My Thoughts on Chaos;Child
A visual novel to surpass Steins;Gate?
Regular readers of my blogs will know that this review was to be expected, as it was hinted at during my visual novel blog, which I will leave below for you to read if you haven’t already.
Introduction
I discovered this visual novel at the beginning of 2017. I had just obtained my PS4 and I was choosing games to fill out my spare time (when uni work didn’t dominate my uni life). Firmly wedged in the shelves of the local GAME store was a box that was a tad larger than the standard game box, that had strange colours that caught my eye. It was a visual novel, called ‘Chaos;Child’, which I had never heard of. This was the standard edition of the game that contained the game and a beautiful glossy art book which was all the more enticing.
A quick bit of research concluded that this was made by the same people who made the fantastic ‘Steins;Gate’ and was part of the same series. And for £20, I thought it was worth a gamble!
Now having finally finished ‘Chaos;Child’, with a mere 2 trophies to obtain to get that beautiful platinum trophy, I thought now would be the perfect time to review this game.
Note: there will be SPOILERS throughout this blog, but I will do my best to minimise them for you. There will also be images of a VIOLENT NATURE. Consider this your warning folks!
The Blog Proper
Narrative and Characters
As previously mentioned, ‘Chaos;Child’ is a visual novel developed by 5pb. It is the fourth main entry in the Science Adventure series (the series in which ‘Steins;Gate’ is a part of).
‘Chaos;Child’ was released in Japan in 2014 for Xbox One, and later for PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, Microsoft Windows, iOS, and Android. The PS4 and PS Vita versions were released by PQube in Europe and North America in 2017, and the Windows version by Spike Chunsoft in 2019.
‘Chaos;Child’ is a thematic sequel of ‘Chaos;Head’ (which was released in 2008) and begins at that visual novel’s climax. An earthquake occurs destroys much of Shibuya, the Japanese town in which both these visual novels are set. Whilst it is easy to presume that this just serves as a depressing world-building, it is this earthquake that sets the plot of this visual novel into motion, as everything that happens in ‘Chaos;Child’ is related to this earthquake, even when Shibuya gets back on its feet.
It is a murder, mystery thriller, which are terms I don’t use lightly. ‘Chaos;Child’ has some of the most violent depictions I have seen in a visual novel. How it passed as a 16 (in the EU anyway) is beyond me.
To use an early example, following the earthquake setting is a bizarre opening section with a character does a live-stream of fortune tellings, before slowly chopping up his arm and eating it before slowly bleeding out, live, on his laptop. What is important to note here is that he has no idea that he is doing this, which is relevant to the plot-proper.
Before I carry on, I should that no knowledge of ‘Chaos;Head’ is required to fully enjoy the game. I didn’t know anything about ‘Chaos;Head’ (other than existed) before I began writing this blog and that is the only connecting factor I am aware of.
In ‘Chaos;Child’, the player assumes the role of Takuru Miyashiro, president of the Hekiho Academy newspaper club, who investigates the ‘Return of the New Generation Madness’ serial murder case, which is a series of weirdly horrific murders. He notices that they share the same dates as the original ‘New Generation Madness’ murders (that are found in ‘Chaos;Head’).
What is immediately obvious is that Takuru is not the most conventional protagonist. He is not confident and super popular/ He is presented as a self-proclaimed ‘right-sider’, who is on the right side of internet-based knowledge. In short, he knows the true facts concerning gossip on forums and is intelligent when it comes online forum discussion and thus looks down upon all the ‘wrong-siders’ in his life.
Obtaining information and the truth that goes with him is incredibly important, which is why he is ecstatic when he believes to have discovered something that no one else has, which is what propels him into discovering the truth behind the Return of the New Generation Madness’. It is now his life mission to solve this case, with no regards to his safety or the safety of his club members. This is one of the many things that makes him a bad person. He is selfish, arrogant and incredibly condescending at times. He is also quite cowardly, especially at the beginning of the story. This also makes him an incredibly interesting character to view the story through.
His backstory is explained and reminded constantly to the player and seeing him at the beginning of the story to the person he becomes at the end makes him a very strong character in a narrative sense.
Similar things can be said about the rest of the incredibly human cast that prevents them from overcoming their flaws, hurting themselves and the people around them by doing so. Each of the main cast goes through a tremendous arc as the story(s) progress. My particular favourite is Hana Arimura, who is incredibly suspicious when she is first introduced, before being accepted into the Newspaper Club, where her energetic, cheeky and occasionally perverted/naughty side shines through. She also one or two heroic moments that I will not mention in this blog.
Many games would have a ‘Captain Bland’ as the protagonist to try and make everyone accept themselves for who and what they are (look at you Persona games 3–5!) but ‘Chaos;Child’ doesn’t do that. You have Takuru, who struggles to talk to strangers (probably due to some serious social anxiety) whilst thinking he is better by those he simply doesn’t understand.
Despite this, there is a dormant kindness buried in Takuru that prevents him from falling into the same pitfuls many archetypes fall face-first into. By playing the visual through such a flawed character, the player is able to face the darker parts of ourselves we often try to hide, making him a really relatable character, even if we don’t want him to be.
