves in possession of curse stones, which are these intricate little objects that are imbued with the curse power of the mystery they represent. Upon receiving the curse stone, the user is telepathically informed that upon filling the curse stone with ‘soul dregs’ (souls of people one kills with their curse), they will be able to go ahead with the Rite of Resurrection and bring a dead person back to life.
Now, I’m personally a big fan of horror games that use ghost stories and urban legends. Ghostwire: Tokyo on PlayStation, Mysterious Forum and 7 Rumours on mobile, and Until Dawn are all great examples of how urban legends and ghost stories can be utilised for a great horror experience. From the experience of the first chapter of Paranormasight, where one gets to come face-to-face with just a few of the mysteries of Honjo, I can say with confidence that Square Enix has absolutely nailed the execution of these stories while also putting their own unique spin on how they’d work as ‘curses’.
As Shogo, you are in possession of the Whispering Canal curse, which allows you to curse people (to death, of course) if they decide to walk away from you. You learn that while simply cursing anybody will add soul dregs to your curse stone, it is the killing of other curse bearers that bags you the most dregs. High risk, high reward.
When it comes to executing your curse unto others, it’s completely optional. When you eventually get someone to turn their back on you, you’re given a few beats before they leave so you can really think about whether or not you want to hit ’em with a fat curse. While I’m generally a pacifist in these sorts of optional game scenarios, I decided to take a different approach and go curse crazy. I was a bad, bad man for a kinda noble cause. With multiple different ways to go about your business also comes multiple endings for Shogo, so if you get something ‘wrong’ you can always go back to the Storyteller (shown below) to try something new. If you die enough times, he might even give you a nudge in the right direction.
However, it’s not as easy as being like, “Oh, what’s that over there? You should probably go check that out!”. Considering all curse bearers hold a higher value of soul dregs, those other folks are just as keen to snuff you out as you are them. That means that not only are you having to get the timing right to curse these MFers to the grave, but you’ve also got to do some smooth talking and smart decision-making to make sure they don’t get you. I won’t spoil it fully so you can figure it out for yourself, but there’s one curse that requires you to break the fourth wall so as to not be affected by it, which was a neat little thing that I’ve seen before in the psychological horror genre and love when done right.
Visually, Paranormasight is wonderfully unnerving (insert picture of Leonardo DiCaprio pointing at the TV in Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood). The character designs are hard for me to pin down to just one comparison, with the anime-like designs reminding me of different titles like Persona, Phoenix Wright, and Zero Escape. One other unexpected comparison in their designs would be Okami, with the thick black outlines of the characters reminding me a lot of some of the human designs in the Wii game. The character designer is the legendary Gen Kobayashi, best known for his character design work on The World Ends With You and Kingdom Hearts, so it makes sense that these character designs are gorgeous.
What sets Paranormasight apart from all these titles is its cool, dark colour scheme. The cold palette definitely adds to the sense of discomfort that you’d experience as you find yourself in different parts of Sumida Ward in Tokyo, with some areas using 360-degree stylised photography to make you feel like you’re really there (in a spooky way). It’s as if Google Earth were a horror game!
I can’t go any further into my experience with Paranormasight for the time being, but based on the first chapter alone, it’s a winner. It’s a frightening experience that starts out as brooding and mysterious and continues this theme throughout. Every choice you make matters, as a lot of the choices could cost you your life or somebody else’s. If you’re a fan of mystery and horror through an investigative lens and appreciate an abundance of in-depth storytelling, you’ll want to keep your eye on Paranormasight: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo.
Paranormasight: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo releases on Nintendo Switch, PC, and mobile devices on March 9th, 2023.
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