No Sleep For Kaname Date - ⭐2 ½
I wrote a spoiler free review on backloggd!
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// TW, NSFW text and misogyny mentions
// CW, spoilers and me talking negatively about this franchise LOL
At first, I wanted to write a longer review of this game, but honestly, I don’t think it’s worth it.
This is as mid as this franchise can get. Remove everything that made it interesting (convoluted mysteries and crazy plot twists) and add more stupid horny jokes. Let’s write a plot that talks positively about AI, sure, who cares anymore!
I don’t want to start rambling too much about this, but I think this game has a misogyny problem. Like, maybe the franchise itself has it, but this game made me more uncomfortable than the other two ??? Iris keeps getting sexualized by the men around her, they have no consequences and she’s always oblivious of what’s happening. Her role is just being a damsel in distress, unaware of the way men treat her, so she just takes it. I think the way they’ve written her is very weird and it’s such a shame because she has so much potential to be more than the mascot of the game who just runs around wearing a skimpy outfit for no reason (and I say this even if I really like her design in this game 😭). She’s supposed to be a protagonist, yet she barely has an important role here.
Kaname Date’s characterization keeps getting worse, and this game turned him into the most unlikeable guy ever. He’s only a porn addict now and all the depth he used to have is nowhere to be found. He was my favorite character in the first game, so believe me when I say I tried really hard to like him in this game! But after hearing him say he wanted to watch DEEPFAKE PORN I just couldn’t stand him anymore. Thank you, writers, for ruining a character for me.
However, this game wasn’t entirely bad. I really like that we got some dad Date scenes again. His father-daughter relationship with Mizuki is probably my favorite thing in this franchise, so I was so happy to see it come back after my disappointment when I played NI. Sure, their scenes together could’ve been better, but I’m happy with what we got.
I also have to mention Pewter and Renju. I was a big fan of Pewter so seeing him make a comeback and his storyline getting proper closure was a delight. I really liked his somnium and the emotional moments we got from it. What a pity it was completely disconnected from the rest of the plot, LOL.
Talking about the rest of the plot, the AI thing pissed me off a lot. I get it, this franchise started before all the AI stuff that we’re seeing today started, and now they have to deal with it and make the franchise work around the AI tech that exists IRL. It still sucks that we got this messy plot instead of literally anything else. Also this game’s stance on genAI is confusing so IDK what to say about it.
Despite complaining, I had a good experience playing this game because 1) I was already expecting it to not be an actual sequel to AI1 to avoid being as disappointed as I was when I played NI and 2) the gameplay was really fun! The escape rooms were really fun to figure out (although maybe a bit too easy), and I liked the references to Zero Escape as I’m a big fan of that franchise. I also think the game was less boring than NI (but it still felt too long despite being shorter than the mainline games lol).
The last thing I enjoyed about this game was the ending song! It was really fun and catchy, I can’t help it, I love this franchise’s stupid songs!
To be honest, I probably don’t like these games anymore. I just like 1 game out of the 3 games in the franchise and at this point I don’t think things will get better. Sure, this game wasn’t written by Uchikoshi so that might be the reason why I didn’t like this one that much but… I don’t know, I’m really tired of it and I think Uchikoshi should move on to a new IP, this one keeps getting worse and I’m just not interested in it anymore.