Ghosts of Miami

Content Warning: [spoiler]drugs, drug dealers preying upon high schoolers, abductions, serial killings, mentions of torture, systemic racism, xenophobia, mentions of homophobia, corrupt cops[/spoiler] Don’t let the colorful, bubbly appearance of the game fool you, because the story covers a lot of dark topics. Clearly, this story takes place in the [i]American 1980s[/i] within the city of Miami, Florida. The protagonist is a Cuban-American, who becomes an investigator, mostly inspired by her father’s disappearance. Amidst solving cases, Chelo can also find romance. [u]Praises[/u] • Encourages utilizing critical thinking skills • Forces the player to consider ethics/morals regarding several circumstances • Portrays a variety of immigrants in a positive way; hopefully, to cause people to sympathize with them and see them as fellow human beings • 5 romance options: - Luci – protagonist’s childhood friend; Colombian-American woman; family is a drug cartel - Richard – protagonist’s brother’s boss; white American man; crime lord - Tala – a fan of the protagonist’s former band; Iranian-American woman; senior in high school - Janet – a drag king that forms at a gay bar; white American woman - Ethan – an EMT that helps the protagonist with her cases; black American man • Four main cases and a fifth case that’s unlocked after a first playthrough • Enlightens the player as to how society has the system rigged against minority groups • Shows how cops are corrupt and only act when rich, white people want them to • 80s-style inspired art that’s nice most of the time [u]Complaints[/u] • Odd skip function. The ~ key above the TAB key, on standard QWERTY keyboards. Will skip dialogue you [i]haven’t[/i] read yet, and can’t be changed in options • Multiple playthroughs are a tad tedious • No manual save • Some achievement requirements are unclear and one seems to be bugged for most people • Sometimes dialogue doesn’t make sense in regard to what order events took place • No CG gallery • A lot of the non-white characters still have really light skin. The dev had the opportunity to show darker-skinned people, but chose not to. Perhaps intentional or unintentional colorism? Yes, there are light-skinned Cubans, Colombians, and Iranians, but if you want actual diversity, part of that is visual presentation, and those characters look no different than the white characters. Despite the issues it has, I still recommend it if you like detective stories.

Ghosts of Miami is a game that's occasionally fun but ultimately frustrating. The problem is that there is no way to get to the end of the game without randomly guessing the exact choices that the developer intended. If you make the "wrong" choice, you only find out several scenes (or several episodes!) later that you cannot progress in the game. This is infuriating, because many of the significant choices are either completely arbitrary (so you are replaying the same scenes for no reason whatsoever) or they force you to get into creepy relationships with people. This is horrible, horrible design and completely ruined my enjoyment of what otherwise might have been a reasonable private investigator VN. Game-breaking mechanics aside, the graphics are very nice and the writing is okay. Don't go in expecting lighthearted fare, it is a very dark and earnest game and there is no comedy. Unfortunately, I'll never find out how it ends because I'm not going to waste my time trying to "romance" everyone just to solve a murder case. Gross.

I really really wanted to like this game but I have so many problems with it. 1) The Mechanics: -no save function (if you mess up a case you have to restart entirely) -virtually no skip read text function (so if you replay you are just stuck frantically clicking) From what I can tell, you have to get the exact perfect combination of choices. I have replayed the first case three times and still couldn't solve it. I was starting to feel dense until I saw that someone else had chosen the same final options and succeeded. So clearly I understood the case but messed up the information gathering to the point of being unable to progress. 2) The Writing -Repetitive clue gathering. Maybe this is just the first case but I got the same clue multiple different ways from multiple different people, some without me even having to choose a dialogue option. It was strange to feel like the clues were being handed to me but still being completely unable to solve the case, as it seemed pretty obvious what was going on. -Romance interests immediately made me uncomfortable. I thought it wouldn't be that bad when I bought the game but then I actually met them and it feels horribly wrong for a mid twenty MC to have both a romance interest that's a teen and a romance interest that is graying at the hairline (and is apparently your brother's boss). This really comes down to personal preference, as this is fiction. But immediately getting hit on by an older man, straight after talking to a high school student with an obvious crush on me, was extremely uncomfortable. I feel kind of bad leaving a review after so little time played, but I am very much the kind of person that will give anything a try and then let it go if it's not my cup of tea. This game I found practically unplayable. I never even got to the relationships and romance which is really disappointing as the character writing seemed solid and the topics were really interesting. So if you're like me and see it on sale and think "well it's worth a shot for so cheap maybe these things other people said won't bother me?" there is a good chance those things will bother you.

