I really enjoyed this video, now I just need to move my fingers across the keyboard to write a comment expressing my approval followed by clicking on "comment".
there's also a section where zero starts talking, the characters react for a few minutes, then zero continues. this is about 5 mins, and the WHOLE time there's this static background voice that's extremely grating and made me a little nauseous
Yeah on my first playthrough (started the series through the nonary games lol) I just thought his voice was alright as I had his words on script, but without... I greatly underestimated how bad the effect is lol
I was able to figure out what he was saying, but only because I played the game before, otherwise, I would have had no clue it was his line about the sinking of the titanic
It's a modulated voice ON TOP OF being broadcast over an ancient PA speaker system. The next step would have been his voice, on a cell phone, next to the microphone of the PA system.
akane using her superhuman psychic powers to solve every puzzle in the nonary game many times over just so she can have junpei help her spell "password" will never fail to make me laugh.
999 is also my favorite game of all time and although i was aware of some of the remakes shortcomings I didn't realize how much was changed. This was an absolutely amazing and thoughtful video. We share a passion for this game and the series as a whole, so it was a treat to hear you speak on what made the experience on the DS special for you. Plus the amount of research and care you put in is astounding. I've subbed, amazing work! :)
I wasn't aware the port made so many narrative changes. What a shame. This video is incredibly well-made and detailed, so I’d like to dignify it with an extended response to some of your points: 1). They should have made 'novel mode' keep the old narration and dialogue. Go ahead and experiment with Adventure Mode, but keep the legacy content. This almost feels like rewriting history, very unfortunate. Also, I think it's very disrespectful to our narrator, who I think did an incredible job setting the scene throughout the game. I respect her narration a LOT, it’s so well-written stylistically. Most of the unsettling and oppressive atmosphere in the game is due to the amazing and often grotesque descriptions in the narration. 2). 999 is perfectly self-contained and I often prefer to ignore its sequels narratively (even though I like them too). Like you did with the timelines, one point I often indulged in was considering Akane’s morality. In the end, did she just act out of self-preservation or had she developed psychopathic tendencies because of her experience? How much did she still care about Junpei as an adult? Arguments could be made along the spectrum and I liked the poetic ambiguous ending of “We’ll never know”. Meeting her again in later games removed this aspect to her. 3). I mentioned this elsewhere but I’ll repeat here. It's incredible how much the simple image of Akane crying on the 'lower' screen enriches this puzzle when playing on the DS. You're using your stylus on the 'top' screen so most of the lower screen is obstructed by your hand, yet you periodically spot glimpses of Akane's desperate face while moving your hand around. It makes it feel transcendental, like we can only see her in flickers. Because it’s visually suppressed, it's subtle and not in-your-face but still exerting this constant emotional pressure. It really makes you want to finish the puzzle as quickly as humanly possible to save her (even though there is no timer). I say this because it wouldn't have worked the other way around. If there wasn't this trick of inverting the DS, Akane would be displayed on the top screen and constantly visible. That would be too blatant and ruin most of the subtle elements. 4) "I'll never be able to experience it for the first time ever again" is 100% the worst problem of this game. -- 0/9, literally unplayable.
Thanks for watching such a long video and for the detailed response! I don't have much to comment on what you wrote as I agree with you and can't think of more to add, but something I will say is the changes they made to the narration (as well as several other things lol) completely destroyed the atmosphere of the game for me. The narration that was taken out makes it lack life now, it's like Akane isn't even there anymore with the dry-boned it now is. Keeping the narration script in tact would have helped, though I think they'd also have to change the character dialogue back to the original for Novel mode so the narration isn't super repetitive.
@@ItsYourPalJacob Exactly, make Novel mode be 100% the old narration and the old dialogue, and do whatever with the adventure mode. Mixing and matching obviously doesn't work because the new dialogue is written with a presumption of absent narration, so then you just get duplication. In the clips shown I noticed how unengaged some players were during super tense & powerful moments; that just shows how much of the atmosphere was lost. Very sad to see. Don't do lil' Akane like that. How could they have implemented the 'two realities' aspect of the dual screens though, if they'd wanted (hypothetically) to be super faithful for the Novel mode? That's really hard. Maybe blur or overlay the screen during Akane's narrations or give her a different font or something, and then carry that 'symbol' over for when the realities diverge? But even then, you can't generate the original effect with one screen freezing (but not disappearing!) as you're focusing on the other, indicating that the timelines are simultaneously advancing on the two screens. Fading back and forth between illustrations wouldn't be as seamless. It's SO tough an issue, maybe insurmountable.
@@misterpayah7723 a year late but another guy suggested using parentheses like in other visual novels, imagine something like:7 (junpei bumped his head) junpei: "OW!" transitioning later to: Junpei: "How did I know that?" (he knew because I knew) it might not immediately give people pause km the same way, having them think that theh themselves are talking, but it'd be super fucking creepy in the best way imo, and it works so well as a solution for some things. It doesn't fix every issue, not by a longshot, but it does help.
The tragedy is, they didn't NEED the dual screen to recreate the DS experience! All the Novel Mode text is entirely in the top half of the screen. All the Adventure Mode dialog text is entirely in the bottom half. It would have been so easy to just stick all the narration in one half and all the spoken dialog in the other, and use the background/no background scheme to more easily tell the two apart. The only thing they would have lost is only the narration half having player input, but that still would have offered a way better experience than the Novel/Adventure solution they went with. Even though the DS version is ten times the pain in the ass to get through all the endings, I'd say it's totally worth it to eventually arrive at one of the most emotional impactful narrative moments in (my 40 years of) video games.
I just wait long enough for my goldfish brain to forget most of the story before I play it again 😂 this game is so good. Sadly my goldfish brain stopped me from fully enjoying the third game because by the time I got my hands on it I'd already forgotten so much of the first two...
I know this is a 3 year old video at this point, but I’m someone who has only played the port version of the game, and to find out how the game SHOULD have played out with the two screens helps the ending make a lot of sense now! There’s definitely a bigger impact on the ds version and I’m happy to at least know of its existence. It’s a shame that my first experience of the game wasn’t the original. Great video, definitely eye opening for me! (I already loved the series even with how weird I thought the steam version was but this just makes me love the overall story even more! xx)
I'm literally only 20 minutes in and I knew the port was bad, but I didn't know it was THIS bad. And the constant talking is such an easy fix too! Literally in EVERY SINGLE visual novel I've played (INCLUDING VLR) non-verbal thoughts are potrayed with (parenthesis) So instead of doing this Junpei: "OW! My Head hurt! I must have fallen pretty far" they could have done Junepei: "Ow!" (I must have fallen pretty far. That hurt!) IT IS LITERALLY SUCH AN EASY FIX Better yet, you could try to make those parenthesis thoughts JUNE'S thoughts so that the spoiler thing doesn't feel weird. Junpei: "Ow!" (Junpei fell pretty far. He can feel the pain swelling in his head.) And done! I finished writing this comment! Even though I haven't finished the video, I'm enjoying it so far- OH NO! I made a typo! Better fix that up! Ok that's better. Now all I need to do is sumbit this comment. Gotta press that enter key!
Can confirm that adventure mode ruined the the twist with Zero at the end. That scene felt extremely out of place when I got there; I thought I had missed some kind of build up or something had got lost in translation to English. I didn't know how vital having two screens was until after I beat it, and I didn't know it was meant to be played in novel mode. On the bright side though, I'm learning Japanese, so I'll have a good reason to play the ds version in the future.
I was literally screaming in agreement once you brought up the problem with the ellipses. I hated that so much. I'm so glad I played the DS version first, it completely cemented this game as one of the greatest of all time. Loved this video, thank you for your analysis, I couldn't have agreed more.
Thank you for making this video and putting lingering thoughts I've had for years into words. The idea of being able to recommend this game to more people was one that had excited me more than anything when the news of the port came out. Years later, I can, but... I've noticed the narrative around 999 itself change since the port came out. I've had one or two friends play the port, come back to me like "yeah, that was pretty good" to an ending that left me an emotional wreck when I first played it, and then never speak to me about it again. These are people that I've even managed to convince to switch to novel mode for the narration, which has left a previously indescribable influence on my own writing. For the longest time, I just wondered what was wrong, what was different, whether the game I loved so much was even really all that good to begin with. Now, your video has sorta given me an answer: this game and its port may as well be two separate games. So, as I move onwards, I will try to recommend the game I loved, with some of the (less-spoilery) points here. There is no shame in that. Wonderful video. I am very excited to go back and hear your past musings, and I hope to hear more.
That really sucks. I can imagine how disheartening it must be to hear such lukewarm reactions to (for us) such powerful memories. Also I agree the narration is incredible, it inspired my writing a lot too. Our ‘narrator’ is certainly very gifted literarily. (I wonder where they picked that up at their age?)
22:55 "In the DS version, everyone is silent" At this point during my watch, RUclips shat itself. I sat in silence for like 10 minutes wondering if it was a bit.
This video actually revealed to me that the top and bottom screens were both Akane and Junpei experiencing the same things in sync. An experience I never. Ever. Would have had or realised had I not watched this video and then played the original on my phone through emulation. Thank you. I had to have that realisation forced on me, but I'm glad it happened, I'm somewhat upset that I didn't get to have that experience or realisation naturally... But what an incredible game this is. And this video convinced me that the DS is one of the only ways to experience 999. Thank you, again.
I played through 999 on Vita as my first visual novel ever, and absolutely loved it, but seeing all the ways things changed made me pop a ds rom on my 3ds to try it out, and I have to say I really prefer the two screen setup. Replaying early segments might get boring and tedious, but I already remember some of the solutions from last time I played, so it should be quick. Good video.
After playing the game 18 times to find the true ending without a guide(Yes I screwed up that badly)... I started writing solutions down on the 4th playthrough or so, and the realization later that this is actually canonically happening in the plot, where your Junpei is TOTALLY just like "Oh hey a door. The code's 93. I don't know why I know that." was great for me after I finished the game.
I feel like I worded something poorly when talking about the different Santa Claus scenes that could potentially lead to some confusion, so let me clarify a bit (Spoilers). I made it sound like the "two Santa Clauses" scene was the one that made my favorite line in the game have so much meaning, which isn't the case. That's the scene that leads to the Knife Ending where he doesn't tell you about about being unable to fulfill Akane's wish and how she died 9 years ago. The scene to the Safe Ending is the only one that has this information: Akane (in Santa's story): "I don't want any presents this year. Instead, I want you to make my wish come true. My wish is that we'll be happy like this for a really, really long time." Santa: "...But I couldn't make that wish come true. Some Santa I am..." Akane (present): "What... happened?" Santa: "She died. She was killed... 9 years ago..."
Oh okay this pinned comment helped a lot, I kept watching thr clip over and over bc I thought you were saying that you had to get the knife ending to see the dialogue about Santa's sister, but I went coffin then safe endings and saw that dialogue the first time around and was confused. But that makes perfect sense now! The knife ending follows that same room so if you played through it once and got the two Santa's dialogue you don't have to see the dialogue again, leading to a huge blind spot!! I'm glad you pointed this out!
I know I’m late to this video but THANK YOU! This put all my criticisms of the port into words in a really well thought out way. I have never actually played the game either way, instead discovering it through NicoB’s playthrough of the DS version years ago. I enjoyed it so much, that I had fun seeing other people let’s play the game as well, watching their reactions to key moments. Buuuut, when this new version came out, everyone began playing *this* version and the fun I had at watching people play the game really soured. It just wasn’t the same anymore, all the tension seemed to be replaced with people rolling their eyes at the dialogue, and it’s so frustrating just *knowing* a better version of this game exists right there in novel mode that most people won’t even bother with. Not to mention the original. I know I’m just ranting and not really contributing much to the criticism you already made, but I thought I’d share my experience with it. Really enjoyed the video
Awesome video, my dude. You nailed pretty much everything perfectly in the head. I kinda wish the video had the spoilers pushed to the second half or so, so I could recommend my blind friends to watch this, but it's still a fantastic video overall. Now I wish I had paid more attention to the subreddit so I could comment about the dialogue and make a cameo on this video, lmao, cuz yea, that has always been one of my biggest problems about this port (aside from the entire true ending). I haven't played the port for myself, so I can only really base off memory how many optional scenes there are outside of puzzle rooms that aren't marked by the key symbols on the flowchart. The Santa Claus one is the only one that comes to mind as optional based on past choices, but there are several scenes that have alternate versions based on dialogue presented at the moment, and what was great about the original DS version is that, when you replayed the game multiple times, you had the chance to select the other choices and see what the other options where. Honestly, if it weren't for this, I would've legitimately completely missed out on the Funyarinpa scene, the Elevator scene, and some of the 4 character-driven scenes before Doors 3-7-8, because my first time through I was trying to take the choices seriously. I can just imagine the people who didn't click "Funyarinpa" or "Maybe she's worried about being alone with a guy" and missed out on some of the greatest moments in the game, not to mention the incredible amount of foreshadowing in the 4 character scenes if you wish to pursue them while searching for Snake (Ace's scene in particular had soooo many hints). But there are also some alternate versions of scenes you can miss out during puzzle rooms as well, assuming you accidentally trigger the right keys and reach the Safe and Coffin Endings before any bad endings. The one that comes to mind the most is the scene with Lotus hacking the computer and Junpei making fun of her instead of explaining monitors and prosopagnosia. And I also want to talk about another Door 6 scene that is Safe Ending exclusive, and for which I'm not sure it's mandatory to watch to get the Safe Ending (since, again, haven't played the port). Much like how the two Santa Claus scenes was one of the biggest scenes for you, the rat experiment scene gave me that same effect, as it made me realize and connect precisely on what my experience of the game is. In each of the Zero Escape games, there's one particular scene in which the characters convey to you a perfect metaphor of the entire game in itself, and the player's role in the story. In VLR, it's the termite scene, comparing the player jumping timelines to termites walking around a termite hill's infrastructure. In ZTD, it's the Sleeping Beauty Problem, comparing itself to the character's experience in falling asleep and getting amnesia. And in 999, it's the rat experiment. Those rats swimming around in those water mazes represent all the Junpeis in the story that have died in various endings, with Akane (and us) serving as mediators as the next rat learns and adapts to reach closer to the goal. Playing the game multiple times is us running the rat through more and more times and having the next rat learn more and more from us. It's such a great way of integrating the player into the story well before the True Ending attempts to do so, and it puts you in the mind space that Akane is in during the story. But of course, the flowchart ruins the entire metaphor and the player experience with Junpei. After all, how can it really feel like multiple Junpeis running through the maze multiple times and learning when you're skipping to midpoint parts of the maze itself and never get to apply what you learn into practice (aka, repeating puzzles)? To me, that's one of the biggest loses the port has to telling such a compelling story in a way that implements the player into the game. That has always been Uchikoshi's greatest strength in his games, even outside of the Zero Escape series. As an extra, I have a little fun fact for all you guys out there. Did you know that there's a "typo" that's "fixed" in the port of 999 that actually removes one of my favorite pieces of foreshadowing? You see the line a few times at the beginning of the video. In the port, during the first flashback, Junpei talks to himself thinking "Huh... That's weird... Did I leave [the window] open?", and it stays that way across both NVL and ADV modes. In the DS version, since that entire scene is in the narration section, that same line is given to us by Akane along with the rest of Junpei's thoughts. EXCEPT, if you pay close attention, you can actually notice that the line *written in first person* was NOT enclosed in quotation marks (" "), which is how all of Junpei's inner monologues are displayed on the bottom screen. This means that the line itself was spoken to us by Akane, not Junpei, and it fits well because Akane was the one to open the door, in the future, trying to enter his apartment. And it's kinda humorous when you think of the shady masked individual hiding in the shadows worrying about the window they forgot to close. EDIT: Hey, random question. Are there videos missing on your channel? Based on this video, you seem to be *extremely* talented at video production and just overall have a great sense of identity as a content creator on RUclips. Yet I can only find a total of 3 videos on your channel, including this one, and the other 2 are from over a year ago. Do you intent to have this be your kickstart (or return) into content creation on RUclips? Cuz if so, then I am certainly more than interested in subscribing and seeing more videos that you produce.
As I'm looking back at my playthrough, I noticed that I don't have any footage of the Funyarinpa scene (I said "dog" because I already knew it was a dog) or the elevator scene. I thought I'd be able to come back to those scenes later but after a while I kinda forgot about it. Thankfully you do have to see the rat experiment scene though. I do really like making videos but they take an incredibly long time to make. This would have been done a few months ago if I didn't have school and work to worry about. I am planning on making more videos, but who knows how long they will take (though I do have a lot more free time now because of covid-19). But anyway, thanks for watching the video and for the kind words, I really appreciate it!
As someone who recently played through the whole series, this video made a bunch of stuff finally make sense to me. Almost everything that I thought didn't really work within the story after playing the Nonary Games version makes sense with the context of how much was sacrificed porting it to one screen. I finally understand why people hold this game in as high regard as they do. So thanks for making this video, because the clarification for people like me is honestly very much needed.
Jacob, I saw the beggining of this video and went to play the DS version of 999, and it became one of my favorite games ever, I thank you so much! Now I can see the full video.