Gameplay/Interactive Mechanics
Being a visual novel, there isn’t a whole lot of gameplay in the traditional sense. There is an awful lot of reading to do, so if that is not your sort of thing, you won’t enjoy ‘Chaos;Child’.
Most visual novels have simple decision making mechanics that takes the player down a different narrative route that provides different endings, thus encouraging the player to return over and over again. Each instalment of the Science Adventure visual novels has an interesting twist on this feature. ‘Chaos;Child’ uses the ‘Delusion Trigger’ feature, which is not the same as the more familiar dialogue choices gamers are drowning in other games.
At various points in the story, (mostly between chapters 1–8 in the common route) Takuru will be able to react to certain scenarios with a positive of negative delusion (by pressing L2 or R2 on PS4). There is also the choice to remain grounded in reality by choosing neither positive or negative, thus remaining neutral. Positive delusions are usually silly dream sequences, whilst the negative ones are usually overly violent and worst-case scenarios x1000.
Many people have stated that choosing negative or positive can affect the way Takuru sees the world and those around, I would say this is incredibly false. During your first playthrough, it does not matter what choices you make, as they will always be locked into the Common Route. Once you have reached the end of your first playthrough, then the delusions will have a greater impact on your story, as the choices you make will send Takuru doing one of five different routes that revolve around one of the other characters in the story, each route being very different from the common route.
Once you have witnessed each of these routes, you will unlock the True Ending, which is an epilogue that focuses on a particular character, who I shan’t name for huge spoiler reasons. The True Ending is on another league compared to the others that tie everything up beautifully but leaves some suspenseful sequel baiting.
If you ignore the various bad endings you can get (which are quite difficult to get for the most part), there are 6 different routes for you explore, which I highly recommend you doing, as each route actually contributes to the main story, answering many questions that the common route (and other routes) will present, whilst presenting you with a least fifty more. ‘Chaos;Child’ is incredibly good a building it’s tension and drip-feeding the player just the right amount of information to keep them hooked in this gruesomely engaging tale.
That being said, it is important to experience the various routes in a certain order. Not for any gameplay reasons, but in an emotional and narrative sense. The game doesn’t do much to hint at the player which one to experience first, so it is down to the internet to squabble over which is the best route to play the routes.
For those who have finished the Common Route and are curious which of the endings/chapters to pursue next, this is my recommended order:
- Dark Sky End
- Deep Sky End
- Another Sky End
- Dream Sky End
- Real Sky End
This is one of my few complaints about ‘Chaos;Child’. Whilst I am a huge fan of both the negative and positive delusions and the tension the former can create, it is no denying that the positive delusions can be incredibly lewd, thus shattering the suspense of a more serious moment in the story. It is not enough to ruin the game, as they can provide for great moments of relief if things get too much (I also found a lot of them funny) in addition to the reaction that the sexually frustrated Takuru has when he and his friends notice that he is daydreaming never gets old This being said, some won’t like the sudden 180 in tone.
It is also rather time-consuming to complete the various routes, even with the convenient fast-forward button (R1 on PS4) to speed past scenes and chapters you have already read. I did not mind this, but it was a point worth mentioning regardless.
There is also no real indication in the game which combination of positive and negative delusions takes you to what route, which either has the player guessing randomly or hunting an online guide. This did irritate me for a couple of reasons. The first was the fact that there was no real way of me working out for myself how to get each ending, and it turns out that most of the routes are activated by mostly positive delusions.
The online guide I found that was very useful was this one.
I mentioned earlier in the blog the in-game terms ‘wrong and right-sider’ on and you may not have known what that might have meant. ‘Chaos;Child’ has a lot of its own unique slang, as well as a lot of medical terms that can fly right over the heads a lot of players. Fortunately, ‘Chaos;Child’ highlights certain phrases/terms that a lot of players may not be aware of in cyan the first time they come across it (see above). Those words are explained in a handy Tips List section in the game menu, which can be easily accessed via a button shortcut (see below).
5pb is well-known for their interesting take on interactivity in their visual novels, and ‘Chaos;Child’ is no exception. The use of the internet is particularly important in ‘Chaos;Child’, like most teenagers in the real world would agree. Many of the panels/scenes are mock-versions of Twitter (which becomes ‘Tweeter’), podcast sites and even a weird Windows 7 operating system that you can interact with, which is best experienced on PC (which I didn’t experience first hand). You can scroll up and down on the occasional webpage to read how the public are engaging with certain scenarios or some early clues the Newspaper Club has gathered (see above) which is best experienced on PC (for obvious reasons). These touches create a wonderful emersion not found in many games because of how authentic these features look and the simplicity of their controls.
Besides this, watching the story unfold and dicking about with Delusion Triggers, there is one other way players can ‘play’ the game, which is another type of trigger known as the ‘Mapping Trigger’.
