Difficulty:

Just Right

Time Spent:

20 to 40 Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Amazing"

First, I will talk about the story (but I'll try to avoid spoilers). The game's main character, Junpei, finds himself locked in a room and, after searching the room and opening the door (thanks to that search), he discovers he and other 8 people are locked in a ship thanks to the activities of the mysterious Zero that planned their captures and calls it the Nonary Game. He (Junpei) doesn't understand what's the meaning of all that, but he can't just stop to try to figure it out since the ship where they are is going to sink in 9 hours (no real time limit for the player, though). The only way they have is to go through the numbered doors and try to look for an exit (Zero says the only one is the 9th door).
Plot analysis: It's well done. All the 6 endings are connected and the True ending answers many of the questions that were left from the other ones and ties together the game quite well, but there are some points in the plot that lead you to thinking about the game even after its ending. However, it's not a bad point of the game. It just shows how interesting the game plot is.

Now, it's time to talk about the gameplay. For you to advance in the game, you need to find a way out of the rooms you enter and those are this game puzzles. You need to find items in the room and: use them on something in the room, extract info from them to use in codes you need (lock numbers, for instance) or combine them to make an item useful for some of the previous situations. The items you need aren't hard to find, but you need to tie the info you find together in order to advance.
Another interesting point in gameplay are the choices you should make. Many of the choices interfer in the ending you get (mainly the door choices) or, at least, in the text you'll get. (For instance, there's a funny "scene" that's only triggered if you choose the incorrect answer during a certain talk)

Reviewing the audiovisual quality will be a little hard to me since it's not the part I give the more emphasis when playing, but it's needed to be said. The musics used are quite good and give an interesting feeling to the game, but there're some times in which the game goes mute. Those muteness moments are really well chosen because it gives a feeling to the player about an unexpected future, so it makes you feel like you're there playing the nonary game and, then, you don't know anything about what's going to happen. You just need to survive, but you just know one person besides you. What do you feel: being afraid is mixed in it, but it can't tie your arms and legs and interfer in your search for a way out. You must survive. That's what the game non-music parts induce you.
The visual part is interesting. It's animesque and you don't get to really see any of the bad things that may happen inside the ship, those parts are just described. The visual is detailed, but focuses in people's expressions and the important places of the rooms avoiding to show the worst parts in them.

Well, that's it. In sum, the game's an awesome visual novel with great puzzles and your choices define wheter you survive or die in this interesting game.

- "Now it is time. Let our game begin." ~ Zero