Andie (and some of you, I’m sure) will undoubtedly be delighted to hear that I finished Corpse Party: Book of Shadows last night, which means I will no longer be sitting in the dark before going to sleep with the sounds of Japanese schoolgirls screaming emanating from my headphones.

So what of Book of Shadows as a whole? Well, I enjoyed it — as much as it is possible to “enjoy” a Corpse Party game, anyway — and, as I noted the other day, I particularly appreciated its unconventional narrative structure. For those who didn’t read that post the other day and are too lazy to click on that link, Book of Shadows essentially acts as a collection of “deleted scenes” and alternate endings to the original Corpse Party for the most part, with each chapter focusing on a different group of characters and either exploring “what if?” scenarios if things had gone differently in the original game, or acting as a means of expanding on and exploring the stories of a number of incidental characters who were either already dead by the time the first Corpse Party’s story unfolded, or who showed up in the game’s “Extra” chapters after you’d finished it.

One of the strengths of the original Corpse Party was how well-realised all of the characters were, and this continues in Book of Shadows, even in the chapters that explore characters other than the main cast of the first game. Each character is an interesting person to spend time with, and the fact the game is structured as more of a visual novel than the original game was means that there’s a lot more in the way of narration from each chapter’s protagonist than there was in the original. This lets you get inside the head of these characters to a much greater degree than previously, and this, coupled with the again fantastic Japanese voice acting, makes for an experience where you really get a strong sense of who these characters are, what they’re like and how they’re handling the horrific situation in which they find themselves. And, as I noted in my previous post, there’s not usually a happy ending, since by the time the cast of the first Corpse Party arrive at Heavenly Host Elementary School, most of the people they come across are dead.

Once you’ve worked your way through all the main chapters of Book of Shadows, you unlock a hidden final chapter called Blood Drive. (If you’ve finished the game and haven’t unlocked this, you either need save data from the original Corpse Party on your memory card or to see all of the Wrong Ends from all the previous chapters before it will unlock.)

Blood Drive is the “true” sequel to the original Corpse Party, following on directly from where the previous game left off. Unfortunately, the chapter Blood Drive is but a preview for the game Blood Drive, which is not yet even out in Japan, meaning that the game ends on one hell of a cliffhanger that won’t be getting resolved in the immediate future. Still, the amount of “oh NO!” I felt as the credits rolled for the last time is testament to how engaging I found the game as a whole — I liked these characters, enjoyed spending time with them and felt bad for them when they suffered, and I really, really want to see how the story continues (or ends?) in Blood Drive.

Unfortunately, I’ll be waiting a while yet. Still, it’s not as if I’m short of other things to play right now — not least of which is Idea Factory’s Sweet Fuse, which I’ve been looking forward to for a while.

Sachiko-san, onegaishimasu. Sachiko-san, onegaishimasu. Sachik– shit, how many times was I supposed to chant it again?

After re-finishing Corpse Party for the second time (and this time around actually playing through all the bonus chapters) I moved straight on to its sort-of-sequel Corpse Party: Book of Shadows, a game which I’ve owned for quite some time but haven’t got around to because I wanted to replay Corpse Party first.

So far, I’m very impressed. Book of Shadows maintains the things that were great about Corpse Party — its dark, mature storyline; its realistically flawed but likeable characters; its unusual but startlingly effective soundtrack; and its incredible, incredible sound design and voice acting — while making a few significant and notable changes.

The most notable change from the previous Corpse Party is that it’s no longer a top-down RPG-style affair and has instead become a first-person perspective point and click adventure with lengthy visual novel-style sequences to advance the plot. I’m fine with this, but I was also fine with the top-down nature of the original. I actually really liked the fact that the first Corpse Party had all the trappings of a JRPG — top-down perspective, a menu you pop up with the triangle button, hit points — without any fighting whatsoever. (That said, the PC-98 original version of Corpse Party, of which the PSP version is one of several remakes, concluded with a boss fight.)

Book of Shadows’ shift to the first person is an interesting one, because despite the change in perspective and despite the change from tile-based backdrops to hand-drawn environments, it’s still recognisable as Heavenly Host Elementary School. The map is the same; the rooms are laid out the same; you’re just seeing them from a different perspective. This gives a pleasing degree of consistency to the experience.

The concept is peculiar but kind of neat, too. One of the “wrong ends” of the original Corpse Party saw the band of unfortunate teens travel back in time after successfully reversing the charm that had got them into the school in the first place, only to find themselves repeating the same events exactly as they were before — thereby dooming themselves to the same fate. Book of Shadows runs with the idea that the characters being aware of this “time loop” might see them try to cheat their fate, and the first chapter at least explores what happens if a particular tragedy that occurred early in the first game was averted. In doing so, we get a chance to spend a lot more time with characters who didn’t get a great deal of screen time in the original game (because they were the first to be unpleasantly murdered) and gain a greater understanding of both them and their relationships with others in the process.

I’m digging it so far. The palpable sense of menace of the original is very much intact in this new game, as is the wince-inducing violence — though as with the previous game, Book of Shadows has a wonderful understanding of the concept of “less is more” when it comes to horror. The most effective scares come from the imagination rather than gory scenes on the screen — and while Book of Shadows, like its predecessor, certainly isn’t afraid to show the aftermath of a violent event, the actual instance of something unpleasant happening tends to be depicted through nothing more than text and sound.

Book of Shadows deserves particularly special mention for its sound. The original Corpse Party made magnificent use of fake 3D effects in the stereo field to make it sound like people were whispering in your ear, standing behind you and all manner of other things. Book of Shadows continues this and somehow manages to be even more effective. In an early scene, for example, you’re playing the role of the character Naomi, who finds herself in bed with her possibly-a-lesbian best friend Seiko, who is over for a sleepover. When the lights go out and Seiko falls asleep, you can hear her soft breathing and occasional murmuring to herself in your left ear while Naomi ponders things to herself; when Seiko is roused by Naomi’s mumbling, her voice sounds like she’s lying right next to you. It’s unnerving in its realism, but startlingly effective for immersing you in the game world and story.

I’m partway through the second chapter of Book of Shadows so far. I’m enjoying the “what if?” nature of these chapters, but what I’m really looking forward to is the not-so-secret final chapter that actually acts as a sequel of sorts to the original story. I’m intrigued to see where the story goes, and despite the fact it’s such a consistently unpleasant, depressing series, I really hope we see more in the future.