I must be too used to the port. I remembered Junpei talking to himself all the time being a character trait of his from the original, forgot he was just thinking that stuff. Then again, i don't see much difference between reading a wall of text labelled as narration and hearing a guy say that text out loud
From the perspective of an adventure mode player: The only thing that particularly left a negative impact on me from my play through was the final puzzle. I don't know if the DS's version of this puzzle would have been able to live up to this hype you describe it with, but to me, that's just one puzzle. All of the story tidbits and even the final plot twist were still incredibly mind-blowing and I still walk away from this game citing it as one of my favorite games of all time. I wish I had known to play it in novel mode, (and I HEAVILY wish the game took your advice and swapped between modes automatically more) but likewise, to go without the voice acting in this game would be to do it a huge disservice in MY eyes. Much like the Santa scene that you cite as the scene that single-handedly represents your entire love for this game as your favorite, the remake has created a similar scene for me. That scene is the end of the Safe ending. What makes the Safe ending so incredible in the remake is the voice acting, particularly from Richard Epcar and Taliesin Jaffe as Ace and Snake respectively. This scene to me is the most satisfying and climatic ending in the entire Zero Escape Trilogy. It gives you the Hero's tragedy that only a character as pure as Snake could make so emotional and the villian's downfall that only a character like Ace deserves. The palpable raw emotion in their voices is not the kind of thing that any text could ever replicate for me and even though you have to shift through some awkward moments to get there, to experience this moment in its rawest form is not something I could ever stand to trade. Although the remakes may ruin the experience for some who experienced the DS version, I can still cite 999 as one of my favorite games of all time despite having played through it in what you describe as the most diminishing way possible.
Agree only ever played the newer version and loved it understood the ending and was aware of the cheesy diajogue ect but didnt feel it detracted from what was great about the game.
Didn't expect to see you here, as someone who completed 999 DS first and found the HD release shallow in comparison, I'm glad others found things to like about it.
I think the new puzzle is better, but that's my hot take. It allows you solve it using both language knoweldge OR math knowledge not just a lazy "throw a sudoku in there"
The scene of Junpei's kidnapping could've just given him a pet. When I walk home I say weird shit to my cats all the time. Or have him on the phone? Like it wouldn't have been THAT much effort
Actually I could be wrong but in the japanese voice the characters to grunt when an elypses is played. Edit: after checking my psvita i can confirm that in the japanese dub the actors dont say anything during the elypses
One difference I've seen nobody mention is how they changed the background music in some scenes in the port (e.g. at the end of the safe ending where Zero talks to Junpei). On a side note: this game means a lot to me, it inspired me to do my final high school project about morphogenetic fields, and I even got in touch with Rupert Sheldrake about it :D
Morphogenetic Sorrow still plays in the Safe Ending and the True Ending, right? I can live with a few changes as long as that particular song is still playing at those particular moments.
Santa's mugshot during the CG where the 9th Man was taking Clover hostage, it was missing in the remaster. It's when Santa was saying "What do you think you're doing?" to the 9th Man.
I don't know if they changed the explanation in the port but Akane literally says she gets information from multiple timelines and it's not going back in time thing.
came here from Wince Media's top ten favourite video games video and WOW am i glad i did. i've only ever played the port version of '999' and never fully understood the hype, but seeing how much it changed from the original really irons out some of my issues. so good to see you explain something so passionately and thoroughly, with clever use of examples (blurring Zero's text, reactions from different streamers, flipping the last puzzle screen, etc) to boot. great work!
Thank you so much for this video. I watched the introduction after I got interested in the game (and stopped there so I could go in blind) and it was enough to sell me on playing the DS version. I finished it a few days ago and absolutely adored it, and a large part of my enjoyment was definitely from the incredible way the hardware was implemented. My mind was completely blown when the bottom screen narration started talking as a character, and turning the DS upside down to solve Sudoku as Junpei got me really emotional. My mind was racing as it was being set up and I completely fell in love with the game when I saw the upside down puzzle and realized what was going on. I remember feeling my heart beating in my chest like Akane's life was really in my hands as Morphogenetic Sorrow was playing, just thinking about that moment after the credits rolled got me to shed a few tears. And now that I've watched the full video I can definitely tell that I wouldn't have enjoyed it nearly as much if those incredible moments were gone, and the writing and dialogue wasn't as good as it was. So thank you for helping me play the right version, and I'll be sure to recommend the DS version to anyone else interested in the game.
I would love to see you keep making videos. There’s clearly a lot of time and effort out into this video. And I loved the port, and still enjoyed this video and respect your opinion. You’ve got a talent for this man, and if you ever return, I’ll be waiting to watch it.
I really enjoyed your video! I've played through 3 versions of 999 (DS, iOS, and Nonary Games), and I liked the DS and NG versions equally for different reasons. Until I watched this, I didn't realize how much pointless dialogue was added. It's amazing how it almost sets a completely different tone in some scenes. If I had the skillset to do it, I would make a mod for the game that fixed a lot the problems you mentioned. It may not be too difficult to do.. but who knows? **SPOILERS** There's one example I'm surprised you didn't mention, though. In the original Axe Ending, something that really added to the grotesqueness of it all was how Junpei's reaction to his arm being cut off was portrayed. The text starts with just one letter per line, and eventually reaches its peak with the scream itself. In the remaster, it's just a scream, no delay/buildup to it. It's another example of how raw the original could be in comparison to the remaster. The remaster I still find to be near equal to the original due to the quality of life improvements alone, but it's those little moments and details in the DS version that really set it apart from anything else I've experienced in any medium.
As someone who played the Nonary Games version first I felt that the twist still worked for me, the second I saw "Akane vision" it clicked with me what they were doing. As for Junpei narrating it never really bothered me too much but it could be jarring. Overall I enjoyed the Nonary Games version as a first playthrough (especially with the flow chart and VA) but if I replay it (which I probably will) I'll probably pick up the DS version and check it out cause I tend to prefer og versions of games.
I remember noticing on my first play through that the altered novel scene could just be completely skipped without even realizing. As much as I disliked the limited save system of the DS version, the flowchart wasn't the solution I envisioned. I would have preferred the ability to make numerous "checkpoint" style saves like in some other visual novels, where the endings you've seen are saved regardless of whether you overwrite your previous file. This way you can save at each decision, view an ending, and then go back to change your choice without losing your progress. Your video has convinced me that even that might not be for the best since restarting is part of the reveal. Even then though, other similar games have allowed players to continue from a previous save, not lose their progress in terms of endings, but still require them to start from the beginning in order to unlock certain endings, including the true ending.
Fantastic video. DS 999 is also one of my favourites. I was always curious how the general flow of the story would work without the split screens, not just the *redacted*. Never seen anyone else explore this, and you did a throughout job. Really interesting. Even more glad I played DS with no idea what the game was about!
One thing I *love* about niche DS games is that they tangle a magnificent story around the mechanics and format of the console, making it 100 times better, but they do it so tightly that playing the original is almost the only way to properly enjoy it. That part makes me sad. I think 999 and Lost/Trace Memory are great examples of this
This video seems very well researched, can’t wait to watch! As a first time Zero-Escape player, I was satisfied with the port but wish that I could have played the original on the DS.
This was an absolute treat to watch. I agree with pretty much everything you said. I'm very happy my first experience was blind and on the original DS version. I remember when hearing it was getting ported I thought it would be impossible to make it completely faithful and it's interesting to see what they attempted and what didn't ultimately work. I think that proves a point in regards to how unique and special the original DS version is. Who knows how long it will be until we see something mechanically similar to the DS, but until that day comes, 999 on the DS is probably one of the most unique console experiences that no other platform can offer.
There is only one way that 999 could have ported. The ONE way that could do what 99% of the original game did was the Wii U. Save for the upside down aspect of Sudoku, this would have been perfect :(. Hell the native Wii U ds emulation would probably be amazing for it.
@@artless3438 The upside down part could be represented by having the displayed content of both screens rotate 180 degrees together when entering the part, similar to how you would rotate the DS.
Very good points! You’ve covered exactly how I feel about the remake. Also, I’ve found that the text skip on DS is actually acceptably fast if you rapidly slide the stylus back and forth on the touchscreen. The actual skipping speed of the text is fast, but the transition between each message is stupidly slow. By sliding across the touchscreen though, it inputs the game to transition to the next message significantly faster. It’s not perfect, and it might not work well for emulators, but it made my playthroughs MUCH less tedious.
@@ok-yv9dd You can hold the normal skip button to skip the text quickly, but there is still an odd slight transition period between each message that slows it down considerably. By spamming inputs on the screen though, it inputs the game to skip these transitions and skip at a faster pace that I found much less annoying for replaying stuff.
This was a fascinating watch - and it's honestly kind of a shame that it only has some 7000-ish views after a year of being up (although I guess that speaks to how sorta-niche Zero Escape is lol). I think - if anything - your video illustrates how difficult porting games originally made for a specific piece of hardware to a significantly different piece of hardware is. Like, the DS/3DS lines of consoles are dead now. There are no more games that are going to be made with two screens in mind - every game that was ever going to use that functionality has already been made, and as DSs/3DSs get older and inevitably become harder to find/maintain, you're gonna have to do one out of a couple things if you wanna play a DS game: 1. You could track down an original DS/3DS and a copy of the game (or at least an R4 cart or something like it), which will become harder as years pass and the consoles/game carts get older and older. 2. You could play a ROM on an emulator - easily achievable nowadays on the net, but offers a severely compromised experience (glitches, lack of portability, needing to use a mouse in lieu of a touch screen, and an example specific to this game's ending that I will call "what-the-fuck-am-I-supposed-to-do-flip-my-computer-monitor-upside-down?). 3. Developers could release new ports of the original DS/3DS games for newer console generations that compromise on whatever mechanics the game had that utilised the touch-screen/dual-screen mechanics. I'll cut myself short and say that your problems with 999's port might just be emblematic of problems that game archiving will face in the next couple decades, as a variety of games are made for different pieces of hardware. It's why - as much as I agree with you about the problems the port has - I can't really find it in myself to be frustrated with the developers about those creatives decisions. Most of them weren't particularly 'bad creative decisions'; they were just given the responsibility of shoving a square peg through a round hole. IMO, the saddest thing about the 999 port specifically is that we could have had a port that would have likely been the universally agreed-upon way of experiencing the game - if only it were released a few years earlier and on the Wii U. Think about it: we'd get the voice acting and HD artwork, but we'd still get both the "novel" and "adventure" mode screens because of the Wii U's dual screen set-up (meaning the writing wouldn't have been totally butchered). Sure, there'd still be the timeline and some of the VA would still be weird, but it would still be a major improvement over what we got! As for now though - unless another company ever decides to make a console with a set-up akin to the DS (unlikely) - we're stuck in this weird limbo between two different versions of the game that will inevitably get more and more difficult as years pass (or maybe someone could make a mod for the PC port that makes it so it could work with multiple monitors. I imagine that could work - although they'd have to stick the sudoku back in lol). Ah, whatever. Sorry for the long, rambly comment - I just wanna reiterate that I really liked the video (if a video got me to think this hard about a topic, it must be doing something right lol).
The flipping screen problem could be fixed with playing the game on a mobile emulator (that's what I did) but I do understand how most people feel about playing on mobile
The screen issue could be fixed if they made it function like VLR. Have the screen go dim and let the narration scroll until its time to un-dim the screen and have the characters and dialogue box appear again. It was so simple.
As someone who learned to love the game through the port I was really unsure while watching this video. I am obsessed with Zero Escape, but especially with 999, it doesn't matter how often I see ,,he knew because I knew" or ,,now who am I ? " every time I get goosebumps. In these last two years I watched most of my friends play through the game while sitting on my bed and me trying to not give away any hints, just because I was so excited. I wanted them to love it just as much as I did. To question everyone, even Akane, but never enough to actually not believe in her, start loving all of them, even Lotus who nobody likes at the start, and then get blown away by the final reveal. I talk about this game every single day, to a point where even my mother, who barely knows anything about me, thought about zero escape when she was looking for a birthday present for me. I go to an art college and the moment I got the chance to start on my own 2 week long project I immediately went for a 4 minute long animation/animatic centered on Akane in 999 (I never posted it because it kind of looks like shit because it was so long and we had no time at all. But the song we used was ,,youth" by daughter. If anyones interested look up the song, and I think you'll see why we chose it) To this day I've never actually played the Ds version. I want to, but I don't have the ds game yet and don't want to use an emulator. I've gotten attached to their english voices and can't imagine them in a different way. Even Zeroes voice, which is objectively kind of bad I love so much. Sure, I definitely couldn't understand him if I didn't know what he was saying, it's definitely a flaw, but this and all of the other vocal flaws never bothered me. The moment I knew that this was a port and how the game originally worked I understood, that that could never be replicated in a better way, but I can't help but like the different screens, not really in themselves, but more so that sometimes you'll get forced into a different one, after learning of the meaning behind them I got extremly attached to that. I also loved how Novel mode would add a purple shade to everything, my lil Akane obsessed mind can't get enough of all the tiny indicators. It definitely can't make up for what the Ds has, but I like the way it was done. I actually thought of the game as Schrödingers cat box, just as you described , where the other timelines dont exist once you get to the true ending, so that kind of worked for me, even though that illusion was shattered once I played Vlr. I thought of the other endings as not very useful once I saw them. The first time I encountered 999 was through a lets play and the player went for the safe and then the true ending and I was happy that way, especially once I played through the submarine ending. I thought of it as more bothersome than useful, since it lessens the true route. But now after watching the video I realized that it was important. Through the flowchart you can switch between the scene of Seven in the cell where he tells part of his story and the one where he tells most of it in the room behind the library so fast, I thought if I had seen that one before it would've lessend the impact on the true route, but if you actually played the game how it was intended, there would be so much space between those two scenes that it would have a totally different effect, you would actually be able to brood over the story, forget it, just to get slammed in the face with it once again. So yeah, I got very attached to the game, even though I encountered it through the port, but I'm very sure that that is not something that counts for everyone. This video also gave me a big boost in wanting to experience the Ds version, I wasn't aware there were this many changes between the versions. I can be unbearable when it comes to this game and I know it, people will make fun of the weird dialouge or the elipses, and it IS weird and I know it, but for me they are part of this experience, because they are part of the version I grew to love. I understand that people don't like them, but I will always love my Zero Escape with a side of cringe.
Literally, all the port had to do was dim the screen and let the narration scroll when it needed to, then brighten the screen back to focus on the text boxes and character portraits when it was time for character dialogue... you know... like they did in VLR!!!??? The switch between Akane and Junpei's pov could have faded in to full opacity back and forth rather than flash back and forth like a tv screen.
I feel like this screams needing a modder to fix issues in the game. If someone were passionate enough about this who knows how to code, I think it be possible to make a mod of the port that cuts out unneeded voice lines and adds 2 screens introducing the more narrator stuff. Hell you can even fix the zooming. This would still leave the timeline but maybe this is one conseet we can make.
I’ve never played this game, so I’m not familiar with the context of your premise. However, your passion on the topic is enough to entertain. I do want to try out the original game now though, so thanks for the vid!
Man, that point about emulating 999 is surprising to me, when I played 999 the first time, I played it through Wii U's virtual console as an inject, and despite how broken the DS virtual console can be for injections compared to any other modern emulator, it worked just fine, without any visual or auditory bugs.
i feel like the port team could’ve solved this problem by simply adding parentheses around junpei’s thought dialogue/3rd person narration, like ace attorney did. great video! i never noticed these problems when i played the port, but maybe i never picked up on it :o another thing to add: i think the singular timeline theory is incredibly clever, and i also think that a lot of uchikoshi’s later games (like ai the somnium files) work way better with the flowcharts because they’re built around it like vlr was!
