CHAOS;CHILD

About CHAOS;CHILD

CHAOS;CHILD is a visual novel by MAGES. Inc., part of the Science Adventure series alongside STEINS;GATE and CHAOS;HEAD NOAH, with a stand-alone story and a new cast. In English it came to PlayStation 4 in October 2017, published by PQube, and to Steam in January 2019, published by Spike Chunsoft. It is also sold on GOG and, since October 2022, on Nintendo Switch.

It is October 2015, six years after a huge earthquake nearly levelled Shibuya. Takuru Miyashiro, an arrogant senior and president of his school's newspaper club, is researching a string of recent deaths when he realises they are a return of the killings that plunged Shibuya into terror six years before. At the same time people called gigalomaniacs, who can make their delusions real, are beginning to awaken.

Most of the game is reading, with voiced Japanese dialogue and English text. At certain moments the delusion trigger lets you choose a positive or negative delusion, pushing Takuru into a pleasant daydream or a disturbing nightmare, and these choices change the course of the investigation and his relationships. The second mechanic is the mapping trigger: at the newspaper club's cork board, with its map of Shibuya, you collect notes and crime scene data and answer questions about the murders. The makers list six endings. Noisy Pixel's reviewer found the first ending took over twenty hours, and all of it upwards of fifty. The horror is in the crime scenes, which are shown in graphic still images and detailed text, and in the slow loss of trust in what Takuru sees.

It suits readers of long Japanese mystery and horror visual novels such as Higurashi or Raging Loop. Be warned that the content rating lists strong gore, torture, sexual material and nudity.

How to play CHAOS;CHILD

1. Buy CHAOS;CHILD on Steam or GOG for Windows, on the PlayStation Store for PS4, or on the Nintendo eShop for Switch.
2. Start a new game and advance the text with a click, a key or the controller.
3. When the delusion trigger appears, choose a positive or negative delusion to shape what Takuru imagines.
4. At the mapping trigger, use the cork board in the newspaper club to collect notes on the murders and answer questions about the case.
5. After your first ending, replay with different choices to reach the other endings.

Tips

• Keep a few save files at different points; your choices change which ending you reach.
• Read the case notes and the map of Shibuya as you go; they help you keep the many deaths and names straight.
• Try both kinds of delusion; the Noisy Pixel review notes many are short, often comic asides, but which ones you take shapes the later routes.
• Expect a long read with dark content from early on; check the content warnings before you start.

Questions