看到制作组直接无脑买，果然是一如既往令我安心且信赖的稳定剧本发挥，一本满足！ 有官中真是太惊喜了，虽然中间仍有部分文本没有汉化完全，但比起啃生肉阅读效率已有大大提升，是近几个月很久没有体验到的快乐了T T 一共五个案件，篇幅都不长，却成功塑造了各式各样形象鲜明且辨识度高的角色，一口气玩下来很连贯也很有趣。沉迷破案以至于无心交流感情，人间真实xD（然而只有前两个是靠自己正确推出来的，后头直接摆烂抄指南作业了orz） 结局推了Richard，因为我是人类喜欢年上男性纸片人///。事实上，每个角色都很有魅力，也许之后会再收集一下可爱jk和黑道青梅的结局。）比起感情线，更让我感觉触动的是女孩儿们的情谊。当然，还有那些鲜艳又残酷，善良或贪婪，像《Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind》里克莱门汀的头发颜色那样富于变化的、正邪难辨的芸芸众生。几乎都是些灰色调的残酷故事，只是包上了一些让它们看起来不那么锋利，再加上一些令味蕾满意的甜味剂的糖果外皮。读后似乎也不觉沉重，亦无需深究，毕竟这仍然是个恋爱向的vn不是吗——微笑着一起见证Ghosts of Miami就足够了。总而言之，是我很喜欢的剧情。 一点美中不足：无法自由存档，且用于快进的“~”键按下后似乎是默认持续跳跃，不会停在新增未读对话发生处。而第五个案件一周目并不会完全呈现，Luci和Richard的路径解锁后才有更多情节发展；这意味着就得重开此前读过了的案件，存档和跳跃的麻烦设计使得这个存读的过程稍微有点令人失去兴致。 总之，结论是，整体来说瑕不掩瑜。优秀的剧本，美术和配乐相得益彰，个人体验很好。以上~

3/5。集中探讨了少数族裔的身份、归属感以及隐藏的一些艰难处境，看似是很阳光的风格，实际上是介绍了性工作者、毒品交易、偷渡、青春幻梦与可悲现实、家庭期待与压力等等较为沉重的话题——但我觉得画面和内核的冲突感并没有给本作增色。 案件部分做得很无聊，没有什么推理可言，调查其实对剧情没有影响，只要在每个案件结尾的回答阶段照着攻略选就行了。那个连环杀人犯的案子也是比较俗套的题材了，情节大体是类似于《噩梦娃娃屋》这款。 有ro，但内容都很少，角色也都写得很平庸，所以我根本就懒得打后续解锁的单人线了。 汉化根本没做完啊，经常会有没有中文的地方，质量也不高。steamdeck上游玩的话要调整兼容性才能显示出中文字体。