Oh my, I never ever felt more gratefull for my mother's DS Lite to work perfectly to this day... I have an R4 gold and I found the game while searching for Ace Attorney Investigations to put in the DS to then remember that Kodaka (If my memory isn't betraying me he's the creator of the Daganronpa series) is friend with the creator of 999 and I just said "If it's his friend and works in the same company it will probably be good" and just added it to the SD card. When I saw it was made in 2009 I just thought to "not get my hopes too high because maybe the ways of talking and writting doesn't fit my taste" (I was born in 2007 for context) and at the start I didn't thought that much of it, got kinda frustrated with the third class cabin (I missed one of the paper notes so I only had mid pasword and basically forced my way into the suitcases, searched a guide after completing it to see if that was suposed to happen and the minigames were going to be wacky) and got disapointed with Lotus design and Akane's personality. But all of this changed! I played more, I got the axe ending first so my second go was "how the hell do I save Snake so Clover doesn't kill me?" and that changed to "who stabed me?" after the submarine ending. It didn't took me too long to end up in an ending guide so I didn't get near the frustration to get the endings like most people in the comment section. One of the things that I loved were the girls. As a girl myself, you don't have an idea how sad can be not beging able to relate nobody of your gender because poor writting to them. I had classified the girls in a few categorys after meeting them in for the first time: -Lotus: Fanservice character, made to make sexual jokes and atract players -Clover: Bubbly and a little annoying little girl/little sister steoreotype -Akane: love interest childhood friend who has an imposible angelic personality. But, sooner or later, this changed! Lotus completly broke out her box, sure some jokes about her age and clothes were there but that wasn't her role. She had a real purpose a personality of her own and a life of her own. She's smart, she's logic and can be caring even if she might have trouble understanding others emotions. I love Lotus as a character eventhought I still dislike her design a bit. Clover had her own incredible devolopment! She lost her brother one if not the most important persons in the world for her, someone who probably guided and protected her her whole life. She didn't cry and forgave like I thought she would. She was hurt, she lost herself and you see it. She knows someone killed him. She wants revenge. She gets twisted in the cruel nonary game after losing her most important person while reviving her trauma, that's incredible. But she can be helped and you can do it. I love Clover, she makes sense. And lastly June, Akane. Akane was during most of my expirience my most disliked character. I didn't hate her but I didn't like her either. "She gets sick and makes stupid drama, she is just there so Junpei can move, if Junpei is out June won't work" that's what I thought until I got the True Ending, wich makes last quote quite ironic because it was true in a way I wouldn't have ever suspected. I was at border of tears doing the Sudoku "okay Nito you got this, you made tons of Sudokus before, June will be safe, you can do it". There wasn't a timer, there wasn't an error limit and the sudoku was pretty easy but I was so scared of getting it wrong. I knew I wasn't able to kill June even if I wanted to, but I was so nervous, June is crying at me. June is scared she needs my help! Perhaps I saw my own self crying for help at that moment, for me who hasn't played Virtue's Reward or other games in the franchise, June is a super interesting character. She's not angelical, she's not perfect. If you ask me for my own theory, we are playing future and present, young June is the present. She's traveling throught posible futures, to see if someone can help her. She thought of Junpei and, from there, she had an Epiphany. "What would Junpei do if he was here?" Then a list of futures apears. She sees the game, the game she now orchested with Junpei helping her. She transmits the answers to him so he can survive and help her. It's so clever! But also, and most importantly, twisted and egothentric. She will put her best friend, brother, cop who tried to save her, the mother of Nonna and the other survivors of the first Nonary game to revive their horrors to survive her own. She will put them in danger for her survival. "Zero is not evil, but weirdly benevolent, twisted benevolent" I thought after the safe ending. That is June because June is Zero. She wants her revenge and her survival. She is kind, but twisted. She remembers me of (Your Turn To Die spoilers) Sara Chidoun. Sara has an strong survival instinct. She wants to survive the Death Game. She isn't a bad person, but for her survival she will sacrifice whoever is needed in the way it's needed. She, a high school girl, has more probability of surviving than an ex cop, a profesional boxer and a profesional baseball player. A high school girl who never saw death in her life nor knew about it was more probable to survive than an inteligent and physically very strong ex cop. They can be all the good things in the world, but when the moment comes they will turn as egothentric and reckless as they need to survive.
Great vid, I'm only now learning about the details of the port after watching a RUclipsr play the game and I noticed the weird stating the obvious dialogue. Conferred with a friend about it and they were pretty sure it was in the original so it's nice to know I was right! Can't help but disagree with 34:17 about the upgraded sprite work, however. Unsure of your familiarity with the animation process, but as an animator whose done pixel and non-pixel art I dislike how they upgraded the animation. I'll spare you the details of how, but pixel art and non-pixel art animate differently due to pixel art being lower res, which means translating it into higher res results in a few problems. In order to fix them you more-or-less have to retime the animation to keep it looking smooth, including adding frames. You cannot just draw over the pixel art. They did not retime things, or at least not to the degree they should have, meaning that a LOT of the animation is much more stiff and offputting than in the DS version. The sample of Clover you put in is actually one of the best translated over to HD because the movement is quick. If you want to see one that's, imo, noticeably worse, find the one of Akane moving her head to the side while talking, or any of the more slow-moving animations. I realize this is something only people who are extremely familiar with animating pixel art would notice, and is probably not going to harm the experience of most players. Regardless, I cannot help but find it bothersome and also pity whichever animators got their work botched.
Very well made and produced! I'm honestly shocked that you don't have a bigger following, even given your videos are pretty niche. Looking forward to you making it big on here.
Oh man, this makes me REALLY wanna play the DS version now. I bought the port because, like you said, it's the cheapest and most accessible way to play the first two ZE games, but now I'm considering going to watch a playthrough or something of the DS version instead. And even then I'm not sure if I would get the same experience, since both screens would have to be showing in the video itself. Either way, this video is super well thought-out and insightful, and I'm always glad to see more videos about a game series I love so much now :)
It's interesting to see this perspective. I've only ever played the ps4 version in adventure mode. Everything still made sense to me and I didn't feel confused. (Note that I played AI The Somnium Files before 999 so I was really bracing for a high concept sci-fi twist which likely primed me for understanding the end more easily) Junpei talking to himself was very goofy but I felt it gave the game a sense of levity and broke the tension. Which I LIKED but I also assumed that's just what Junpei's character was like. I didn't know the original game was trying to feel dire almost the whole time. There's so much comedy mixed in with the thriller moments that I interperated most of the translation compromises here as intentional humor, and thought Junpei always pointing out the obvious was a running gag. I still ended up liking it as I found this tone amusing not annoying. I'll probably end up trying a different version when I get the urge to replay 999 to see how the tone is different. But I guess you can rest easy knowing that Adventure Mode didn't ruin EVERY first time player's experience. Even if the original would have been better, I still loved even this altered version since I didn't have the original to compare it to.
I COMPLETELY MISSED that *spoiler* was bottom screen. That makes SO MUCH SENSE NOW! Omg, I already loved this game but now I think it's a dang masterpiece! Thanks for this video!
as someone who first payed the port the twist didn't feel confusing at all, i immediately undestood what was happening ( the two screens would've made the moment more powerful i think but it didn't affect the compreension or the impact of the revelation for me), the flow chart also didn't affect the revelation for me because i undestood that akane's was seeing the diferent timelines just like we were when she talks about the diferent paths in the flow of the river i just thought she was explaning the flow chart mechanic ( i didn't know it wasn't present in the original game), the dialogue changes didn't bother me because i'm used to anime dialogue and it felt just like that, the final puzzle with akane's face make for a more emocional scene but i don't know about the final puzzle in itself tho, i don't like the port's final puzzle but i don't know if the final puzzle being just sudoku would,ve been much better. i agree that the original is probly the best way to play this game ( the game was obviously made with the unique 2 screens feature of the DS in mind) that said the port is still a enjoyable experience and a great game.
I've never played the port. The adventure mode changes sound ridiculous! And even worse, it seems like they infect the novel mode as well. Why? Why not just use the original script for novel mode?? People are not going to want to play novel mode because adventure mode is already repetitive enough. And novel mode is VITAL to the ending. I honestly think most people who say the port isn't that bad have not played both versions. Because, y'know, you'd *assume* that a port of a *visual novel* would have the same script as the original, perhaps updated in minor ways (for example, the various Ace Attorney ports). So most people who have only played the original probably assume that novel mode is the same as the original, and adventure mode merely cuts the narration. Thank you for exposing this travesty to those of us who have only played 999 DS!
I actually find Junpeis self narration super natural! It sounds like an inner voice. I heard some ppl don’t have one tho, maybe that’s why it seems weird to you? It honestly sounds a lot like my inner voice and things id think-out-loud-in-my-head lol
From this comment and others, it’s quite evident to me that I I worded something poorly, so let me clarify with a response I’ve posted before: It’s not that Junpei voicing his thoughts (or talking to himself) is what I’m criticizing, it’s that he’s essentially narrating the story out loud to himself in the most unnatural way possible. The way it’s handled in the game makes it seem like the writers didn’t think that the audience could make these connections on their own so they have one of their characters stating obvious things and information they already know. That's why I say in the video that they’re essentially breaking the forth wall, the characters themselves almost seem aware that an audience is watching them. If thinking to yourself or voicing your thoughts were my criticism then there would be a slew of other things I would hate for the same reason, but that’s not my argument. Let's use "Spy x Family" as an example since I think it's something that uses self-narration very well. The main character, Loid, speaks to himself all the time. For the people who misunderstood the point I was making, they may assume that I just hate the show because of that alone: Loid speaking to himself. However, Spy x Family makes it come across much more naturally as Loid is almost always problem solving in his head. There are a few awkward lines where he states the obvious to himself for the sake of the audience but for the most part it's him trying to figure things out, put things together, etc. Junpei in the port is technically problem solving, but it's for things he already knows and has figured out. Like the example I give at 18:09 where Junpei has a plan to go in which door he wants, the part that follows where he echoes his plan to himself in his head after he had already planned it, set it up, acted it out, and succeeded in said plan just screams that the writers need to let the audience know what is happening somehow, and they can't find a more natural way to do it. So it's not the fact that characters voice out their thoughts or think to themselves is the problem for me, it’s the way it was presented.
Thank you for this. 999 is my favorite game also, and I've only played the DS version, though I've watched people play the port. And I didn't fully realize how different everything way, dialog wise, even discounting the two modes.
I didn't have any emulation issues playing the game on my phone with a ds emulator,and the touchscreen works nicely like that. It also keeps the portability and the vertical alignment for the final puzzle , and allows you to use fast forwarding on repeat playthroughs, so I think it's the best way to play the game. It's also great for ace attorney, and other ds vns.
I'm so glad you talked about the whole "That's not how they sounded in my head!" Thing, because that happened to me with Clover specifically. When I played the game with a DS emulator, the voice I had in my head for Clover was Laura Bailey's because, for some reason, I found Clover similar in appearance to Rise Kujikawa from Persona 4 (Don't ask...), which is a character Laura Bailey voiced and I thought her voice really suited Clover. Then I watched some videos of the remaster, heard her voice, and thought "That's not how she sounded in my head!" Nothing against her actual VA though, she is an amazing voice actress!
I felt this same way for Junpei. The whole time, I imagined Yuri Lowenthal (Yosuke from Persona 4) as his voice. When I got hit with Evan Smith's slightly fem vocal performance I was so disappointed
To me, it happened with all female voices except Lotus. For Clover, the voice i had in mind was based off of Andrea Libman's voice of Pinkie Pie, but not nearly as high pitched. Infact, when i was doing a research on the voices she done, i found a segment where it would have been an exact match for the voice of Clover i had in mind. For June, i expected a much softer voice, akin to those soft spoken characters you'd often hear in an anime. Infact, i expect this to be the case in the Japanese voice lines(i haven't checked them at this point). Though tbf this kinda voice is rarely found in English dubs, for some reason..
Really great video, I agree on a lot of points. I played the Nonary Games remake first about a year ago, and recently beat 999 on original DS hardware after my hands on a reasonably priced copy. Having experienced both without the nostalgia for the DS version, I really do think that playing 999 on original DS hardware (with a spoiler-free ending guide on hand) is still the definitive way to experience the story. The criticisms are understandable though. The presentation has aged very well, and I didn't really miss the voice acting at all. One thing some people don't mentions are the controls. I enjoyed doing the puzzles a lot more with the DS stylus and touch screen. While I found the narration a little repetitive at times (count how many things "strike Junpei as odd"), I was a really big fan of it. I think you're on the mark with calling out how much heavy lifting the narration actually does for the pacing of the story. This video got me thinking about I would improve the Nonary Games remake. To be honest, the dual screen twist is pretty much impossible to translate properly, but the flow chart is fixable. Personally, I'd remove the ability to jump through the flow chart for the reasons you outlined in the video, but keep a "partial flowchart", similar to how it's done in AI: The Somnium Files. The chart starts out empty, and only the branch you progress through is visible. On subsequent playthroughs, the branch you've created will still be visible, making it more clear where you need to go next. Combine that with a much faster text skip and some kind of puzzle auto-complete mechanic, and I think you have gameplay that is more streamlined, but faithful to the original experience.
Honestly, while it definitely would've been awkward, I wonder if they could've done something creative with the extra monitor space most people were gonna have, just so that Adventure/Novel modes wouldn't have had to exist. Like, maybe the game opens up in two separate windows, and while dialogue and "Junpei's eyes" (during escape sequences and such) appears on one screen, the narration and actual puzzle solving goes on in the other window. ---Spoilers, clearly--- Honestly, it never really occurred to me just how much the dual-screen mattered when playing through the port. I must have played through 999 like... forever past its original time - like I'm talking on a 3DS in 2016 right before learning it had a sequel I think? - so at the time I just figured these were things that were an 'extra flourish' on top of what was already good about the game's strengths. Like, "aww, it'd actually kinda cute that I have to turn the DS around if I weren't crying my eyes out trying to save the child"; that sorta thing. I never really thought of the significance because honestly it was done so naturally that I never even noticed it. Like, *of course* the narration turned to Akane's voice after all that foreshadowing. I was fortunate enough to have experienced the mostly natural flow of story the DS version had that when I played the port for what was effectively nostalgia value it never really hit me that there was much different, because even through all the awkwardly-paced dialogue and such on Adventure Mode, I still felt the rush of the original come back to me and I was kinda... Well, honestly it was almost like a 'morphogenetic field' moment, to put it cheesily. Like I knew things that I *shouldn't,* so the awkwardness never dawned on me. I still remember the bittersweet grin I had when watching a friend play through the game beside me and getting the various endings. Misery loves company and all. Man, what a great fuckin' game, though. It really does speak a bit to its overall charm when even a fairly awkward port can't make it remotely *bad.* Just merely "not as good as it could have been." Who knows, perhaps some day someone will come along and mod Nonary Games to better integrate aspects of the original into the port. I do have a couple ideas myself...
Wow. Just.... wow. I played 999 for the first time a couple of months ago, using a DS emulator. A friend of mine recommended I play the DS version, claiming it to be the superior version. I trusted him. And now, after watching this video, I can say with absolute confidence that I made the right choice. The downsides of the port are, in my opinion, devastating and horribly disruptive to the game overall. The improvements that were made with the port are also incredibly minor, in my case. -I vastly prefer the voice blips instead of voice acting -I prefer the original pixel character sprites -The emulator I used had a very fast skip function that improved the original skip function and (almost) eliminated the need for a flowchart I can't thank you enough for expressing just how fundamentally different the game experience is between the two versions. I even ended up learning a bunch of stuff about the plot that I'd misinterpreted or missed!
hey, i’m glad this game is getting some love! i have a weird attachment to this game, i can think of a few other games i have the same attachment to, but it always pops up in my head. Not that i mind, i adore it, but this along with a few other games will always remain in the collection.
I'd like to preface this comment by saying that I have not yet played VLR or ZTD (I have a friend who wants me to play the former but not the latter). So I can *only* look at 999 in a vacuum rather than part of a full series. I'll also make it clear that ever since seeing the twist of the game, I have taken to referring to the 12-year-old version of Junpei's childhood crush as Akane, and the 21-year-old version as June, just to make it easier to understand which of the two time periods I am referring to. I am a huge fan of alternate history stories - where someone goes back in time and changes *one* tiny thing and just seeing how that affects things going on. This naturally involves a lot of time travel, and I've been able to categorize fictional time travel mechanics into four broad groups. - There's the "what you did in the past always happened" kinds like the third Harry Potter book and what Kingdom Hearts claims to be. - There's the "when you go back in time you make a new timeline" scenario which is what most time travel media goes with just to avoid thinking about paradoxes - There's the "when you go back in time you overwrite the time you came from, and the change happens in the past" which is what Back to the Future 1 is. - There's the "when you go back in time you overwrite the time you came from, and the change happens in the future" which I've only seen Star Trek do to retroactively explain how their disparate time travel stories make sense in a single set of mechanics. And yet, it is in the last group that I believe 999 belongs. The mere fact that information is transferring between timelines excludes the first option because the idea relies on multiple timelines in the first place, and the fact that June *ceases to exist* in real time when Akane dies excludes the second and third options (June would just remain even after Akane dies if it was option 2, and June wouldn't exist at all if it was option 3). Interestingly enough, the game's writer, Uchikoshi, isn't aware of this himself. In interviews he's had since the game's release, he's given the impression that Akane died in the First Nonary Game, then June came into existence just at the start of the Second Nonary Game, and then through the True Ending history got retroactively changed to one in which Akane survived and she spends the intervening time inside Building Q in order to plan the Second game. Which is, interestingly enough, how a single person (not an outside observer like the player) would perceive events in the fourth system listed above. He wrote the game as an inside participant would see the time travel shenanigans, not how an outside writer would want the events to play out. Such a system works as follows: when you go back in time, you destabilize reality *just enough* that it splits into two timelines. However, it's not *so unstable* that the timelines can both survive. At the moment that the time traveler came from, the two timelines collapse back into one, and the one with more stability wins out. Multiple timelines exist, but only one survives. HOWEVER, there is a way for two timelines to achieve exactly equal stability, and if this occurs, then *both* timelines survive past the moment of departure. And that is for the two timelines to become mutually dependent on each other. 999 achieves this, but only for two endings, not all five. All of the game's timelines are dependent on the True Ending because June exists at the beginning of the game. But the True Ending only depends on the Safe Ending, not just for gameplay reasons, but because that is the timeline in which Junpei solves the "truth is gone, truth is gone, truth is gone" puzzle that is required to get Snake out of his coffin. Akane carries this information out of the Safe Ending to allow Junpei to solve the same puzzle faster in the True Ending, enabling the gang to catch up to Santa just in time to save Akane. Theoretically, since Clover *does* have the proper piece of paper in her pocket, the puzzle could've been solved the same way it was in the Safe Ending, but I presume that would have been too slow...and Akane knew that, which is why she reveals her hand by outright shouting information into Junpei's mind, that he has no right knowing. All this to say, that (yes I read some of your replies to other comments) Clover and Snake in the Safe Ending are the only actual required deaths, even if you assume that there are multiple timelines at play here. (Side note: one of the first things I realized when I got to the twist, was that June called *herself* an inch tall during that scene where Santa explains about being Santa Claus for his sister who was cute as a button. Apparently, there was a demo for the game on DS, which was just the first escape room but with June as your companion, and in that demo she makes a joke about being small enough to escape through a pipe. Because these two jokes, the stress that she was under the past nine years, and even the idea that on some level she might have *enjoyed* getting a ride inside Junpei's head like that, I headcanon June as someone who likes the idea of being pocket-sized, but has never let herself truly fantasize about it due to the things she had to do - including stay hidden from the world so that her sudden survival didn't destabilize the timeline - and thus never found the online community of like-minded people.)
