Front and center I must say I have long been a fan of the weird original titles for the PSPs that were these often lower budget, creativity driven, technical meh products. I love Nights of Azure, I’d probably adore gravity rush. These games often are a mess but extremely creative, and maybe a bit ill advised in some parts. Mary Skelter is probably a perfect example of this weird era of games.
A dungeon crawler that wants to be horny, but really can’t do or show anything more racey than a teen rated manga I’d read in the chairs of old book stores waiting for my mom to pick me up as a kid. It’s frankly juvenile, as is its obsession with blood and gore, all neon pink. It’s very much a distant sister to Danganronpa aesthetically and in terms of maturity. Yet honestly its juvenile vibe makes it easy to ignore the horny vibes if your not here for it. While the original game was more of a harem game, this one takes an entirely different vibe, I’ll get into it later.
The dungeon crawling isn’t really all that different than a might and magic game, monsters are often a little wild in their unique designs however which can be fun to see, if not particularly interesting mechanically. Aesthetically the monsters and world remind me a little like a “we have Madoka Magica’s Witch realms at home” vibe. However, by the end I was completely done with the combat and the dungeons, as is typical of JRPGs, were too long, and extra too long once you get to the end game. That all said I will say the world puzzles were fun and inventive as is all the unique little on map abilities. It has an almost metroidvania quality to gaining traversal abilities, though its far more linear than that implies.
Lastly mechanically, while the battles all bored me by the end, the Skelter/Massacre mechanic did add some good fun in parts, being a fun system that rewards and punishes gambling with your corruption and blood in equal measure, as is the fact that without a doubt the most dangerous thing to your team is your team itself if you let them skelter.
The real star of the show however, is its shockingly fun character work. While the first game follows your stock standard harem protagonist, and while hes here in the second, hes demoted to a happy little monster side kick, allowing Otsu, a new blood maiden, to take a leading roll. Where the first one has a harem like dating system, Otsu, has an established relationship. She, literally, already has a wife. The game not focusing on who you will kiss, but how you mesh with each-other as a couple, and as your party grows to include some extremely cute kid characters (like my beloved Hamlin and Rapunzel) how you navigate a roll more akin to a pair of new mothers. Its exceptionally cute, and something I’ve only really gotten to experience in my beloved Haven.
The writing here is often zany, sometimes strangely horny, but also genuinely charming. This is helped by great side characters like Hamlin and fantastic voice performances giving a standard script a lot more gravitas. Frankly I don’t have many experiences with games about forming a queer found family, and thats a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ shame because it made this one really latch onto my heart.
Which is why it sucks to admit, this game is a prequel and a tragedy to boot. No spoiling what happens but I was absolutely bawling at the end, which once its done, the game suggests you take this knowledge into the first game to get a new tragedy averting ending. Which leads to another genuinely great thing about this game. It includes the first one already inside it. Less important to me, who really isn’t interested in a title not devoted to Otsu and Little Mermaid but objectively a very cool pro-consumer thing to do, and wonderful given 2 is a prequel that expects you to keep going into one for its new end game content.
All this to say, while this games messy, often juvenile, more than a little boring, it is extremely touching. It had me crying at the end, laughing throughout and finding something special and unique, even if I really could go with a few hours shaved off. Weird games are often the ones that will end up being something special, even if not always in a polished perfect way.
