Zero Escape: Zero Time Dilemma

Well I'll waste zero time (dilemma) and get right into this. Since this game is the third in the zero escape series, and inextricably tied to the second, I will be comparing them often. In spite of the fact the second game does a good job at wrapping up most of the plot elements. Zero time dilemma does have big shoes to fill for trying to connect all the plot threads together. No major spoilers are in this review. The Characters: They mention early on that each of the characters have a bit of rapport with each other, in Dcom, before the game starts. But they hardly show the characters meeting in Dcom. So they tell you about the characters chemistry and personality rather than showing. Like they hammer home Carlos's sister and how much he loves her. And how he became a fire fighter because she almost died in a house fire. The game can repeat itself a lot. I get why they do it because it is nonlinear. It wasn't done much in the second game, and honestly made it better. Because they only share personal things once you spend time with them and build trust. It's far more realistic. I like how you effectively have 3 main protagonists from each of the 3 teams. But it comes at the cost of none of the 3 characters in each team ever interact with anyone else though. That was one of the most important things about the original to me. Not mentioning how all the pairings are characters who already have deep relationships, which limits the screen time of new character interactions. Four of those characters with deep relationships are characters from previous games. I'm not sure how to feel about the returning characters. Some of them are edgier and it's unrealistic. Mainly Junpei. Like I would imagine some of them being traumatized at ending up at another nonary game. They hand wave it away with him seeing people die at his new job, with no fanfare. And I think the idea is seeing them become more jaded. For reference the 3rd game takes place in-between the first and second game. It just needed more time in the oven. It feels like fanservice. Mainly because not much novel is done with them being here this time. And it limits what the twists and story potential can happen, since you already know about the character. The Writing: The new fragment system isn't as good and makes it very hard to gauge when chronologically something is taking place, or what votes happened. It cuts the gameplay and story into snippets of 30 minutes or so. If I were to guess it was to make everything more bite sized. But it make the game more confusing for me. I think they tried to make the game more accessible but lost a lot of the nuance, and time to set up things with the faster pace. it gets especially hard near the end of the game. I felt like it was tricky but manageable for the second game. But the third feels a smidge too much for me at times. On a more positive note: The writing involving how they set up the science and science fiction elements, is still great. The injection being a analogy for learned helplessness and Newcomb's paradox. And mixing it with the Monty hall problem. On another note the stranded pair ending is also phenomenal, its a perfect moment in a flawed game. And there are a few moments like that, that make me want others to play this game. I like how they develop the themes of the first two games story with swapping places, and timelines. You could previously choose to screw over the other participants for your own benefit. And in addition, You can choose selfish decisions that will screw over you (sort of). This is the most crabs in a bucket game I've ever played. They revealed that the whole cult shenanigans from the second game was because a even worse cult was going to do something even worse. It feels like I was robbed of what the story involving it was going to be. And they just kicked the can down the road, when this is the last game in the series. And you never learn about the new cult fanatic's motives or even see them. Also one minor gripe that annoyed me is I wish during the ending of the game they shot zero and said their phrase back at them: "life is simply unfair, don't you think?". I suppose it would be thematic Whether they were or not so I'm fine with the cliffhanger. The Tone: This game has a lot more overt gore, which I don't mind too much but I think at times the game strays from the series core identity. Death did happen in the other games similar to zero escape, Like Danganronpa (made by same studio). And zero time dilemma feels like what I imagined the series was going to be when I first started it. Lots of different endings each wacky. Some where you go on a killing streak, or get lost somewhere. They made it a lot more edgy like some of the scenes are justified, but others are too much and ruin it. Like cutting someone's heart out its gore for the sake of it, instead of a fitting narrative reason. But when I started the series, I realized that I didn't really want those things. The zero escape games have their own identity that it better and more unique than what I imagined it to be. So it does seem to me like zero time dilemma kind of jumped the shark a bit. Like the ideas aren't bad, but they don't fit this series. Maybe if it was the first game in the series it could've worked. The shock value also extends into the rules. To "win" at least 6 contestants have to die for the door to escape to open. Plus that the deaths in some of the routes are based on unfair odds. For example rolling three dice to all of them roll a one. In the originals death happened, but it was always because of a persons actions and not the nonary game itself. It makes the game much more cruel, and more like its trying to be a "death game" (which the others games are slightly). It's just kind of lame. And the cast are so quick to blame a death on the other members of their own team, rather than assume someone from another team found a way to kill that they didn't think of. Or that zero did it to divide them and spread distrust. Conclusion: Its a game still worth playing in spite of my flaws, assuming you have played the first two entries in the series. I felt like there was a lot of questions left unanswered that were posed by the second and third game. And just who killed who in some of the endings. It seems to me that the game has some loose plotlines I would guess its because they ran out of time. although the game is more cinematic with the camera angles. It did need a bigger budget to really make it come to life. Sadly it does make the game feel less interactive because you don't even press a button to move the text anymore. Overall I found this game to be a mixed bag with some really thought provoking ideas, and some laughably bad moments. My final verdict is: 7.1/10 Thank you for reading.