I don't know if you've played VLR or ZTD by now, but I'd honestly recommend playing ZTD if you haven't if only because it can be incredibly funny. I also had a group of friends who'd been into the series before I got into it and who bemoaned how ZTD ended up being, which made me morbidly curious about what it did to cause such strong reactions lmao. While I can definitely see the reasons for the complaints and agree with many of them, having low expectations and just experiencing ZTD gave me a lot of joy. It's also, I think, the closest we can get to an anime of the zero escape series, so I'll take what I can get lmao.
I love the use of the dual screens in the ds version, it's why I bought that version in the first place after all. But I do appreciate the addition of the flowchart and some voice acting in the port.
Great video! It really does suck recommending the Zero Escape series now knowing that they're most likely going to experience an inferior version of 999. I had similar thoughts to yours when I played through the port. And I was sad when I came out of it feeling that the DS version was still better even with the QoL changes. It's just so hard to explain to new people why the original is so much better without giving away huge spoilers that I loved experiencing organically when I played it.
I played the DS version when I was younger and never quite caught on to the narrator twist. Once I did, however, I realized how important it was and how the remaster kinda screwed it up. Made me sad.
I'll be honest, I am too. I know people have their different preferences and that some people might prefer the port, but I can't for the life of me understand why. Even though I am clearly heavily biased in favor of the DS version in the video, I still attempted to give the port a chance when talking about the quality of life changes. There were things about the QoL changes that I didn't talk about because I was already being so negative towards the port. I understand that people like the conveniences of the QoL changes, but I don't understand how that can justify bad writing in a *Visual Novel* of all things. I respect the opinions of those who like the port, I really do. I enjoy having discussions with them about the two versions as well, but it's just been difficult to do that lately because no one seems to want to talk about it.
@@ItsYourPalJacob Yeah, the QoL changes are obviously nice, but in a game where dialogue is SO central it's hard to see why people would be okay with the version where it's so clearly worse
999 and Nier Automata are two games I can confidently say are actual art in their ORIGINAL FORMS, as they were INTENDED. The emotional investment means nothing when the PHYSICAL ACT of YOU being the one interacting with the game is missing or changed entirely. I swear I was not expecting to be sitting there, shaking and crying as i hold a DS upside down because I'm trying to save a little girl and explaining that without the time you spend actually playing it it doesnt work just doesn't get through to some people. No not all stories work in all mediums, and I see this a lot when people talk about how their favorite book can never compare to a movie, but somehow you see time and time again people discounting the power that narratives can have -just- because it is in a video game and therefore a newer form of media.
999 had a great way of being a visual novel in the DS with the dialogue in the top screen, where the characters images were, and narration on the bottom. Seriously, most of the time visual novels either are just "novel mode", or "novel mode" during descriptions and rpg-like dialogue boxes when just dialogue and scenes with nothing needing to be said (and put together when re-reading in the log). That made it become pretty easy to get used to the split on the DS, and a great surprise when it WASN'T just a novel way of taking advantage of the hardware but actually important. But having description text cover the whole screen in a darkening screen behind it or a giant transparent box, just to show it is separate from the rest of it, while it leaves for dialogue/choices and shows just a small message box is not exactly rare in visual novels in single-window/screen ones either. All this mess that became of "Adventure Mode", or rather just the fact there IS an "adventure mode" and a "novel mode" just to simulate the two screens... it is just baffling to me. While it would miss the hardware nuance of having two screens, the different way of speaking of description itself would have been able to hint at the twist without all that splitting. At most, give the player an option use the hardware upgrade and voice acting to lower the amount of description needed but still have it for things that the visual and dialogue would not be enough instead of this awkward talking-out-loud. Seems to me that the people that did the port were, at best, fans of 999 itself but had no idea of how other visual novels work. I did not play the port yet, so I have no idea how the flowchart in it works. I DO remember that in VLR the flowchart is in no way complete even if it seems so in a first view, and more "nodes" appear as you progress. Maybe a good way to do it would be an adapting one, at first seemingly like just a chapter selection unlocked only after you get a bad ending, as if just to re-read past pieces or advance to others you read before and horizontal instead of vertical as if to show the passage of time, but then you make a different choice and only then notice "hey, there is a branching path in this..." Having it horizontal also fits better the trilogy because... ZTD also has a very different kind of flowchart. It is kind of weird to not draw attention to that changed dialogue, honestly, because... first time I played 999, on the DS, I got the path to the true ending by accident, not my first but still before getting the Safe ending, but I lacked the code to continue. So you are kinda required to replay at least route anyway if you lack info you get on others. And did they NEED to change the final puzzle? Just because they were not using the touch screen anymore? They could have used shoulder buttons to change the values instead of having the player touch the numbers to put where, easy fix. With the image on the other screen put transparent on top of it as you do it, for the extra gut punch that it is lacking.
I recently finished the series. I played in adventure mode and wasn’t even aware what novel mode was at all. I didn’t understand most of the ending until watching this video. I actually really hated the ending cause it felt random and I didn’t exactly understand what was going on. It was my least favorite ending out of the three games while I think it should’ve been my favorite. I’m going to get the ds version soon and play it so I can understand things like this better. Thank you for this video and solidifying my idea of playing the original.
Thanks for pointing out all the differences! I just finished the port and I can see it must have been so much more impactful with the two screens. I honestly don't know how they could have fixed that. Unless you actually have a two screened consol the true ending is always going to be less impactful. I'm sad the DS version wasn't my first experience, but I am glad I experienced the game regardless. It pulled me in more than any triple A game i've played recently. It's still an amazing story.❤
I watched a streamer named Joseph Anderson play this game with no prior knowledge and a lot of these issues really turned him off the game, nice analysis
Joseph is also allergic to anything anime and subtext in general so it wasn't just the port. He hates suspending his disbelief and reading through the lines and laughs at anything
Excited to watch this later! I remember watching a bit of the port one day and wondering where the descriptive narration was. It really did wonderfully shape my experience with the DS game! ...now if only I could get another copy since a friend I lent it to must have 'lost' it
I remember trying to play this game again after the DS, and realizing the ports were on home consoles. Honestly, if players were playing on a TV screen, then they could have split the screen vertically and also had the voice acting. Now that I'm playing it on the steam deck, the story issues you were describing are everywhere 😅
Wow I just stumbled upon this and I wanna say thank you so very much! I have only played the Port version on adventure mode and my friends and I would meme the constant and over the top gasping noises. Now I have a much better understanding of the original game and everything suddenly makes sense and I can appreciate the game much much more
One other thing that the remaster did worse is one of the puzzles in the Torture Room. The puzzle where you have to hit different switches to light up blocks on the monitor that looked like a head. In the original you had to make the bottom screen match the top screen, and so that's what the instructions were. But for the remaster they added a button that says hint, which switches you from the bottom screen to the top screen, but they left the instructions unchanged. So it still says to make the bottom screen match the top screen, when that's not how the remastered puzzle works.
Yes I only played the ps4 version and that was my least favorite puzzle. It was the only one where I broke down and looked up the solution because I just couldn't hold the visual info in my head easily while also looking at the other visuals in front of me.
45:00. No joke, I played the port and I never found out you could use the flow chart to skip to different sections of the game. I took the flow chart as a spoiler for how routes flowed, so I tried to never look at it, so I always replayed the game from the start.
Spoilers ahead: 28:01 This is so funny like instead of forcing narration so it leaves shock it just shifts to them talking and make this seem like some family guy parody
I’ve been playing the Zero Escape games with my friend recently and dang I didn’t realize the dialogue and narration problem was that bad, great video! But also at the same time I don’t mind it because of how goddamn well Evan Smith sells his voice acting as Junpei, like 50% of his line deliveries are gold and I was laughing so much during my playthrough
Let's go, well researched and new content on the Nonary Games! I love the whole series and I began playing on the DS with 999 and moved to PC for VLR and ZTD, and boy am I glad of that! I never realized how much more poorly done the ports adaptation of the duel screen was. I agree on all parts regarding the changes made to accommodate this. However, I would like to defend the Flowchart system, as it's something that I very much love from the sequels. So I get where you are coming from in regards to how the Flowchart system ruins your speculation and theories regarding the timelines and all that, however I would like to throw out there that it "technically" does not invalidate the theory. I agree that you can feel less connected to the Narrator and subsequently Akane if you are able to totally skip past the puzzle rooms, but I would argue that player burnout drops significantly if they don't have to do stuff over and over, meaning they might feel more inclined to keep with the game and connect easier without the tedium. (Plus it removes the "plot hole" of why no one is surprised by or questions how you are able to solve these puzzles in like 2 minutes without talking to anyone about anything ;p) I also see why you don't like that the FlowChart spoils where decisions are and how it spoils the game when you can see all of it from the start. (In essence they copied the one from VLR) It would've been interesting for them to only show what you have seen and maybe the paths you missed (ala ZTD) But you do have to agree that it makes it much easier for new players to figure out where and when their decisions move them between routes. I also think that yes it should've been tweaked a little to show new moments of important dialogue, but to it's credit/detriment the game can be beaten to the true ending in two playthroughs so you can miss a ton anyway. XD Sidenote: I actually like seeing it all from the start cause it makes me excited to see all the I have available to me and to get that feeling of utter excitement and joy when I finally get all I need to achieve a new route. In my opinion the best version of the game would be like a 3DS version with the Flowchart, VA, and text speed options, and either the sprites or the new drawings.(because the split screen is sooooo vital to how the game works and it's clear that it's too dificult to rewrite the 999 script to work without it) (Which makes it all too clear that VLR was written specifically to work with or without it) Anyway, thanks for the video I loved it!
A smaller reason I like having no flowchart is because I just like the idea that all the main characters got out alive and had a "happy" ending. The idea that multiple Junpeis and multiple "versions" of the other characters died and that timeline had a sad ending isn't one that I'm particularly fond of. That's just me though. But yeah those are great points in favor of the flowchart and it ends up working out for others. Also yeah if there was a change I'd make to both versions it'd be making the other endings required, it makes the game more impactful. Thanks for watching the video!
For any one interested in watching this vn i would recommend watching it through lacari vods ( in twitch ) , he played the whole game in advanced mode but he went from all bad endings to safe to true ending ( unintentionally ) making his playthrough unironically the best way to view the game as i had learned very single detail necessary to make the last playthrough extremely enjoyable
it still feels weird to me to assuming akane is doing all the hard work since logically Junpei would make better sense as the puzzle solver given both his age and craftiness.
Thank you for making this video. When I first tried the port,the new system for adventure/novel mode made me quit the game. I wish I could have find your video at the time, because no one talked about these problems. In the end I am glad I continue this version
I played this game for the first time this summer, on the DS. I had found it for cheap at a local used game store. To see what they did to it and all the amazing revelations and use of the screens in the port really makes me sad. One of my favorite games ever, reduced quite a bit.
I just beat this game for the first time using the port. I found the improvements to be good and I wasn't aware of the changes to the writing. It was only after door 4 I actually figured out how much better the novel mode was so I restarted the game. For the voice acting I always had it on japanese so I didn't notice the awkward delivery or the gasps. So by luck I managed to get over some of the issues you mentioned but even then the DS version seemed much better in writing. As for the flowchart it actually encouraged me to play the game over and over to get the true ending. If I played the DS version I would have stopped after a while. Definitely the biggest thing I was bothered by is the final puzzle which seems so bad compared to the original DS version. I absolutely love this game though and I would not have checked it out if it weren't for the port. Great video by the way and I'm definitely checking out VLR!
I was expecting to just be silently mad at this video and not comment cause i usually don't. But my hand is forced. I now must because... I now have seen a perspective I didn't consider when originally playing the game that makes me appreciate the series much much more now. For a long time i've been like. "man now I can finally finish the game because the flow chart makes things so much easier" never even getting to the true end on the DS cause I was a dumb kid. So I never even put together that the narrator was insert character name here just incase someone unfamiliar happens to see this comment. The ending scene would have been so much more impactful to me if I'd have done it on the DS. Thankfully I still have both my DS and copy of 999 so Now I'm inspired to play and finish 999 on the DS like I should have so long ago. Amazing video. thanks for helping me realize 999 was so much better than I originally gave it credit for Overall though I do still like the port. I've been able to introduce friends to the series though it.
i played 999 on a rom, but i did put it on to my dsi first which spared me from having to mess around with settings, so i got the true experience. and im thankful i chose the original format over the remaster, i dont think it would've hit the same. also this video finally made me realize why i had to turn my ds upside down so there's that lol. i assumed it was to represent akanes perspective somehow, but knowing that its actually just turning the bottom screen into the top screen to show junpei is solving the puzzle makes a lottttt more sense
I have a special relationship with this game, I originally played it on DS in my native language (Italian) after a fan translation was shared on a forum I used to browse. I'm not a fan of time paradoxes, so initially I didn't like the plot twist much. Even so, the entire time I was captured by the unique setting, it shocked me in a way that no other game did. To this day, there's still something that creeps me out in the way numbered doors are designed, the oppressive atmosphere, and the OST. In fact even if I say that I didn't like some elements of the plot, I can't deny how much I enjoyed it overall. The final puzzle with Akane crying on the other screen was very touching. So when a port was announced I just had to buy it. I also got to play the iOS version (which completely removed the interactive rooms). Perhaps it's because I had already experienced the superior version or because I'm a fan of the voice actors that were chosen, but I didn't realize how bad the PC game was at first. I did wonder why they decided to change the puzzle that had the strongest impact on me, though. Also, I'm glad they included the flow chart or I wouldn't have been able to re-do the entire game, considering how ridiculously slow the skip feature is.
I am not sure, whether it was said somewhere here, but probably the best ds emulator is Drastic on Android - it's where i played the game and it was absolutely fine, add the ability to apply texture filters - and it's probably the definitive place to play the ds version
It’s kinda weird how simple it’d be to adapt adventure mode. Whether they wanted to keep Junpei’s internal dialogue or they wanted to show what Junpei’s thinking, it’d all be solved with pretty basic effects. If Junpei’s internal dialogue is kept, add an echo to what supposed to be in his head. If they wanted to show things, tons of visual novels utilize visual effects and sounds to tell the player something happened. Like the “earthquake” line, they could have added some screen shake and a loud sound to show the player that something bad just happened. Part of me feels like they wanted to make everyone in the cast feel more included, but it makes a lot of original lines awkward
Honestly it probably had more to do with lack of budget. Easier to cut corners and slap something okay-ish together than to try and make the budget work with what they needed to do. They likely really didn't care much since the series didn't sell well in the first place. We're lucky af that they even decided to make the ports in the first place given the fact that we almost didn't even get ZTD.
![Zero Escape [999|VLR|ZTD] Game Systems Analysis](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/lW2Fy3HG9dI/mqdefault.jpg)
I really enjoyed this video, now I just need to move my fingers across the keyboard to write a comment expressing my approval followed by clicking on "comment".
That moment you blurred Zero's text and let us listen to his horrible voice? Genius. Pure genius.
there's also a section where zero starts talking, the characters react for a few minutes, then zero continues. this is about 5 mins, and the WHOLE time there's this static background voice that's extremely grating and made me a little nauseous
Yeah on my first playthrough (started the series through the nonary games lol) I just thought his voice was alright as I had his words on script, but without... I greatly underestimated how bad the effect is lol
I was able to figure out what he was saying, but only because I played the game before, otherwise, I would have had no clue it was his line about the sinking of the titanic
It's a modulated voice ON TOP OF being broadcast over an ancient PA speaker system.
The next step would have been his voice, on a cell phone, next to the microphone of the PA system.
@@dorpthnext step after that? Speaking through two tin cans and a string through a cell phone through a PA system with a modulated voice
This is like the most niche argument I'm passionate about to get a video essay this long, holy shit.
akane using her superhuman psychic powers to solve every puzzle in the nonary game many times over just so she can have junpei help her spell "password" will never fail to make me laugh.
999 is also my favorite game of all time and although i was aware of some of the remakes shortcomings I didn't realize how much was changed. This was an absolutely amazing and thoughtful video. We share a passion for this game and the series as a whole, so it was a treat to hear you speak on what made the experience on the DS special for you. Plus the amount of research and care you put in is astounding. I've subbed, amazing work! :)
I wasn't aware the port made so many narrative changes. What a shame. This video is incredibly well-made and detailed, so I’d like to dignify it with an extended response to some of your points:
1). They should have made 'novel mode' keep the old narration and dialogue. Go ahead and experiment with Adventure Mode, but keep the legacy content. This almost feels like rewriting history, very unfortunate. Also, I think it's very disrespectful to our narrator, who I think did an incredible job setting the scene throughout the game. I respect her narration a LOT, it’s so well-written stylistically. Most of the unsettling and oppressive atmosphere in the game is due to the amazing and often grotesque descriptions in the narration.
