PSP Game: Zettai Zetsumei Toshi 3
I’m not surprised if you all haven’t heard of this game before, because I have to admit that it isn’t too popular over here in the west. This game is the third installment in the “Zettai Zetsumei Toshi” (絶体絶命都市) series, or I believe it is also known as “Disaster Report”.
The basis of this game is that the protagonist is trapped in torn up city due to a natural disaster, and you have to navigate the protagonist along with people you meet along the way out of harm’s way.
The third game, named “Zettai Zetsumei Toshi 3: Kowareyuku Machi no Kanojo no Uta” (絶体絶命都市3 -壊れゆく街と彼女の歌-), the end part of the title roughly translates to “The broken city and the girl’s song”. In this particular game, you can play as either Kousaka Naoki or Makimura Rina. The choice itself doesn’t affect the story much, it’s just a preference.
The male protagonist: Kousaka Naoki
The one in pink, female protagonist: Makimura Rina
I’ll try not to spoil the story of this game too much as this game is pretty much 70% story and 30% gameplay, so I’ll try my best at giving a clear view of the game while keeping it spoiler-free. The game starts off where the protagonist is on the bus going to this city on an island called “Central Island” for his/her new university life, when suddenly a great earthquake strikes while the bus is in the tunnel. As the protagonist navigates his way around the tunnel, he/she discovers Honjou Saki.
As you progress through the story, it turns out Honjou Saki was formerly a nurse at the “Central Island Hospital”. However, she quit to persue her dream as an artist. I know I said I didn’t want to ruin the story, but why did I put this bit in here? Simply because the song that she sings inside the game is too awesome for me to not mention.
Turns out this song is sang by Iida Mai, called Kimi no Tonari Ni (Which translates to something like: Right beside you.). I personally haven’t heard of this artist’s name, but her singing is definitely not bad and the song lyrics as well as melody fits into the game superbly.
For most part of the gameplay, you are running from falling buildings, bridges falling apart, or like the screenshot above, cars falling from after quakes. The HP bar is pretty self explainatory, but a keen eye gamer will notice that there is also a guage with “ST” written on it. That is your stress gauge; the stress guage takes priority over the stress guage.
Basically, as stress accumulates, your HP bar gets pushed down. Stress itself won’t kill you, but if you let the stress guage fill up entirely, it also means your HP guage only has a tiny bit left. Meaning a small fall or trip can kill your character. What’s more is that when the stress guage fills up all the way, your character will start wobbling, walk slowly, and have blurry vision. So it’s in your best interest to keep the stress guage as low as possible.
From time to time, there will be cutscenes with dialogues between the main character and Saki. Like a visual novels, these conversations will give you choices to choose what the protagonist decide to say. Some choices raise the affinity with Saki, and some lowers it. These choices will decide Saki’s reation toward you as the game progress, and ultimately decides one of the nine endings you can get. Yes, you read correctly, 9 endings.
If you wonder…The choices listed in the screenshots are as following. “What’s that song you just sang?” “Your singing is good.” “You are humming quite carefreely.” “It hurts my ears.” “It hurts my ears, and your face hurts my eyes!” “No, it’s nothing much…”
As well, throughout the game, you’ll pick up various items to use as your compass. Some of which are pretty normal and some are simply ridiculous (such as a stick of shish kabob). Aside from compass, you will also find various costume. Most of which are even more ridiculous than the compasses you find (like a cowboy suit or a swallow tail tuxedo). I’d love to give you a screenshot of it, but I can’t find a screenshot online and I have no idea how to cap screenshots from my PSP.
There is also a multiplayer mode for this game, where you can use ad-hoc and play with up to 4 players. Stages you can use in multiplayer are unlocked as you progress through the single player mode. I wish I could give you more details on the multiplayer mode, but I have no friends to play with. (Sad, I know.)
Overall, if you look at this as a game, you’ll find that it lacks a bit in gameplay as one playthrough is only about 3 – 5 hours. However, I am completely dumbfounded by the amazing character and story developement, as well as the mood it gives in those 3 – 5 hours.
I’m not sure if this game will ever be brought over in English, but if it does, I definitely recommend it. Or if you are well versed in Japanese, you can find: the trial version on playstation network, the actual game, or the theme song album here.