Oh Ghosts of Miami... This game is complicated for me. All and all, I DO recommend it for several reasons. I mean the art is gorgeous, characters are diverse and extremely likable, the mysteries do a great job of incorporating the sociopolitical environment of the time, and the game centers marginalized communities at its core. I LOVE all of that! Chelo is an amazing protagonist and, too, the mysteries are really interesting. So, for the most part, it's an E A S Y recommend. Now, where I struggle are with two things in particular; mystery logic and the ending. As much as I liked the social events that the mysteries brought up and the camaraderie between Chelo and her peers, I didn't like some of the game design decisions. For instance, some cases have it where you, the player, have access to several spaces to gain clues, but you don't actually have enough time to see each one, so you have to opt to skip places. Why did I hate this? Because if you chose the "wrong" places to look into or even looked at the correct places in the "wrong order" you would miss crucial information in helping you solve the case. This was made more frustrating by the fact that every place seemed like a logical place to investigate, so it felt like you had to choose based on chance. The key to a good mystery is giving the player everything they need to make a logical decision without making the conclusion obvious--intentionally withholding information just leads to frustration. Now, the second thing I didn't like was the ending. I wanna keep this as spoiler free as I can, so all I'll say is that there's a secret case at the end that you only get access to after successfully solving each case AND exploring two specific romantic character routes. Why did I hate this? Well, for one, I took legitimate issue with dating these two characters. And, secondly, it forces the player to center the romance element of the game where that was not my focus at all. In the middle of high stakes cases, your potential suitors would ask for dates which, tonally, felt strange and, at times, straight up irresponsible to waste a slot of time with them when you instead could have gathered evidence. It's not like this is a romance or otome game, so blocking such a vital case behind romancing people that you don't want to is very frustrating. Romance elements should always be supplemental especially if the game's focus is not on romance. Successfully solving each case should have been the only requirement to unlock and complete the final one, end of story. That said, I really do genuinely like this game. I like it a lot actually. But I am annoyed by the ending and the logic of some of the cases. If you're looking for a queer, socially-relevant, and charming story focusing on marginalized people, I can't recommend this game enough! The good outweighs the bad, trust me! Update: ....okay, so I caved and went back because I had to see the final case and...I'm actually really glad that I did lol. I STILL think the romance elements should have been optional, but I must admit that going through each character route gave the characters a lot of breath and made me fall in love with the cast even more than before. I say for those interested in this game, just focus on the mystery on your first playthrough. Then, in subsequent playthroughs, use "~" to skip every thing you've already seen and just focus on romancing the unlocked characters so that you can see the true ending. Then, you wanna go back and romance the other 3 characters if you're interested. Doing this really added so much to the game (and even fleshed out some of the mysteries more tbh) and I rather enjoyed it. I can't act like I don't love this game y'all--not just any game could make me go back and do all this. This one is something special.

80年代のマイアミで探偵として事件に挑むミステリーADV。 1周3時間、全実績解除に20時間程度。 英語の苦手な自分が辞書を引き引きプレイした時間なので、得意な人ならもっと早いでしょう。 古き良きアニメ基調のグラフィックに、音楽まで80年代の雰囲気たっぷり。 ビビッドな表面の明るさと裏腹に、挑む事件の数々には暗い背景があるマイアミ仕様。 主人公をはじめとするコミカルなキャラクターに癒やされます。 基本的には色々な人に話を訊いて事件を調査し、各章の最後の推理パートで 事件の真相を推理して合っていれば解決するという仕組みです。 ただ、恋愛対象として攻略可能なキャラが5人おり、それぞれ異なるEDが用意されています。 注意点が3つ。 1つめ、テキストストップは日本語キーボードでは「@」キー、英字キーボードでは「~」キーのようです。 自分は最後の最後までこれに気が付かずマウスを連打していました。 ただ、いわゆる既読スキップ機能はなく、未読箇所ふくめスキップするためご注意を。 2つめ、任意でのセーブ機能は存在しません。 オートセーブがあるためゲームを辞めることはいつでもできますが、選択肢ごとにデータを残して試行錯誤は不可能です。 幸い、章あたりのテキスト量は多くないため、上記したスキップ機能を活用すればさして苦になりません。 3つめ、章ごとに独立してシナリオ攻略可能ですが、攻略対象キャラの好感度はチャプターをまたぎます。 具体的には、最終章では好感度が一定以上でEDが分岐するのですが、不足している場合は以前の章から稼ぎ直す必要があります。 キャラにはよって致命的な選択肢があるようなので、基本的に1章からやり直して総当りするのが無難でしょう。 なんであれ、80年代の雰囲気に浸ってミステリーをやりたいのならきっとうってつけの一作です。 自分はジャネット推しです。

有些地方没有汉化完全！！！！！！ 突然看一大段英文看的感觉真的不好受... 而且明快的色彩下并不是啥明快的剧情... 玩之前应该有个心理准备...