2). 999 is perfectly self-contained and I often prefer to ignore its sequels narratively (even though I like them too). Like you did with the timelines, one point I often indulged in was considering Akane’s morality. In the end, did she just act out of self-preservation or had she developed psychopathic tendencies because of her experience? How much did she still care about Junpei as an adult? Arguments could be made along the spectrum and I liked the poetic ambiguous ending of “We’ll never know”. Meeting her again in later games removed this aspect to her.
3). I mentioned this elsewhere but I’ll repeat here. It's incredible how much the simple image of Akane crying on the 'lower' screen enriches this puzzle when playing on the DS. You're using your stylus on the 'top' screen so most of the lower screen is obstructed by your hand, yet you periodically spot glimpses of Akane's desperate face while moving your hand around. It makes it feel transcendental, like we can only see her in flickers. Because it’s visually suppressed, it's subtle and not in-your-face but still exerting this constant emotional pressure. It really makes you want to finish the puzzle as quickly as humanly possible to save her (even though there is no timer). I say this because it wouldn't have worked the other way around. If there wasn't this trick of inverting the DS, Akane would be displayed on the top screen and constantly visible. That would be too blatant and ruin most of the subtle elements.
4) "I'll never be able to experience it for the first time ever again" is 100% the worst problem of this game. -- 0/9, literally unplayable.
Thanks for watching such a long video and for the detailed response! I don't have much to comment on what you wrote as I agree with you and can't think of more to add, but something I will say is the changes they made to the narration (as well as several other things lol) completely destroyed the atmosphere of the game for me. The narration that was taken out makes it lack life now, it's like Akane isn't even there anymore with the dry-boned it now is. Keeping the narration script in tact would have helped, though I think they'd also have to change the character dialogue back to the original for Novel mode so the narration isn't super repetitive.
@@ItsYourPalJacob Exactly, make Novel mode be 100% the old narration and the old dialogue, and do whatever with the adventure mode. Mixing and matching obviously doesn't work because the new dialogue is written with a presumption of absent narration, so then you just get duplication. In the clips shown I noticed how unengaged some players were during super tense & powerful moments; that just shows how much of the atmosphere was lost. Very sad to see. Don't do lil' Akane like that.
How could they have implemented the 'two realities' aspect of the dual screens though, if they'd wanted (hypothetically) to be super faithful for the Novel mode? That's really hard. Maybe blur or overlay the screen during Akane's narrations or give her a different font or something, and then carry that 'symbol' over for when the realities diverge? But even then, you can't generate the original effect with one screen freezing (but not disappearing!) as you're focusing on the other, indicating that the timelines are simultaneously advancing on the two screens. Fading back and forth between illustrations wouldn't be as seamless. It's SO tough an issue, maybe insurmountable.
@@misterpayah7723 a year late but another guy suggested using parentheses like in other visual novels, imagine something like:7
(junpei bumped his head)
junpei: "OW!"
transitioning later to:
Junpei: "How did I know that?"
(he knew because I knew)
it might not immediately give people pause km the same way, having them think that theh themselves are talking, but it'd be super fucking creepy in the best way imo, and it works so well as a solution for some things. It doesn't fix every issue, not by a longshot, but it does help.
The tragedy is, they didn't NEED the dual screen to recreate the DS experience!
All the Novel Mode text is entirely in the top half of the screen. All the Adventure Mode dialog text is entirely in the bottom half. It would have been so easy to just stick all the narration in one half and all the spoken dialog in the other, and use the background/no background scheme to more easily tell the two apart. The only thing they would have lost is only the narration half having player input, but that still would have offered a way better experience than the Novel/Adventure solution they went with.
Even though the DS version is ten times the pain in the ass to get through all the endings, I'd say it's totally worth it to eventually arrive at one of the most emotional impactful narrative moments in (my 40 years of) video games.
I just wait long enough for my goldfish brain to forget most of the story before I play it again 😂 this game is so good. Sadly my goldfish brain stopped me from fully enjoying the third game because by the time I got my hands on it I'd already forgotten so much of the first two...
Someone should make a fan mod for the PC version to be able to make the novel and adventure modes split screen
OMG yes. It shouldn't be that hard. And also removing the redundant/awkward dialogue and the ellipses.
I know this is a 3 year old video at this point, but I’m someone who has only played the port version of the game, and to find out how the game SHOULD have played out with the two screens helps the ending make a lot of sense now! There’s definitely a bigger impact on the ds version and I’m happy to at least know of its existence. It’s a shame that my first experience of the game wasn’t the original. Great video, definitely eye opening for me! (I already loved the series even with how weird I thought the steam version was but this just makes me love the overall story even more! xx)
And Injust spotted the ghost trick video so off I go to watch it!
I'm literally only 20 minutes in and I knew the port was bad, but I didn't know it was THIS bad. And the constant talking is such an easy fix too! Literally in EVERY SINGLE visual novel I've played (INCLUDING VLR) non-verbal thoughts are potrayed with (parenthesis)
So instead of doing this
Junpei: "OW! My Head hurt! I must have fallen pretty far"
they could have done
Junepei: "Ow!" (I must have fallen pretty far. That hurt!)
IT IS LITERALLY SUCH AN EASY FIX
Better yet, you could try to make those parenthesis thoughts JUNE'S thoughts so that the spoiler thing doesn't feel weird.
Junpei: "Ow!" (Junpei fell pretty far. He can feel the pain swelling in his head.)
And done! I finished writing this comment! Even though I haven't finished the video, I'm enjoying it so far- OH NO! I made a typo! Better fix that up! Ok that's better. Now all I need to do is sumbit this comment. Gotta press that enter key!
The game industry is lost without you good sir/ma'am/polite term for human
Well, at least it has the novel screen whose narrative is similar to the DS one
@@gianwright5178 yeah but it still keeps a lot of the "tell don't show" dialouge and makes the vig twist a lot more confusion than actually satisfying
@@A5H_01 imagine not knowing how to implement one of the most basic fundamentals of a visual novel
Can confirm that adventure mode ruined the the twist with Zero at the end. That scene felt extremely out of place when I got there; I thought I had missed some kind of build up or something had got lost in translation to English. I didn't know how vital having two screens was until after I beat it, and I didn't know it was meant to be played in novel mode. On the bright side though, I'm learning Japanese, so I'll have a good reason to play the ds version in the future.
I was literally screaming in agreement once you brought up the problem with the ellipses. I hated that so much. I'm so glad I played the DS version first, it completely cemented this game as one of the greatest of all time. Loved this video, thank you for your analysis, I couldn't have agreed more.
Thank you for making this video and putting lingering thoughts I've had for years into words. The idea of being able to recommend this game to more people was one that had excited me more than anything when the news of the port came out. Years later, I can, but... I've noticed the narrative around 999 itself change since the port came out. I've had one or two friends play the port, come back to me like "yeah, that was pretty good" to an ending that left me an emotional wreck when I first played it, and then never speak to me about it again. These are people that I've even managed to convince to switch to novel mode for the narration, which has left a previously indescribable influence on my own writing. For the longest time, I just wondered what was wrong, what was different, whether the game I loved so much was even really all that good to begin with. Now, your video has sorta given me an answer: this game and its port may as well be two separate games. So, as I move onwards, I will try to recommend the game I loved, with some of the (less-spoilery) points here. There is no shame in that.
Wonderful video. I am very excited to go back and hear your past musings, and I hope to hear more.
That really sucks. I can imagine how disheartening it must be to hear such lukewarm reactions to (for us) such powerful memories.
Also I agree the narration is incredible, it inspired my writing a lot too. Our ‘narrator’ is certainly very gifted literarily. (I wonder where they picked that up at their age?)
22:55
"In the DS version, everyone is silent"
At this point during my watch, RUclips shat itself. I sat in silence for like 10 minutes wondering if it was a bit.
Would’ve been the most Chad bit tbh
This video actually revealed to me that the top and bottom screens were both Akane and Junpei experiencing the same things in sync. An experience I never. Ever. Would have had or realised had I not watched this video and then played the original on my phone through emulation.
Thank you.
I had to have that realisation forced on me, but I'm glad it happened, I'm somewhat upset that I didn't get to have that experience or realisation naturally...
But what an incredible game this is.
And this video convinced me that the DS is one of the only ways to experience 999.
Thank you, again.
Same
woof that streamer/youtuber montage hurt me right in the heart holy heck. Way to instantly convince me on your argument.
I played through 999 on Vita as my first visual novel ever, and absolutely loved it, but seeing all the ways things changed made me pop a ds rom on my 3ds to try it out, and I have to say I really prefer the two screen setup. Replaying early segments might get boring and tedious, but I already remember some of the solutions from last time I played, so it should be quick. Good video.
After playing the game 18 times to find the true ending without a guide(Yes I screwed up that badly)... I started writing solutions down on the 4th playthrough or so, and the realization later that this is actually canonically happening in the plot, where your Junpei is TOTALLY just like "Oh hey a door. The code's 93. I don't know why I know that." was great for me after I finished the game.
I feel like I worded something poorly when talking about the different Santa Claus scenes that could potentially lead to some confusion, so let me clarify a bit (Spoilers).
I made it sound like the "two Santa Clauses" scene was the one that made my favorite line in the game have so much meaning, which isn't the case. That's the scene that leads to the Knife Ending where he doesn't tell you about about being unable to fulfill Akane's wish and how she died 9 years ago.
The scene to the Safe Ending is the only one that has this information:
Akane (in Santa's story): "I don't want any presents this year. Instead, I want you to make my wish come true. My wish is that we'll be happy like this for a really, really long time."
Santa: "...But I couldn't make that wish come true. Some Santa I am..."
Akane (present): "What... happened?"
Santa: "She died. She was killed... 9 years ago..."
Oh okay this pinned comment helped a lot, I kept watching thr clip over and over bc I thought you were saying that you had to get the knife ending to see the dialogue about Santa's sister, but I went coffin then safe endings and saw that dialogue the first time around and was confused. But that makes perfect sense now! The knife ending follows that same room so if you played through it once and got the two Santa's dialogue you don't have to see the dialogue again, leading to a huge blind spot!! I'm glad you pointed this out!
I know I’m late to this video but THANK YOU! This put all my criticisms of the port into words in a really well thought out way. I have never actually played the game either way, instead discovering it through NicoB’s playthrough of the DS version years ago. I enjoyed it so much, that I had fun seeing other people let’s play the game as well, watching their reactions to key moments. Buuuut, when this new version came out, everyone began playing *this* version and the fun I had at watching people play the game really soured. It just wasn’t the same anymore, all the tension seemed to be replaced with people rolling their eyes at the dialogue, and it’s so frustrating just *knowing* a better version of this game exists right there in novel mode that most people won’t even bother with. Not to mention the original. I know I’m just ranting and not really contributing much to the criticism you already made, but I thought I’d share my experience with it. Really enjoyed the video
Awesome video, my dude. You nailed pretty much everything perfectly in the head. I kinda wish the video had the spoilers pushed to the second half or so, so I could recommend my blind friends to watch this, but it's still a fantastic video overall. Now I wish I had paid more attention to the subreddit so I could comment about the dialogue and make a cameo on this video, lmao, cuz yea, that has always been one of my biggest problems about this port (aside from the entire true ending).
I haven't played the port for myself, so I can only really base off memory how many optional scenes there are outside of puzzle rooms that aren't marked by the key symbols on the flowchart. The Santa Claus one is the only one that comes to mind as optional based on past choices, but there are several scenes that have alternate versions based on dialogue presented at the moment, and what was great about the original DS version is that, when you replayed the game multiple times, you had the chance to select the other choices and see what the other options where. Honestly, if it weren't for this, I would've legitimately completely missed out on the Funyarinpa scene, the Elevator scene, and some of the 4 character-driven scenes before Doors 3-7-8, because my first time through I was trying to take the choices seriously. I can just imagine the people who didn't click "Funyarinpa" or "Maybe she's worried about being alone with a guy" and missed out on some of the greatest moments in the game, not to mention the incredible amount of foreshadowing in the 4 character scenes if you wish to pursue them while searching for Snake (Ace's scene in particular had soooo many hints). But there are also some alternate versions of scenes you can miss out during puzzle rooms as well, assuming you accidentally trigger the right keys and reach the Safe and Coffin Endings before any bad endings. The one that comes to mind the most is the scene with Lotus hacking the computer and Junpei making fun of her instead of explaining monitors and prosopagnosia.
And I also want to talk about another Door 6 scene that is Safe Ending exclusive, and for which I'm not sure it's mandatory to watch to get the Safe Ending (since, again, haven't played the port). Much like how the two Santa Claus scenes was one of the biggest scenes for you, the rat experiment scene gave me that same effect, as it made me realize and connect precisely on what my experience of the game is. In each of the Zero Escape games, there's one particular scene in which the characters convey to you a perfect metaphor of the entire game in itself, and the player's role in the story. In VLR, it's the termite scene, comparing the player jumping timelines to termites walking around a termite hill's infrastructure. In ZTD, it's the Sleeping Beauty Problem, comparing itself to the character's experience in falling asleep and getting amnesia. And in 999, it's the rat experiment. Those rats swimming around in those water mazes represent all the Junpeis in the story that have died in various endings, with Akane (and us) serving as mediators as the next rat learns and adapts to reach closer to the goal. Playing the game multiple times is us running the rat through more and more times and having the next rat learn more and more from us. It's such a great way of integrating the player into the story well before the True Ending attempts to do so, and it puts you in the mind space that Akane is in during the story. But of course, the flowchart ruins the entire metaphor and the player experience with Junpei. After all, how can it really feel like multiple Junpeis running through the maze multiple times and learning when you're skipping to midpoint parts of the maze itself and never get to apply what you learn into practice (aka, repeating puzzles)? To me, that's one of the biggest loses the port has to telling such a compelling story in a way that implements the player into the game. That has always been Uchikoshi's greatest strength in his games, even outside of the Zero Escape series.
As an extra, I have a little fun fact for all you guys out there. Did you know that there's a "typo" that's "fixed" in the port of 999 that actually removes one of my favorite pieces of foreshadowing? You see the line a few times at the beginning of the video. In the port, during the first flashback, Junpei talks to himself thinking "Huh... That's weird... Did I leave [the window] open?", and it stays that way across both NVL and ADV modes. In the DS version, since that entire scene is in the narration section, that same line is given to us by Akane along with the rest of Junpei's thoughts. EXCEPT, if you pay close attention, you can actually notice that the line *written in first person* was NOT enclosed in quotation marks (" "), which is how all of Junpei's inner monologues are displayed on the bottom screen. This means that the line itself was spoken to us by Akane, not Junpei, and it fits well because Akane was the one to open the door, in the future, trying to enter his apartment. And it's kinda humorous when you think of the shady masked individual hiding in the shadows worrying about the window they forgot to close.
EDIT: Hey, random question. Are there videos missing on your channel? Based on this video, you seem to be *extremely* talented at video production and just overall have a great sense of identity as a content creator on RUclips. Yet I can only find a total of 3 videos on your channel, including this one, and the other 2 are from over a year ago. Do you intent to have this be your kickstart (or return) into content creation on RUclips? Cuz if so, then I am certainly more than interested in subscribing and seeing more videos that you produce.
As I'm looking back at my playthrough, I noticed that I don't have any footage of the Funyarinpa scene (I said "dog" because I already knew it was a dog) or the elevator scene. I thought I'd be able to come back to those scenes later but after a while I kinda forgot about it. Thankfully you do have to see the rat experiment scene though.
I do really like making videos but they take an incredibly long time to make. This would have been done a few months ago if I didn't have school and work to worry about. I am planning on making more videos, but who knows how long they will take (though I do have a lot more free time now because of covid-19). But anyway, thanks for watching the video and for the kind words, I really appreciate it!
@@ItsYourPalJacob Great video bro, can't wait to see what you come out with next :) .
As someone who recently played through the whole series, this video made a bunch of stuff finally make sense to me. Almost everything that I thought didn't really work within the story after playing the Nonary Games version makes sense with the context of how much was sacrificed porting it to one screen. I finally understand why people hold this game in as high regard as they do. So thanks for making this video, because the clarification for people like me is honestly very much needed.
Jacob, I saw the beggining of this video and went to play the DS version of 999, and it became one of my favorite games ever, I thank you so much! Now I can see the full video.
I must be too used to the port. I remembered Junpei talking to himself all the time being a character trait of his from the original, forgot he was just thinking that stuff.
Then again, i don't see much difference between reading a wall of text labelled as narration and hearing a guy say that text out loud
From the perspective of an adventure mode player:
The only thing that particularly left a negative impact on me from my play through was the final puzzle. I don't know if the DS's version of this puzzle would have been able to live up to this hype you describe it with, but to me, that's just one puzzle. All of the story tidbits and even the final plot twist were still incredibly mind-blowing and I still walk away from this game citing it as one of my favorite games of all time.
I wish I had known to play it in novel mode, (and I HEAVILY wish the game took your advice and swapped between modes automatically more) but likewise, to go without the voice acting in this game would be to do it a huge disservice in MY eyes.
