World's End Club

This game was okay, but I wish I hadn't bought it. It seems like the developers couldn't decide what kind of game they wanted this to be. It seems like it is for kids but has a lot of dark plot elements, and the platformer aspect can be very frustrating sometimes. Especially the game over screen, the animation takes way too long. There were too many random plot twists, too many characters so most of them never got any development, and the animations for many of the characters' power-ups also took too long. The worst thing about this is that when you first start a new game, you don't get to a guaranteed save point until over an hour in. (There is a big "stage select" menu where you see where you're at in the game and it autosaves between stages, but the first few stages are extremely long and don't make it clear if they even autosave your game.) I am not sure what the target audience of this game is. Would definitely not recommend for fans of Kodaka's/Uchikoshi's other games. I actually cannot think of a single thing I liked about this game. Maybe the music and character designs. But overall, don't buy this. If you really want to support Kodaka or Uchikoshi they have many other better games.

I wanted to like this game, I like platforms and I'm a big fan of the director - Kazutaka Kodaka. Sadly, the game is not for me. It's mostly dialogue, with the story being fed to us by a spoon. When we get to the game play, the level are uninteresting to say the least - even boring. There are also clear sighs that the game is not fully polished, one example being the audio dialogue skipping ahead before finishing if the text if set to anything except 'slow'. I will say that the illustrations and characters, drawn by Take (Takegarou) of Pokemon Sun&Moon, are great.

I was really excited when I hears about this game : I like the artist behind the character designs, heard Uchikoshi and Kodaka were behind it, so what could go wrong? The game has good ideas, I like the different route aspect of the game, the story and characters are alright.. but what hurts the most is the platformers gameplay. This isn't fun to play. It feels like the platformers portions weren't playtested enough, because how can you make a platformer without a life bar, or at least not a reset screen taking 30 seconds ?? 😭 This made the experience REALLY annoying when you need to figure some parts of the game and made me struggle a lot in places. I feel like it should've been playtested more before release Huge disappointment in this 😔

This game REALLY wanted to cash in on danganronpa for its intro, then decided to be a 2.5D character platformer with barely any substance. There's potential here, but it's been entirely wasted on bad writing/planning and subpar localization

The Map theme did not need to go that hard. Almost feels like an early concept for the Hundred Line, as a lot of mechanics would be expanded upon within that game, like branching paths and multiple endings. A pretty underrated gem.

нууу есть свои моменты... но положительные только на микропроцент перевешивают негативные

美术和画面都不错，但还是不推荐。 首先，碰撞箱判定有问题，导致战斗体验非常差。剧情很公式，处处透露着儿童向的情节但有很多黄段子？？至于宣传用的噱头也是很搞笑的，对于此作更贴切点的描述是打越和小高联手拉了坨大的。 总之，推荐游玩年龄为12岁以下。

10/10+ arabic language Thank you to them <3

A game with tons of charm. The vibe I get is a mystery narrative-driven game with a Digimon cast that are designed like Pokemon trainers. Just like the other game from the creative team, it is rough around the edges, but the charisma of the cast and premise carry through the clunky gameplay part. Talking about gameplay, its sections are probably the roughest parts, with painstakingly long animations that are clumsily programmed to take too much time, such as the Game Over screen or dodging mechanic (or lack thereof). The thing about AI gameplay was that the notion of the time travelling puzzle, despite it being clunky in presentation, is a concept that feels fresh and intriguing to go through. And when it comes to Zero Escape, it is about escape room puzzles. And with Danganronpa, both the Death Game genre pull and putting it all on the visual novel UI being presented with such bold style. Sadly, World End Club does not have novelty to fall onto its rough execution but thankfully the sections are serviceable and short. The cast is similar to gameplay-driven games like Pokemon where the characters are endearing, but rather flat, to accompany a story without much complexity, but the game does not have an addictive gameplay loop to fall on. However, where the experience shine is truly through the characters. They are charmingly designed and voiceacting by an all-star cast. Those who enjoy tokusatsu shows like Super Sentai or Digimon will feel right at home. The characters, just like any mystery plot, are relatively flat, but the production really aim on their charisma and friendship to make you care for what is basically a bunch of very good kids. I do enjoy them being grade schoolers which means there's significantly less creepy pervert writing than the franchises the team is known for has - it still means there are some bad stereotypes that fall through the gaps when it comes to certain characters writing, but nothing egregious. There is significant ambition in the game. I cannot again overstate how well crafted the characters feel so that you grasp who they are and just enough nuanced to have them feel like characters in only a few moments, that's great introductory direction. And I found myself curious to follow what this bunch of kids were used to. One flaw I may find is that although the natural interactions between the characters imply relationships, unlike Digimon (which the energy of the cast remind me a lot of), we do not get to spend the time to really explore the kids' upbringing and how although they are all so different, they all became friends. It is, again, the game massively riding on the charisma of its voice actor performance, character design and music to communicate to us that those children are a tightly knitted group. It certainly speedruns steps from pre-conceived tropes, but as someone who is really into those type of group of kids save the world shows, I had no issue to just enjoy the ride, as I found the performances really nice. World's End Club is certainly an enjoyable ride, given it initially released on mobile and then the Switch, I understand where it comes from, and I certainly can see the public audience being mostly young players who enjoy the genre without its edginess or perviness. I think there is definitely at some point an overintellectualisation of Zero Escape and AI at play when I hear about it from fans of the franchise, and then an odd power fantasy when it comes to certain type of protagonist surrounded by certain type of characters, where when the player may at some point feel fatigued by the roughness of the game, they can "rest" their eyes on a cast of eye candy waifus and ill-adjusted male characters that make them feel comforted. World's End Club does not have that, because those are endearing grade schoolers who only express an okay amount of sexuality for their age without it being as catered to as the edgier title by this team. If you like shows like Digimon, Pokemon, Super Sentai or Kamen Rider, I definitely recommend to give this a go. It is cheap and a fun ride.

Let me start this review by saying that this game is not for everyone out there. Gameplay wise, this game is basically a disaster. I wish they would have spent more time on the visual aspects, because that's pretty rough a lot of the time too (except for the UI, like that's legitimately so good). Back in the late 1500's, you had the globe theatre, where Romeo and Juliet was played. The stage didn't really use many props, and the audience's imagination had to make a good visualizer in their head of what the story looks like. That's a good way to explain this game: an amazing story, but the medium in which it's told just requires a little imagination. If you want better gameplay, go play Mario Bros. or some other platformer. But if you're looking for a great life-changing gem of a story, it's right here waiting for you. I really hope this game gets some remaster or even series in the future, because all the potential is right there.