用最鲜艳最欢快的画风讲述最压抑致郁的故事。简繁中的翻译质量都很差，一开始还以为是机翻，通关以后发现居然有汉化成员名单，绷不住了。

So, this is my first time I'm ever writing a review for a game, and this game deserves that first review. This is a wonderful masterpiece and legitimately one of the best games I've ever played when it comes to representation. I myself am a member of the LGBT community, but there is nothing more that I hate when a game flat out says dialogue such as "God I'm so gay!" It's unnatural and honestly, really tacky? In this game, there is none of that if you are wondering. Moving on to that: [h1] PROS: [/h1] [u] -Hispanic LGBT Representation through the roof! [/u] *Moving onto things I dislike, nothing more than when popular media decides to directly translate spanish to english such as: "Hola Mi Hermano! Hi, my Brother!" Spanish people don't talk like that. Chelo and Mickey are some of the most organic characters I've seen when it comes to this. Chelo using words such as Cojones and Cabrones is also incredibly funny, especially since this is 80s MIAMI, there's gonna be spanish speakers! It's soo refreshing to see them talking like actual hispanic people. *What I was NOT expecting in this game were drag queens, I mean, that's nothing bad of course, but how were they portrayed so well as well? The stereotypes of hispanic and lgbt people seen in other video games are NO WHERE near this game, which is a breath of fresh air. The characters are all pleasant in their own ways, and you can't help but enjoy each and every piece of dialogue that they say. [u] -The romantic interests are not all the same age and gender. [/u] *So I'm a visual novel connoisseur, and one thing I absolutely hate about them is that they'll copy-paste the same interest multiple times. With this game, that's not the case. I would hate to spoil about it, but They have the assortment of: An escobar party queen, a highschool senior socialite, a sweet, dorky EMT, a mysterious older man, and a drag king who treats you like a princess. The male-to-female ratio is also surprising, considering the female love interests overbalance the male, which i think is a good thing! Since most visual novels only ever provide one female love interest, this is, again, a breath of fresh air to me. [u] -You can't save everyone. Also the music freaking bops. [/u] *The darkness of this game is astonishing, considering this is the best soundtrack I've heard in a video game in a long time. The intro? Best thing I've seen all year, you should purchase it for that reason alone. Anyways, the game advertises being a detective that finds missing people. Neato, right? It teaches you the dark side of that, that you can't find everyone and become a savior to your city. Which, is sad, but it's ultimately the truth, the game doesn't sugarcoat it that Chelo is some kind of superhero. She's not, she's human like you and me. [h1] CONS: [/h1] [u] -You can only kiss once. [/u] *That is to say, I am a bit disappointed we don't see any actual physical romantic moments between Chelo and her love interests save for Ethan and Tala. I would have liked to see her kiss Luci, devs. Sorry. [u] -There is no CG gallery. [/u] *So yeah, I played this game for almost ten hours, but I'm still disappointed that there is no gallery to go back to seeing the lovely art the creators probably painstakingly spent making, it would be nice to see it! [u] -The skip button isn't obvious. [/u] *Let me save you a world of headache and tell you ahead of time that the skip dialogue option is the tilde button that looks like ~ this. If you don't know this, you will be stuck in limbo manually skipping everything, I wish there was a way the devs put this into the game, so we would know for achievement purposes. [u] -There isn't a lot. [/u] *Okay, this is less of a con and more of me getting attached; but the game is a bit short if you have ADHD like me and binged the whole thing in one day. I get it, you're not supposed to do that, but I kind of wish we had more cases with Chelo and a way to actually see her sign up to be a P.I. I hope the devs add DLC, or even a sequel to this, because there is ONE playthrough of this on youtube. [h1] OVERALL: [/h1] I'm pissed off that this game isn't popular. The game is an 80's centric LGBT themed hispanic-starring MASTERPIECE with what, 20 reviews in total? It's depressing, upsetting, and I hate it. I am definitely going to try to make all of my friends play this game, because Chelo Martinez deserves more representation, and the true ending was upsetting! Come on devs, give us more CHELO! [i] (I would like to add this, creators, if you see this, the word "Boardwalk" is misspelled multiple times in case you guys don't speak english as your first language either) [/i]