Much like the Santa scene that you cite as the scene that single-handedly represents your entire love for this game as your favorite, the remake has created a similar scene for me. That scene is the end of the Safe ending. What makes the Safe ending so incredible in the remake is the voice acting, particularly from Richard Epcar and Taliesin Jaffe as Ace and Snake respectively. This scene to me is the most satisfying and climatic ending in the entire Zero Escape Trilogy. It gives you the Hero's tragedy that only a character as pure as Snake could make so emotional and the villian's downfall that only a character like Ace deserves. The palpable raw emotion in their voices is not the kind of thing that any text could ever replicate for me and even though you have to shift through some awkward moments to get there, to experience this moment in its rawest form is not something I could ever stand to trade.
Although the remakes may ruin the experience for some who experienced the DS version, I can still cite 999 as one of my favorite games of all time despite having played through it in what you describe as the most diminishing way possible.
Agree only ever played the newer version and loved it understood the ending and was aware of the cheesy diajogue ect but didnt feel it detracted from what was great about the game.
Didn't expect to see you here, as someone who completed 999 DS first and found the HD release shallow in comparison, I'm glad others found things to like about it.
I think the new puzzle is better, but that's my hot take. It allows you solve it using both language knoweldge OR math knowledge not just a lazy "throw a sudoku in there"
The scene of Junpei's kidnapping could've just given him a pet. When I walk home I say weird shit to my cats all the time. Or have him on the phone? Like it wouldn't have been THAT much effort
Actually I could be wrong but in the japanese voice the characters to grunt when an elypses is played.
Edit: after checking my psvita i can confirm that in the japanese dub the actors dont say anything during the elypses
I want to see you cover VLR and dedicate an entire section to Clover smiling through fucking anything
VLR made me fucking hate clover holy shit
A whole video to one visual bug? pass
@@spyczech "an entire section"
@@itselisha222 and I'm saying there isn't much else to criticize there it's an excellent game
One difference I've seen nobody mention is how they changed the background music in some scenes in the port (e.g. at the end of the safe ending where Zero talks to Junpei).
On a side note: this game means a lot to me, it inspired me to do my final high school project about morphogenetic fields, and I even got in touch with Rupert Sheldrake about it :D
Morphogenetic Sorrow still plays in the Safe Ending and the True Ending, right?
I can live with a few changes as long as that particular song is still playing at those particular moments.
@@wd3185 I believe so yeah, luckily
Santa's mugshot during the CG where the 9th Man was taking Clover hostage, it was missing in the remaster.
It's when Santa was saying "What do you think you're doing?" to the 9th Man.
I don't know if they changed the explanation in the port but Akane literally says she gets information from multiple timelines and it's not going back in time thing.
came here from Wince Media's top ten favourite video games video and WOW am i glad i did. i've only ever played the port version of '999' and never fully understood the hype, but seeing how much it changed from the original really irons out some of my issues. so good to see you explain something so passionately and thoroughly, with clever use of examples (blurring Zero's text, reactions from different streamers, flipping the last puzzle screen, etc) to boot. great work!
Briefly mentioned that at 43:34 - 43:54. It's easy to miss lol
Thank you so much for this video. I watched the introduction after I got interested in the game (and stopped there so I could go in blind) and it was enough to sell me on playing the DS version. I finished it a few days ago and absolutely adored it, and a large part of my enjoyment was definitely from the incredible way the hardware was implemented. My mind was completely blown when the bottom screen narration started talking as a character, and turning the DS upside down to solve Sudoku as Junpei got me really emotional. My mind was racing as it was being set up and I completely fell in love with the game when I saw the upside down puzzle and realized what was going on. I remember feeling my heart beating in my chest like Akane's life was really in my hands as Morphogenetic Sorrow was playing, just thinking about that moment after the credits rolled got me to shed a few tears. And now that I've watched the full video I can definitely tell that I wouldn't have enjoyed it nearly as much if those incredible moments were gone, and the writing and dialogue wasn't as good as it was. So thank you for helping me play the right version, and I'll be sure to recommend the DS version to anyone else interested in the game.
I would love to see you keep making videos. There’s clearly a lot of time and effort out into this video. And I loved the port, and still enjoyed this video and respect your opinion. You’ve got a talent for this man, and if you ever return, I’ll be waiting to watch it.
I really enjoyed your video! I've played through 3 versions of 999 (DS, iOS, and Nonary Games), and I liked the DS and NG versions equally for different reasons. Until I watched this, I didn't realize how much pointless dialogue was added. It's amazing how it almost sets a completely different tone in some scenes. If I had the skillset to do it, I would make a mod for the game that fixed a lot the problems you mentioned. It may not be too difficult to do.. but who knows?
**SPOILERS** There's one example I'm surprised you didn't mention, though. In the original Axe Ending, something that really added to the grotesqueness of it all was how Junpei's reaction to his arm being cut off was portrayed. The text starts with just one letter per line, and eventually reaches its peak with the scream itself. In the remaster, it's just a scream, no delay/buildup to it. It's another example of how raw the original could be in comparison to the remaster. The remaster I still find to be near equal to the original due to the quality of life improvements alone, but it's those little moments and details in the DS version that really set it apart from anything else I've experienced in any medium.
As someone who played the Nonary Games version first I felt that the twist still worked for me, the second I saw "Akane vision" it clicked with me what they were doing. As for Junpei narrating it never really bothered me too much but it could be jarring. Overall I enjoyed the Nonary Games version as a first playthrough (especially with the flow chart and VA) but if I replay it (which I probably will) I'll probably pick up the DS version and check it out cause I tend to prefer og versions of games.
I remember noticing on my first play through that the altered novel scene could just be completely skipped without even realizing. As much as I disliked the limited save system of the DS version, the flowchart wasn't the solution I envisioned. I would have preferred the ability to make numerous "checkpoint" style saves like in some other visual novels, where the endings you've seen are saved regardless of whether you overwrite your previous file. This way you can save at each decision, view an ending, and then go back to change your choice without losing your progress.
Your video has convinced me that even that might not be for the best since restarting is part of the reveal. Even then though, other similar games have allowed players to continue from a previous save, not lose their progress in terms of endings, but still require them to start from the beginning in order to unlock certain endings, including the true ending.
Honestly, I think the flowchart was added because that's how VLR handled its structure.
@@TheEnderLeader1 It's a safe assumption. The mechanic is identical.
Fantastic video. DS 999 is also one of my favourites. I was always curious how the general flow of the story would work without the split screens, not just the *redacted*. Never seen anyone else explore this, and you did a throughout job. Really interesting. Even more glad I played DS with no idea what the game was about!
Lafayette being kept past the book death was like the one change t hey did that was actually pretty good. A lot of the other changes, though...
I love 9 Hours 9 Persons 9 Doors, Virtues Last Reward, and even Zero Time Dilemma. This series is absolutely amazing.
One thing I *love* about niche DS games is that they tangle a magnificent story around the mechanics and format of the console, making it 100 times better, but they do it so tightly that playing the original is almost the only way to properly enjoy it. That part makes me sad.
I think 999 and Lost/Trace Memory are great examples of this
This video seems very well researched, can’t wait to watch! As a first time Zero-Escape player, I was satisfied with the port but wish that I could have played the original on the DS.
I played this on a mobile emulator and now I know it was the right choice
This was an absolute treat to watch. I agree with pretty much everything you said.
I'm very happy my first experience was blind and on the original DS version. I remember when hearing it was getting ported I thought it would be impossible to make it completely faithful and it's interesting to see what they attempted and what didn't ultimately work.
I think that proves a point in regards to how unique and special the original DS version is. Who knows how long it will be until we see something mechanically similar to the DS, but until that day comes, 999 on the DS is probably one of the most unique console experiences that no other platform can offer.
There is only one way that 999 could have ported. The ONE way that could do what 99% of the original game did was the Wii U.
Save for the upside down aspect of Sudoku, this would have been perfect :(. Hell the native Wii U ds emulation would probably be amazing for it.
@@artless3438 The upside down part could be represented by having the displayed content of both screens rotate 180 degrees together when entering the part, similar to how you would rotate the DS.
Very good points! You’ve covered exactly how I feel about the remake. Also, I’ve found that the text skip on DS is actually acceptably fast if you rapidly slide the stylus back and forth on the touchscreen. The actual skipping speed of the text is fast, but the transition between each message is stupidly slow. By sliding across the touchscreen though, it inputs the game to transition to the next message significantly faster. It’s not perfect, and it might not work well for emulators, but it made my playthroughs MUCH less tedious.
Can't you hold right?
@@ok-yv9dd You can hold the normal skip button to skip the text quickly, but there is still an odd slight transition period between each message that slows it down considerably. By spamming inputs on the screen though, it inputs the game to skip these transitions and skip at a faster pace that I found much less annoying for replaying stuff.
This was a fascinating watch - and it's honestly kind of a shame that it only has some 7000-ish views after a year of being up (although I guess that speaks to how sorta-niche Zero Escape is lol).
I think - if anything - your video illustrates how difficult porting games originally made for a specific piece of hardware to a significantly different piece of hardware is. Like, the DS/3DS lines of consoles are dead now. There are no more games that are going to be made with two screens in mind - every game that was ever going to use that functionality has already been made, and as DSs/3DSs get older and inevitably become harder to find/maintain, you're gonna have to do one out of a couple things if you wanna play a DS game:
1. You could track down an original DS/3DS and a copy of the game (or at least an R4 cart or something like it), which will become harder as years pass and the consoles/game carts get older and older.
2. You could play a ROM on an emulator - easily achievable nowadays on the net, but offers a severely compromised experience (glitches, lack of portability, needing to use a mouse in lieu of a touch screen, and an example specific to this game's ending that I will call "what-the-fuck-am-I-supposed-to-do-flip-my-computer-monitor-upside-down?).
3. Developers could release new ports of the original DS/3DS games for newer console generations that compromise on whatever mechanics the game had that utilised the touch-screen/dual-screen mechanics.
I'll cut myself short and say that your problems with 999's port might just be emblematic of problems that game archiving will face in the next couple decades, as a variety of games are made for different pieces of hardware. It's why - as much as I agree with you about the problems the port has - I can't really find it in myself to be frustrated with the developers about those creatives decisions. Most of them weren't particularly 'bad creative decisions'; they were just given the responsibility of shoving a square peg through a round hole.
IMO, the saddest thing about the 999 port specifically is that we could have had a port that would have likely been the universally agreed-upon way of experiencing the game - if only it were released a few years earlier and on the Wii U. Think about it: we'd get the voice acting and HD artwork, but we'd still get both the "novel" and "adventure" mode screens because of the Wii U's dual screen set-up (meaning the writing wouldn't have been totally butchered). Sure, there'd still be the timeline and some of the VA would still be weird, but it would still be a major improvement over what we got!
As for now though - unless another company ever decides to make a console with a set-up akin to the DS (unlikely) - we're stuck in this weird limbo between two different versions of the game that will inevitably get more and more difficult as years pass (or maybe someone could make a mod for the PC port that makes it so it could work with multiple monitors. I imagine that could work - although they'd have to stick the sudoku back in lol).
Ah, whatever. Sorry for the long, rambly comment - I just wanna reiterate that I really liked the video (if a video got me to think this hard about a topic, it must be doing something right lol).
The flipping screen problem could be fixed with playing the game on a mobile emulator (that's what I did) but I do understand how most people feel about playing on mobile
The screen issue could be fixed if they made it function like VLR. Have the screen go dim and let the narration scroll until its time to un-dim the screen and have the characters and dialogue box appear again. It was so simple.
As someone who learned to love the game through the port I was really unsure while watching this video.
I am obsessed with Zero Escape, but especially with 999, it doesn't matter how often I see ,,he knew because I knew" or ,,now who am I ? " every time I get goosebumps. In these last two years I watched most of my friends play through the game while sitting on my bed and me trying to not give away any hints, just because I was so excited. I wanted them to love it just as much as I did. To question everyone, even Akane, but never enough to actually not believe in her, start loving all of them, even Lotus who nobody likes at the start, and then get blown away by the final reveal. I talk about this game every single day, to a point where even my mother, who barely knows anything about me, thought about zero escape when she was looking for a birthday present for me. I go to an art college and the moment I got the chance to start on my own 2 week long project I immediately went for a 4 minute long animation/animatic centered on Akane in 999 (I never posted it because it kind of looks like shit because it was so long and we had no time at all. But the song we used was ,,youth" by daughter. If anyones interested look up the song, and I think you'll see why we chose it)
To this day I've never actually played the Ds version. I want to, but I don't have the ds game yet and don't want to use an emulator. I've gotten attached to their english voices and can't imagine them in a different way. Even Zeroes voice, which is objectively kind of bad I love so much. Sure, I definitely couldn't understand him if I didn't know what he was saying, it's definitely a flaw, but this and all of the other vocal flaws never bothered me. The moment I knew that this was a port and how the game originally worked I understood, that that could never be replicated in a better way, but I can't help but like the different screens, not really in themselves, but more so that sometimes you'll get forced into a different one, after learning of the meaning behind them I got extremly attached to that. I also loved how Novel mode would add a purple shade to everything, my lil Akane obsessed mind can't get enough of all the tiny indicators. It definitely can't make up for what the Ds has, but I like the way it was done.
I actually thought of the game as Schrödingers cat box, just as you described , where the other timelines dont exist once you get to the true ending, so that kind of worked for me, even though that illusion was shattered once I played Vlr.
I thought of the other endings as not very useful once I saw them. The first time I encountered 999 was through a lets play and the player went for the safe and then the true ending and I was happy that way, especially once I played through the submarine ending. I thought of it as more bothersome than useful, since it lessens the true route. But now after watching the video I realized that it was important. Through the flowchart you can switch between the scene of Seven in the cell where he tells part of his story and the one where he tells most of it in the room behind the library so fast, I thought if I had seen that one before it would've lessend the impact on the true route, but if you actually played the game how it was intended, there would be so much space between those two scenes that it would have a totally different effect, you would actually be able to brood over the story, forget it, just to get slammed in the face with it once again.
So yeah, I got very attached to the game, even though I encountered it through the port, but I'm very sure that that is not something that counts for everyone. This video also gave me a big boost in wanting to experience the Ds version, I wasn't aware there were this many changes between the versions.
I can be unbearable when it comes to this game and I know it, people will make fun of the weird dialouge or the elipses, and it IS weird and I know it, but for me they are part of this experience, because they are part of the version I grew to love. I understand that people don't like them, but I will always love my Zero Escape with a side of cringe.
I had considered getting the remaster when I saw it was out. But I had recently bought the DS version second hand, and I'm really glad I got it.
Literally, all the port had to do was dim the screen and let the narration scroll when it needed to, then brighten the screen back to focus on the text boxes and character portraits when it was time for character dialogue... you know... like they did in VLR!!!??? The switch between Akane and Junpei's pov could have faded in to full opacity back and forth rather than flash back and forth like a tv screen.
Oh I love that idea
I feel like this screams needing a modder to fix issues in the game. If someone were passionate enough about this who knows how to code, I think it be possible to make a mod of the port that cuts out unneeded voice lines and adds 2 screens introducing the more narrator stuff. Hell you can even fix the zooming. This would still leave the timeline but maybe this is one conseet we can make.
I’ve never played this game, so I’m not familiar with the context of your premise. However, your passion on the topic is enough to entertain. I do want to try out the original game now though, so thanks for the vid!
Oh my God, please play the original game. The DS really does make the whole experience, it just makes it so damn good.
@@wd3185 One thing I'd add is to use emulation, so you can speed past the repeated parts.
@@popsicleman8816 Another add: i recomend playing on a cellphone via emulation it translate the ds double screen better
Man, that point about emulating 999 is surprising to me, when I played 999 the first time, I played it through Wii U's virtual console as an inject, and despite how broken the DS virtual console can be for injections compared to any other modern emulator, it worked just fine, without any visual or auditory bugs.
i feel like the port team could’ve solved this problem by simply adding parentheses around junpei’s thought dialogue/3rd person narration, like ace attorney did. great video! i never noticed these problems when i played the port, but maybe i never picked up on it :o
another thing to add: i think the singular timeline theory is incredibly clever, and i also think that a lot of uchikoshi’s later games (like ai the somnium files) work way better with the flowcharts because they’re built around it like vlr was!
Oh my, I never ever felt more gratefull for my mother's DS Lite to work perfectly to this day... I have an R4 gold and I found the game while searching for Ace Attorney Investigations to put in the DS to then remember that Kodaka (If my memory isn't betraying me he's the creator of the Daganronpa series) is friend with the creator of 999 and I just said "If it's his friend and works in the same company it will probably be good" and just added it to the SD card. When I saw it was made in 2009 I just thought to "not get my hopes too high because maybe the ways of talking and writting doesn't fit my taste" (I was born in 2007 for context) and at the start I didn't thought that much of it, got kinda frustrated with the third class cabin (I missed one of the paper notes so I only had mid pasword and basically forced my way into the suitcases, searched a guide after completing it to see if that was suposed to happen and the minigames were going to be wacky) and got disapointed with Lotus design and Akane's personality. But all of this changed! I played more, I got the axe ending first so my second go was "how the hell do I save Snake so Clover doesn't kill me?" and that changed to "who stabed me?" after the submarine ending. It didn't took me too long to end up in an ending guide so I didn't get near the frustration to get the endings like most people in the comment section. One of the things that I loved were the girls. As a girl myself, you don't have an idea how sad can be not beging able to relate nobody of your gender because poor writting to them. I had classified the girls in a few categorys after meeting them in for the first time:
-Lotus: Fanservice character, made to make sexual jokes and atract players
-Clover: Bubbly and a little annoying little girl/little sister steoreotype
-Akane: love interest childhood friend who has an imposible angelic personality.
