Tsukikage no Simulacre - This was actually quite scary. Kurenai!
Tsukikage no Simulacre (月影のシミュラクル) is a mystery/horror visual novel developed by Applique and released in 2016. Originally an all-ages title, it was later converted into a more traditional visual novel with the re-release subtitled Kaihou no Hane. I played this back in 2018, but it is probably one of the visual novels that has remained the most vivid in my mind due to its setting.
The story follows Seiichi Uzuki, who receives an invitation letter from his cousin, Rei Kisaragi, to come back to his family home in the countryside to oversee a mysterious ceremony held there every few years. Seiichi agrees and returns to the rural town of Izawa, where he is also reunited with his childhood friends, Shinobu and Miyu.
The ceremony seems to focus on a "fake marriage" between one member of the family (Seiichi, in this case) and an extremely realistic doll that heavily resembles his cousin Rei. Seiichi was asked to perform this role because the current head of the family (Seiichi's father, Kanesada) is unable to do so after sustaining heavy injuries in a fire years before the story began.
As Seiichi arrives and the initial preparations for the ceremony start, he begins to see that things are more complicated. At night, he apparently meets a woman wearing the same clothes as the doll, but she is actually alive. Questions begin to surface in his mind. Is this Rei trying to play a prank on him? Or is the doll really coming to life?
As the story progresses, people start dying in the mansion, and Seiichi is hard-pressed to find the culprit behind the murders. Since the mansion is far away from the city, it is difficult for him to find a way to escape with the other residents. What is the secret of the mansion? Is the doll really alive, or is someone else playing games to hide their crimes?
There are various elements that need to be analyzed, and the visual novel does an amazing job of giving you more and more information as you explore the various routes (there are many different endings) while trying to find the way to the "True End" of the story. There are a copious number of Bad Ends in the game, but all of them add new hints that can be useful for speculating about the events.
You will start to doubt everyone in the mansion, as they all seem to have motives to do something bad. It could be Rei because she is exactly identical to the doll, the maid Kazuha wanting revenge for the death of her parents in the fire, or even Rei's father, whose bandaged face we never see.
Everything seems to have started on that fateful day with the huge fire years ago. There are various other pieces of information that you learn immediately, but it takes a long time to piece them all together. For example, we have Shinobu investigating the death of her mother years before the beginning of the story, which seems completely unrelated to the main plot.
To help with this quest, the game has a built-in flowchart system that allows you to see where the story is supposed to branch out at various stages and lets you jump in and out of specific moments. Of course, you will still have to figure out the right choices to unlock those other branches.
I remember that I was genuinely scared by the story in the first few days, despite being an adult myself. It is not about what is happening, but about what is implied and never seen. The visual novel is a master at making you fear the unknown without actually showing anything gruesome at all.
Tsukikage no Simulacre is a strong recommendation from me. The story is solid and extremely immersive, and the short length (11 hours for me) makes it a great candidate for a weekend of fun.