At various points in the story, Takuru and co. will gather around the Newspaper Club’s notice board and places various pictures of crime scenes and work out what’s going on and how they connect with the mysterious Sumo Stickers (see above) as well as various ideas on sticky notes on a map of Shibuya to piece to gather the murders. It is an addition that didn’t need to exist, but one that works very well for the most part.
It does a fantastic job immersing the players, making them feel that they are the ones solving the case. You have to remember the weird internet names assigned to each murder but becomes a chore if you make little effort to remember what’s going on like I did when I first began my playthrough. This feature caught me by surprise when it happened, so when I realised there was going to be some puzzle-solving on information I didn’t remember, I spent an hour trying to guess which pictures went with what, earning myself the trophy where you incorrectly label the pictures 20 times. After that, I started a new save, and made extensive notes on everything related to both cases on New Generation Madness like I was an actual detective. I’d show you my notes, but my handwriting is dreadful, so you won’t be able to read it.
It was incredibly satisfying seeing the map become cluttered with pictures and sticky notes with information that I had collected, some of which presented some brilliant plot moments, so it is really worth paying attention everything that happens in the game. Accompanied by a really engaging cue, this is a really fun mechanic, especially when you get the trophy when you pin the data without any mistakes.
For fun, I will leave two images of the Newspaper Club’s Shibuya map. One at the beginning of the game, and one towards the end. I will present one warning, however: DO NOT enlarge the fuller one if you wish to minimise spoilers!
As fun as this mode is, there is one glaring issue with it that has not been fixed that needs to be addressed in this blog. I played the UK release of the game, and whilst most other important screenshots are translated, the map is not. For a large portion of the game, this is not a problem as you do not have to physically place the pictures on the map itself. During the Deep Sky Route, there is one puzzle that requires you to know the names of places in Shibuya, and unless you read Japanese, you are going to have to use an online guide to finish the game on PS4, which does not bode well for emersion.
If you want to the puzzle out for yourself, here is a translated version of the map that my sources tell me is correct. The previous route guide link also has a screenshot of the solution as well.
Presentation
As you have already seen by the various screenshots, ‘Chaos;Child’ takes on a very anime aesthetic. Whilst I have had some complaints the style does not always match the dark tone of the game, I am rather fond of its style. There is not a single character portrait, background or combat scene that is not gorgeous to look at. Even the more horrible and creepy backgrounds and character arts force me to turn my way. I presume that ‘Chaos;Child’ had a much large budget than previous Science Adventure games, and it shows brilliantly here. But if I were to be extremely picky, there are a couple of typos in the narrative, but they are not too distracting.
I will leave some screenshots of some of my favourite moments (that I haven't included already and aren’t too spoilery) so you can see the contrast in the presentation.
Sound design and voice acting are both incredibly important in visual novels, which is what makes them stand out from reading books and both of which are simply fantastic. From horrible squelching of flesh, ambient footsteps and diabolical screaming, there is not a bad sound to be heard and every syllable of every piece of dialogue is just incredible. There is nothing I can complain about or possible improvements I could suggest, and that is really annoying for a critic.
Then there is the soundtrack, composed by game composer veteran, Takeshi Abo. You will hear many of the tracks over and over across you 50hr+playthrough, which some may criticise, but I don’t think that every single game needs to have a super-interactive soundtrack. Music in media should always enhance the emotions depicted on-screen before anything else, and this soundtrack does this perfectly. Whether the music is a horrible creepy ambience, a climactic battle sequence or an Ecchi jokey slapstick moment during a moment of relief, this soundtrack is fantastic in supporting the dialogue, with a wide variety of tracks with various degrees of horror, sadness and joy. No matter how many times you will hear a cue, it will not grow old.
I would usually throw some of my favourite cues from the game at you to listen to, but I cannot make myself do it, as I fear that some of the emotional impacts would not be as great when you hear them in context. That being said, there are two cues I wish to highlight that I could not ignore in this blog.
The first is the cue ‘Peak Level’ which is always terrifying especially on your first playthrough. It usually accompanies a scene where the cast is in mortal danger and could potentially be slaughtered. One person is, which is rather infamous among avid visual novel fans. I’ll leave it to you to work out which chapter it’s in...
The other cue is ‘Visible Essence’, which only plays towards the end of the game, in association with a group of characters (who are remaining nameless for spoiler reasons). Like the previous cue, this plays when ‘shit hits the fan’, but more on a narrative sense and not when all the characters are about to die. It is remarkably different from everything else prior and I am just in awe with it.
Coda
To find a piece of media with as few flaws as this one is incredibly rare. The bold writing found within ‘Chaos;Child’ makes it shine as perhaps the best narrative experiences I have had the joy to experience. It’s delusion triggers never distract from the main story at hand and all of the routes presents a brilliant essay on the human mind. It is a shame that the localisation wasn’t as polished as the rest of the game and its mechanics.
If I were to rate this game out of 10, I would give a Ciao Gracias/10, as that is just as helpful as proper out of 10 scores.
What do you think of this game? Is it better than ‘Steins;Gate’ when it comes to visual novels? If so/not, why? Who is your ‘Chaos;Child’ waifu? I’ve already told you mine…
Let’s start a conversation, people!