But, sooner or later, this changed! Lotus completly broke out her box, sure some jokes about her age and clothes were there but that wasn't her role. She had a real purpose a personality of her own and a life of her own. She's smart, she's logic and can be caring even if she might have trouble understanding others emotions. I love Lotus as a character eventhought I still dislike her design a bit. Clover had her own incredible devolopment! She lost her brother one if not the most important persons in the world for her, someone who probably guided and protected her her whole life. She didn't cry and forgave like I thought she would. She was hurt, she lost herself and you see it. She knows someone killed him. She wants revenge. She gets twisted in the cruel nonary game after losing her most important person while reviving her trauma, that's incredible. But she can be helped and you can do it. I love Clover, she makes sense. And lastly June, Akane. Akane was during most of my expirience my most disliked character. I didn't hate her but I didn't like her either. "She gets sick and makes stupid drama, she is just there so Junpei can move, if Junpei is out June won't work" that's what I thought until I got the True Ending, wich makes last quote quite ironic because it was true in a way I wouldn't have ever suspected. I was at border of tears doing the Sudoku "okay Nito you got this, you made tons of Sudokus before, June will be safe, you can do it". There wasn't a timer, there wasn't an error limit and the sudoku was pretty easy but I was so scared of getting it wrong. I knew I wasn't able to kill June even if I wanted to, but I was so nervous, June is crying at me. June is scared she needs my help! Perhaps I saw my own self crying for help at that moment, for me who hasn't played Virtue's Reward or other games in the franchise, June is a super interesting character. She's not angelical, she's not perfect. If you ask me for my own theory, we are playing future and present, young June is the present. She's traveling throught posible futures, to see if someone can help her. She thought of Junpei and, from there, she had an Epiphany. "What would Junpei do if he was here?" Then a list of futures apears. She sees the game, the game she now orchested with Junpei helping her. She transmits the answers to him so he can survive and help her. It's so clever! But also, and most importantly, twisted and egothentric. She will put her best friend, brother, cop who tried to save her, the mother of Nonna and the other survivors of the first Nonary game to revive their horrors to survive her own. She will put them in danger for her survival. "Zero is not evil, but weirdly benevolent, twisted benevolent" I thought after the safe ending. That is June because June is Zero. She wants her revenge and her survival. She is kind, but twisted. She remembers me of (Your Turn To Die spoilers) Sara Chidoun. Sara has an strong survival instinct. She wants to survive the Death Game. She isn't a bad person, but for her survival she will sacrifice whoever is needed in the way it's needed. She, a high school girl, has more probability of surviving than an ex cop, a profesional boxer and a profesional baseball player. A high school girl who never saw death in her life nor knew about it was more probable to survive than an inteligent and physically very strong ex cop. They can be all the good things in the world, but when the moment comes they will turn as egothentric and reckless as they need to survive.
Great vid, I'm only now learning about the details of the port after watching a RUclipsr play the game and I noticed the weird stating the obvious dialogue. Conferred with a friend about it and they were pretty sure it was in the original so it's nice to know I was right!
Can't help but disagree with 34:17 about the upgraded sprite work, however. Unsure of your familiarity with the animation process, but as an animator whose done pixel and non-pixel art I dislike how they upgraded the animation. I'll spare you the details of how, but pixel art and non-pixel art animate differently due to pixel art being lower res, which means translating it into higher res results in a few problems. In order to fix them you more-or-less have to retime the animation to keep it looking smooth, including adding frames. You cannot just draw over the pixel art. They did not retime things, or at least not to the degree they should have, meaning that a LOT of the animation is much more stiff and offputting than in the DS version. The sample of Clover you put in is actually one of the best translated over to HD because the movement is quick. If you want to see one that's, imo, noticeably worse, find the one of Akane moving her head to the side while talking, or any of the more slow-moving animations. I realize this is something only people who are extremely familiar with animating pixel art would notice, and is probably not going to harm the experience of most players. Regardless, I cannot help but find it bothersome and also pity whichever animators got their work botched.
Very well made and produced! I'm honestly shocked that you don't have a bigger following, even given your videos are pretty niche. Looking forward to you making it big on here.
Oh man, this makes me REALLY wanna play the DS version now. I bought the port because, like you said, it's the cheapest and most accessible way to play the first two ZE games, but now I'm considering going to watch a playthrough or something of the DS version instead. And even then I'm not sure if I would get the same experience, since both screens would have to be showing in the video itself. Either way, this video is super well thought-out and insightful, and I'm always glad to see more videos about a game series I love so much now :)
Awesome video. Gotta agree with you on this. I was very disappointed by the lack of the sudoku puzzle.
It's interesting to see this perspective. I've only ever played the ps4 version in adventure mode. Everything still made sense to me and I didn't feel confused. (Note that I played AI The Somnium Files before 999 so I was really bracing for a high concept sci-fi twist which likely primed me for understanding the end more easily) Junpei talking to himself was very goofy but I felt it gave the game a sense of levity and broke the tension. Which I LIKED but I also assumed that's just what Junpei's character was like. I didn't know the original game was trying to feel dire almost the whole time. There's so much comedy mixed in with the thriller moments that I interperated most of the translation compromises here as intentional humor, and thought Junpei always pointing out the obvious was a running gag. I still ended up liking it as I found this tone amusing not annoying. I'll probably end up trying a different version when I get the urge to replay 999 to see how the tone is different. But I guess you can rest easy knowing that Adventure Mode didn't ruin EVERY first time player's experience. Even if the original would have been better, I still loved even this altered version since I didn't have the original to compare it to.
I COMPLETELY MISSED that *spoiler* was bottom screen. That makes SO MUCH SENSE NOW! Omg, I already loved this game but now I think it's a dang masterpiece! Thanks for this video!
as someone who first payed the port the twist didn't feel confusing at all, i immediately undestood what was happening ( the two screens would've made the moment more powerful i think but it didn't affect the compreension or the impact of the revelation for me), the flow chart also didn't affect the revelation for me because i undestood that akane's was seeing the diferent timelines just like we were when she talks about the diferent paths in the flow of the river i just thought she was explaning the flow chart mechanic ( i didn't know it wasn't present in the original game), the dialogue changes didn't bother me because i'm used to anime dialogue and it felt just like that, the final puzzle with akane's face make for a more emocional scene but i don't know about the final puzzle in itself tho, i don't like the port's final puzzle but i don't know if the final puzzle being just sudoku would,ve been much better. i agree that the original is probly the best way to play this game ( the game was obviously made with the unique 2 screens feature of the DS in mind) that said the port is still a enjoyable experience and a great game.
I've never played the port. The adventure mode changes sound ridiculous! And even worse, it seems like they infect the novel mode as well. Why? Why not just use the original script for novel mode?? People are not going to want to play novel mode because adventure mode is already repetitive enough. And novel mode is VITAL to the ending.
I honestly think most people who say the port isn't that bad have not played both versions. Because, y'know, you'd *assume* that a port of a *visual novel* would have the same script as the original, perhaps updated in minor ways (for example, the various Ace Attorney ports). So most people who have only played the original probably assume that novel mode is the same as the original, and adventure mode merely cuts the narration. Thank you for exposing this travesty to those of us who have only played 999 DS!
I actually find Junpeis self narration super natural! It sounds like an inner voice. I heard some ppl don’t have one tho, maybe that’s why it seems weird to you? It honestly sounds a lot like my inner voice and things id think-out-loud-in-my-head lol
Hahah just got to “it’s so embarrassing like who talks to themselves like this” apparently i do / my inner voice does
From this comment and others, it’s quite evident to me that I I worded something poorly, so let me clarify with a response I’ve posted before: It’s not that Junpei voicing his thoughts (or talking to himself) is what I’m criticizing, it’s that he’s essentially narrating the story out loud to himself in the most unnatural way possible. The way it’s handled in the game makes it seem like the writers didn’t think that the audience could make these connections on their own so they have one of their characters stating obvious things and information they already know. That's why I say in the video that they’re essentially breaking the forth wall, the characters themselves almost seem aware that an audience is watching them. If thinking to yourself or voicing your thoughts were my criticism then there would be a slew of other things I would hate for the same reason, but that’s not my argument. Let's use "Spy x Family" as an example since I think it's something that uses self-narration very well. The main character, Loid, speaks to himself all the time. For the people who misunderstood the point I was making, they may assume that I just hate the show because of that alone: Loid speaking to himself. However, Spy x Family makes it come across much more naturally as Loid is almost always problem solving in his head. There are a few awkward lines where he states the obvious to himself for the sake of the audience but for the most part it's him trying to figure things out, put things together, etc. Junpei in the port is technically problem solving, but it's for things he already knows and has figured out. Like the example I give at 18:09 where Junpei has a plan to go in which door he wants, the part that follows where he echoes his plan to himself in his head after he had already planned it, set it up, acted it out, and succeeded in said plan just screams that the writers need to let the audience know what is happening somehow, and they can't find a more natural way to do it. So it's not the fact that characters voice out their thoughts or think to themselves is the problem for me, it’s the way it was presented.
Thank you for this. 999 is my favorite game also, and I've only played the DS version, though I've watched people play the port. And I didn't fully realize how different everything way, dialog wise, even discounting the two modes.
I didn't have any emulation issues playing the game on my phone with a ds emulator,and the touchscreen works nicely like that. It also keeps the portability and the vertical alignment for the final puzzle , and allows you to use fast forwarding on repeat playthroughs, so I think it's the best way to play the game. It's also great for ace attorney, and other ds vns.
I'm so glad you talked about the whole "That's not how they sounded in my head!" Thing, because that happened to me with Clover specifically. When I played the game with a DS emulator, the voice I had in my head for Clover was Laura Bailey's because, for some reason, I found Clover similar in appearance to Rise Kujikawa from Persona 4 (Don't ask...), which is a character Laura Bailey voiced and I thought her voice really suited Clover. Then I watched some videos of the remaster, heard her voice, and thought "That's not how she sounded in my head!"
Nothing against her actual VA though, she is an amazing voice actress!
I felt this same way for Junpei. The whole time, I imagined Yuri Lowenthal (Yosuke from Persona 4) as his voice. When I got hit with Evan Smith's slightly fem vocal performance I was so disappointed
To me, it happened with all female voices except Lotus. For Clover, the voice i had in mind was based off of Andrea Libman's voice of Pinkie Pie, but not nearly as high pitched. Infact, when i was doing a research on the voices she done, i found a segment where it would have been an exact match for the voice of Clover i had in mind. For June, i expected a much softer voice, akin to those soft spoken characters you'd often hear in an anime. Infact, i expect this to be the case in the Japanese voice lines(i haven't checked them at this point). Though tbf this kinda voice is rarely found in English dubs, for some reason..
Really great video, I agree on a lot of points. I played the Nonary Games remake first about a year ago, and recently beat 999 on original DS hardware after my hands on a reasonably priced copy. Having experienced both without the nostalgia for the DS version, I really do think that playing 999 on original DS hardware (with a spoiler-free ending guide on hand) is still the definitive way to experience the story. The criticisms are understandable though.
The presentation has aged very well, and I didn't really miss the voice acting at all. One thing some people don't mentions are the controls. I enjoyed doing the puzzles a lot more with the DS stylus and touch screen. While I found the narration a little repetitive at times (count how many things "strike Junpei as odd"), I was a really big fan of it. I think you're on the mark with calling out how much heavy lifting the narration actually does for the pacing of the story.
This video got me thinking about I would improve the Nonary Games remake. To be honest, the dual screen twist is pretty much impossible to translate properly, but the flow chart is fixable. Personally, I'd remove the ability to jump through the flow chart for the reasons you outlined in the video, but keep a "partial flowchart", similar to how it's done in AI: The Somnium Files. The chart starts out empty, and only the branch you progress through is visible. On subsequent playthroughs, the branch you've created will still be visible, making it more clear where you need to go next. Combine that with a much faster text skip and some kind of puzzle auto-complete mechanic, and I think you have gameplay that is more streamlined, but faithful to the original experience.
Honestly, while it definitely would've been awkward, I wonder if they could've done something creative with the extra monitor space most people were gonna have, just so that Adventure/Novel modes wouldn't have had to exist. Like, maybe the game opens up in two separate windows, and while dialogue and "Junpei's eyes" (during escape sequences and such) appears on one screen, the narration and actual puzzle solving goes on in the other window.
---Spoilers, clearly---
Honestly, it never really occurred to me just how much the dual-screen mattered when playing through the port. I must have played through 999 like... forever past its original time - like I'm talking on a 3DS in 2016 right before learning it had a sequel I think? - so at the time I just figured these were things that were an 'extra flourish' on top of what was already good about the game's strengths. Like, "aww, it'd actually kinda cute that I have to turn the DS around if I weren't crying my eyes out trying to save the child"; that sorta thing. I never really thought of the significance because honestly it was done so naturally that I never even noticed it. Like, *of course* the narration turned to Akane's voice after all that foreshadowing.
I was fortunate enough to have experienced the mostly natural flow of story the DS version had that when I played the port for what was effectively nostalgia value it never really hit me that there was much different, because even through all the awkwardly-paced dialogue and such on Adventure Mode, I still felt the rush of the original come back to me and I was kinda...
Well, honestly it was almost like a 'morphogenetic field' moment, to put it cheesily. Like I knew things that I *shouldn't,* so the awkwardness never dawned on me. I still remember the bittersweet grin I had when watching a friend play through the game beside me and getting the various endings. Misery loves company and all.
Man, what a great fuckin' game, though. It really does speak a bit to its overall charm when even a fairly awkward port can't make it remotely *bad.* Just merely "not as good as it could have been."
Who knows, perhaps some day someone will come along and mod Nonary Games to better integrate aspects of the original into the port. I do have a couple ideas myself...
Wow. Just.... wow.
I played 999 for the first time a couple of months ago, using a DS emulator. A friend of mine recommended I play the DS version, claiming it to be the superior version. I trusted him. And now, after watching this video, I can say with absolute confidence that I made the right choice.
The downsides of the port are, in my opinion, devastating and horribly disruptive to the game overall.
The improvements that were made with the port are also incredibly minor, in my case.
-I vastly prefer the voice blips instead of voice acting
-I prefer the original pixel character sprites
-The emulator I used had a very fast skip function that improved the original skip function and (almost) eliminated the need for a flowchart
I can't thank you enough for expressing just how fundamentally different the game experience is between the two versions. I even ended up learning a bunch of stuff about the plot that I'd misinterpreted or missed!
could you link the emulator - id love to experience this game in the way its meant to be.
@@bigbadgammagnome Looks like I got it from a website that has since changed names. Romsgames should be it.
hey, i’m glad this game is getting some love!
i have a weird attachment to this game, i can think of a few other games i have the same attachment to, but it always pops up in my head. Not that i mind, i adore it, but this along with a few other games will always remain in the collection.
I'd like to preface this comment by saying that I have not yet played VLR or ZTD (I have a friend who wants me to play the former but not the latter). So I can *only* look at 999 in a vacuum rather than part of a full series.
I'll also make it clear that ever since seeing the twist of the game, I have taken to referring to the 12-year-old version of Junpei's childhood crush as Akane, and the 21-year-old version as June, just to make it easier to understand which of the two time periods I am referring to.
I am a huge fan of alternate history stories - where someone goes back in time and changes *one* tiny thing and just seeing how that affects things going on. This naturally involves a lot of time travel, and I've been able to categorize fictional time travel mechanics into four broad groups.
- There's the "what you did in the past always happened" kinds like the third Harry Potter book and what Kingdom Hearts claims to be.
- There's the "when you go back in time you make a new timeline" scenario which is what most time travel media goes with just to avoid thinking about paradoxes
- There's the "when you go back in time you overwrite the time you came from, and the change happens in the past" which is what Back to the Future 1 is.
- There's the "when you go back in time you overwrite the time you came from, and the change happens in the future" which I've only seen Star Trek do to retroactively explain how their disparate time travel stories make sense in a single set of mechanics.
And yet, it is in the last group that I believe 999 belongs. The mere fact that information is transferring between timelines excludes the first option because the idea relies on multiple timelines in the first place, and the fact that June *ceases to exist* in real time when Akane dies excludes the second and third options (June would just remain even after Akane dies if it was option 2, and June wouldn't exist at all if it was option 3).
Interestingly enough, the game's writer, Uchikoshi, isn't aware of this himself. In interviews he's had since the game's release, he's given the impression that Akane died in the First Nonary Game, then June came into existence just at the start of the Second Nonary Game, and then through the True Ending history got retroactively changed to one in which Akane survived and she spends the intervening time inside Building Q in order to plan the Second game. Which is, interestingly enough, how a single person (not an outside observer like the player) would perceive events in the fourth system listed above. He wrote the game as an inside participant would see the time travel shenanigans, not how an outside writer would want the events to play out.
Such a system works as follows: when you go back in time, you destabilize reality *just enough* that it splits into two timelines. However, it's not *so unstable* that the timelines can both survive. At the moment that the time traveler came from, the two timelines collapse back into one, and the one with more stability wins out. Multiple timelines exist, but only one survives.
HOWEVER, there is a way for two timelines to achieve exactly equal stability, and if this occurs, then *both* timelines survive past the moment of departure. And that is for the two timelines to become mutually dependent on each other.
999 achieves this, but only for two endings, not all five. All of the game's timelines are dependent on the True Ending because June exists at the beginning of the game. But the True Ending only depends on the Safe Ending, not just for gameplay reasons, but because that is the timeline in which Junpei solves the "truth is gone, truth is gone, truth is gone" puzzle that is required to get Snake out of his coffin. Akane carries this information out of the Safe Ending to allow Junpei to solve the same puzzle faster in the True Ending, enabling the gang to catch up to Santa just in time to save Akane. Theoretically, since Clover *does* have the proper piece of paper in her pocket, the puzzle could've been solved the same way it was in the Safe Ending, but I presume that would have been too slow...and Akane knew that, which is why she reveals her hand by outright shouting information into Junpei's mind, that he has no right knowing.
All this to say, that (yes I read some of your replies to other comments) Clover and Snake in the Safe Ending are the only actual required deaths, even if you assume that there are multiple timelines at play here.
(Side note: one of the first things I realized when I got to the twist, was that June called *herself* an inch tall during that scene where Santa explains about being Santa Claus for his sister who was cute as a button. Apparently, there was a demo for the game on DS, which was just the first escape room but with June as your companion, and in that demo she makes a joke about being small enough to escape through a pipe. Because these two jokes, the stress that she was under the past nine years, and even the idea that on some level she might have *enjoyed* getting a ride inside Junpei's head like that, I headcanon June as someone who likes the idea of being pocket-sized, but has never let herself truly fantasize about it due to the things she had to do - including stay hidden from the world so that her sudden survival didn't destabilize the timeline - and thus never found the online community of like-minded people.)
I don't know if you've played VLR or ZTD by now, but I'd honestly recommend playing ZTD if you haven't if only because it can be incredibly funny. I also had a group of friends who'd been into the series before I got into it and who bemoaned how ZTD ended up being, which made me morbidly curious about what it did to cause such strong reactions lmao. While I can definitely see the reasons for the complaints and agree with many of them, having low expectations and just experiencing ZTD gave me a lot of joy. It's also, I think, the closest we can get to an anime of the zero escape series, so I'll take what I can get lmao.
I love the use of the dual screens in the ds version, it's why I bought that version in the first place after all. But I do appreciate the addition of the flowchart and some voice acting in the port.
Great video!
It really does suck recommending the Zero Escape series now knowing that they're most likely going to experience an inferior version of 999. I had similar thoughts to yours when I played through the port. And I was sad when I came out of it feeling that the DS version was still better even with the QoL changes. It's just so hard to explain to new people why the original is so much better without giving away huge spoilers that I loved experiencing organically when I played it.
I played the DS version when I was younger and never quite caught on to the narrator twist. Once I did, however, I realized how important it was and how the remaster kinda screwed it up. Made me sad.
Wow, I'm glad I got into this game before the remake was a thing. Surprised anyone truly prefers the remake to be honest.
I'll be honest, I am too. I know people have their different preferences and that some people might prefer the port, but I can't for the life of me understand why. Even though I am clearly heavily biased in favor of the DS version in the video, I still attempted to give the port a chance when talking about the quality of life changes. There were things about the QoL changes that I didn't talk about because I was already being so negative towards the port. I understand that people like the conveniences of the QoL changes, but I don't understand how that can justify bad writing in a *Visual Novel* of all things.
I respect the opinions of those who like the port, I really do. I enjoy having discussions with them about the two versions as well, but it's just been difficult to do that lately because no one seems to want to talk about it.
@@ItsYourPalJacob Yeah, the QoL changes are obviously nice, but in a game where dialogue is SO central it's hard to see why people would be okay with the version where it's so clearly worse
999 and Nier Automata are two games I can confidently say are actual art in their ORIGINAL FORMS, as they were INTENDED. The emotional investment means nothing when the PHYSICAL ACT of YOU being the one interacting with the game is missing or changed entirely. I swear I was not expecting to be sitting there, shaking and crying as i hold a DS upside down because I'm trying to save a little girl and explaining that without the time you spend actually playing it it doesnt work just doesn't get through to some people. No not all stories work in all mediums, and I see this a lot when people talk about how their favorite book can never compare to a movie, but somehow you see time and time again people discounting the power that narratives can have -just- because it is in a video game and therefore a newer form of media.
999 had a great way of being a visual novel in the DS with the dialogue in the top screen, where the characters images were, and narration on the bottom.
Seriously, most of the time visual novels either are just "novel mode", or "novel mode" during descriptions and rpg-like dialogue boxes when just dialogue and scenes with nothing needing to be said (and put together when re-reading in the log). That made it become pretty easy to get used to the split on the DS, and a great surprise when it WASN'T just a novel way of taking advantage of the hardware but actually important.
But having description text cover the whole screen in a darkening screen behind it or a giant transparent box, just to show it is separate from the rest of it, while it leaves for dialogue/choices and shows just a small message box is not exactly rare in visual novels in single-window/screen ones either. All this mess that became of "Adventure Mode", or rather just the fact there IS an "adventure mode" and a "novel mode" just to simulate the two screens... it is just baffling to me. While it would miss the hardware nuance of having two screens, the different way of speaking of description itself would have been able to hint at the twist without all that splitting. At most, give the player an option use the hardware upgrade and voice acting to lower the amount of description needed but still have it for things that the visual and dialogue would not be enough instead of this awkward talking-out-loud.
Seems to me that the people that did the port were, at best, fans of 999 itself but had no idea of how other visual novels work.
I did not play the port yet, so I have no idea how the flowchart in it works. I DO remember that in VLR the flowchart is in no way complete even if it seems so in a first view, and more "nodes" appear as you progress.
Maybe a good way to do it would be an adapting one, at first seemingly like just a chapter selection unlocked only after you get a bad ending, as if just to re-read past pieces or advance to others you read before and horizontal instead of vertical as if to show the passage of time, but then you make a different choice and only then notice "hey, there is a branching path in this..."
Having it horizontal also fits better the trilogy because... ZTD also has a very different kind of flowchart.
It is kind of weird to not draw attention to that changed dialogue, honestly, because... first time I played 999, on the DS, I got the path to the true ending by accident, not my first but still before getting the Safe ending, but I lacked the code to continue. So you are kinda required to replay at least route anyway if you lack info you get on others.
And did they NEED to change the final puzzle? Just because they were not using the touch screen anymore? They could have used shoulder buttons to change the values instead of having the player touch the numbers to put where, easy fix.
With the image on the other screen put transparent on top of it as you do it, for the extra gut punch that it is lacking.
I recently finished the series. I played in adventure mode and wasn’t even aware what novel mode was at all. I didn’t understand most of the ending until watching this video. I actually really hated the ending cause it felt random and I didn’t exactly understand what was going on. It was my least favorite ending out of the three games while I think it should’ve been my favorite. I’m going to get the ds version soon and play it so I can understand things like this better. Thank you for this video and solidifying my idea of playing the original.
Thanks for pointing out all the differences! I just finished the port and I can see it must have been so much more impactful with the two screens. I honestly don't know how they could have fixed that. Unless you actually have a two screened consol the true ending is always going to be less impactful. I'm sad the DS version wasn't my first experience, but I am glad I experienced the game regardless. It pulled me in more than any triple A game i've played recently. It's still an amazing story.❤
I watched a streamer named Joseph Anderson play this game with no prior knowledge and a lot of these issues really turned him off the game, nice analysis
Joseph is also allergic to anything anime and subtext in general so it wasn't just the port. He hates suspending his disbelief and reading through the lines and laughs at anything
Excited to watch this later! I remember watching a bit of the port one day and wondering where the descriptive narration was. It really did wonderfully shape my experience with the DS game! ...now if only I could get another copy since a friend I lent it to must have 'lost' it
I remember trying to play this game again after the DS, and realizing the ports were on home consoles. Honestly, if players were playing on a TV screen, then they could have split the screen vertically and also had the voice acting.
Now that I'm playing it on the steam deck, the story issues you were describing are everywhere 😅
It would be cool if the voice of the "narrator" was zero's in the remaster or a random generic bleep sound like Sigma's in VLR.
Wow I just stumbled upon this and I wanna say thank you so very much! I have only played the Port version on adventure mode and my friends and I would meme the constant and over the top gasping noises. Now I have a much better understanding of the original game and everything suddenly makes sense and I can appreciate the game much much more
One other thing that the remaster did worse is one of the puzzles in the Torture Room.
The puzzle where you have to hit different switches to light up blocks on the monitor that looked like a head. In the original you had to make the bottom screen match the top screen, and so that's what the instructions were. But for the remaster they added a button that says hint, which switches you from the bottom screen to the top screen, but they left the instructions unchanged. So it still says to make the bottom screen match the top screen, when that's not how the remastered puzzle works.
Yes I only played the ps4 version and that was my least favorite puzzle. It was the only one where I broke down and looked up the solution because I just couldn't hold the visual info in my head easily while also looking at the other visuals in front of me.
45:00. No joke, I played the port and I never found out you could use the flow chart to skip to different sections of the game. I took the flow chart as a spoiler for how routes flowed, so I tried to never look at it, so I always replayed the game from the start.
I... I got the platinum on Vita and I didn't even realise there WAS a novel mode :'(
Well, now you've got something interesting to do if you ever feel like replaying it at least
Spoilers ahead:
28:01
This is so funny like instead of forcing narration so it leaves shock it just shifts to them talking and make this seem like some family guy parody
I totally agrere with this, the DS version is just better.
it really was built differently
I’ve been playing the Zero Escape games with my friend recently and dang I didn’t realize the dialogue and narration problem was that bad, great video!
But also at the same time I don’t mind it because of how goddamn well Evan Smith sells his voice acting as Junpei, like 50% of his line deliveries are gold and I was laughing so much during my playthrough
Let's go, well researched and new content on the Nonary Games!
I love the whole series and I began playing on the DS with 999 and moved to PC for VLR and ZTD, and boy am I glad of that! I never realized how much more poorly done the ports adaptation of the duel screen was. I agree on all parts regarding the changes made to accommodate this. However, I would like to defend the Flowchart system, as it's something that I very much love from the sequels.
So I get where you are coming from in regards to how the Flowchart system ruins your speculation and theories regarding the timelines and all that, however I would like to throw out there that it "technically" does not invalidate the theory. I agree that you can feel less connected to the Narrator and subsequently Akane if you are able to totally skip past the puzzle rooms, but I would argue that player burnout drops significantly if they don't have to do stuff over and over, meaning they might feel more inclined to keep with the game and connect easier without the tedium. (Plus it removes the "plot hole" of why no one is surprised by or questions how you are able to solve these puzzles in like 2 minutes without talking to anyone about anything ;p)
I also see why you don't like that the FlowChart spoils where decisions are and how it spoils the game when you can see all of it from the start. (In essence they copied the one from VLR) It would've been interesting for them to only show what you have seen and maybe the paths you missed (ala ZTD) But you do have to agree that it makes it much easier for new players to figure out where and when their decisions move them between routes. I also think that yes it should've been tweaked a little to show new moments of important dialogue, but to it's credit/detriment the game can be beaten to the true ending in two playthroughs so you can miss a ton anyway. XD
Sidenote: I actually like seeing it all from the start cause it makes me excited to see all the I have available to me and to get that feeling of utter excitement and joy when I finally get all I need to achieve a new route.
In my opinion the best version of the game would be like a 3DS version with the Flowchart, VA, and text speed options, and either the sprites or the new drawings.(because the split screen is sooooo vital to how the game works and it's clear that it's too dificult to rewrite the 999 script to work without it) (Which makes it all too clear that VLR was written specifically to work with or without it)
Anyway, thanks for the video I loved it!
A smaller reason I like having no flowchart is because I just like the idea that all the main characters got out alive and had a "happy" ending. The idea that multiple Junpeis and multiple "versions" of the other characters died and that timeline had a sad ending isn't one that I'm particularly fond of. That's just me though. But yeah those are great points in favor of the flowchart and it ends up working out for others.
Also yeah if there was a change I'd make to both versions it'd be making the other endings required, it makes the game more impactful.
Thanks for watching the video!
For any one interested in watching this vn i would recommend watching it through lacari vods ( in twitch ) , he played the whole game in advanced mode but he went from all bad endings to safe to true ending ( unintentionally ) making his playthrough unironically the best way to view the game as i had learned very single detail necessary to make the last playthrough extremely enjoyable
it still feels weird to me to assuming akane is doing all the hard work since logically Junpei would make better sense as the puzzle solver given both his age and craftiness.
Now I'm glad I played 999 with sped up text mod. Loved the whole series it's one of the most unique stories I've ever experienced
Thank you for making this video. When I first tried the port,the new system for adventure/novel mode made me quit the game. I wish I could have find your video at the time, because no one talked about these problems. In the end I am glad I continue this version
I played this game for the first time this summer, on the DS. I had found it for cheap at a local used game store. To see what they did to it and all the amazing revelations and use of the screens in the port really makes me sad. One of my favorite games ever, reduced quite a bit.
I just beat this game for the first time using the port. I found the improvements to be good and I wasn't aware of the changes to the writing.
It was only after door 4 I actually figured out how much better the novel mode was so I restarted the game. For the voice acting I always had it on japanese so I didn't notice the awkward delivery or the gasps. So by luck I managed to get over some of the issues you mentioned but even then the DS version seemed much better in writing.
As for the flowchart it actually encouraged me to play the game over and over to get the true ending. If I played the DS version I would have stopped after a while.
Definitely the biggest thing I was bothered by is the final puzzle which seems so bad compared to the original DS version. I absolutely love this game though and I would not have checked it out if it weren't for the port. Great video by the way and I'm definitely checking out VLR!
I was expecting to just be silently mad at this video and not comment cause i usually don't. But my hand is forced. I now must because...
I now have seen a perspective I didn't consider when originally playing the game that makes me appreciate the series much much more now.
For a long time i've been like. "man now I can finally finish the game because the flow chart makes things so much easier" never even getting to the true end on the DS cause I was a dumb kid. So I never even put together that the narrator was insert character name here just incase someone unfamiliar happens to see this comment. The ending scene would have been so much more impactful to me if I'd have done it on the DS.
Thankfully I still have both my DS and copy of 999 so Now I'm inspired to play and finish 999 on the DS like I should have so long ago. Amazing video. thanks for helping me realize 999 was so much better than I originally gave it credit for
Overall though I do still like the port. I've been able to introduce friends to the series though it.
100% agreed, the narrative and especially the true ending just lose a lot of impact.
Really great work!
i played 999 on a rom, but i did put it on to my dsi first which spared me from having to mess around with settings, so i got the true experience. and im thankful i chose the original format over the remaster, i dont think it would've hit the same. also this video finally made me realize why i had to turn my ds upside down so there's that lol. i assumed it was to represent akanes perspective somehow, but knowing that its actually just turning the bottom screen into the top screen to show junpei is solving the puzzle makes a lottttt more sense
Watched this after finishing the port yesterday and yeahhh there’s stuff i didn’t realise that you go over in this
I have a special relationship with this game, I originally played it on DS in my native language (Italian) after a fan translation was shared on a forum I used to browse. I'm not a fan of time paradoxes, so initially I didn't like the plot twist much. Even so, the entire time I was captured by the unique setting, it shocked me in a way that no other game did. To this day, there's still something that creeps me out in the way numbered doors are designed, the oppressive atmosphere, and the OST. In fact even if I say that I didn't like some elements of the plot, I can't deny how much I enjoyed it overall. The final puzzle with Akane crying on the other screen was very touching. So when a port was announced I just had to buy it. I also got to play the iOS version (which completely removed the interactive rooms). Perhaps it's because I had already experienced the superior version or because I'm a fan of the voice actors that were chosen, but I didn't realize how bad the PC game was at first. I did wonder why they decided to change the puzzle that had the strongest impact on me, though. Also, I'm glad they included the flow chart or I wouldn't have been able to re-do the entire game, considering how ridiculously slow the skip feature is.
I am not sure, whether it was said somewhere here, but probably the best ds emulator is Drastic on Android - it's where i played the game and it was absolutely fine, add the ability to apply texture filters - and it's probably the definitive place to play the ds version
It’s kinda weird how simple it’d be to adapt adventure mode. Whether they wanted to keep Junpei’s internal dialogue or they wanted to show what Junpei’s thinking, it’d all be solved with pretty basic effects. If Junpei’s internal dialogue is kept, add an echo to what supposed to be in his head. If they wanted to show things, tons of visual novels utilize visual effects and sounds to tell the player something happened. Like the “earthquake” line, they could have added some screen shake and a loud sound to show the player that something bad just happened. Part of me feels like they wanted to make everyone in the cast feel more included, but it makes a lot of original lines awkward
Honestly it probably had more to do with lack of budget. Easier to cut corners and slap something okay-ish together than to try and make the budget work with what they needed to do. They likely really didn't care much since the series didn't sell well in the first place. We're lucky af that they even decided to make the ports in the first place given the fact that we almost didn't even get ZTD.