VN mini review: Chaos;Head

From VNDB :

“Takumi is a high school student. He is withdrawn and is not interested in 3D things. In his town, a mysterious serial murder case happens and people get panicked. One day, when he chats on the internet, a man suddenly contacts him and gives him a URL. He goes to the website and finds a blog image that suggests a next murder case…. On the next day, it really happens…. ”

The title says Chaos;Head, and the game is really chaotic. That is to be expected, since the protagonist is a schizophrenic and all. The copious amounts of insanity and gore forms a really odd kind of juxtaposition with the colorful girls and their “moe” settings. It didn’t work at all in the anime, but I’d say that in the game the atmosphere was pulled off very well. The plot, convoluted as it is, is also surprisingly addicting to read, although I didn’t like the characters much (there is pretty much no character development outside the protagonist). The plot progresses as the reader controls the protagonist’s delusions and sense of self. It’s a novel system, but one that is implemented well. I only played to the end of the A and AA routes, not the B route. I am a bit curious, but the way that the game mechanic is designed makes replays quite annoying (if you try to skip, you skip through the chaos triggers, or the choices, without stopping).

I strongly dislike Mutsumi Sasaki’s character designs, and Kozue in particular had just a horrendously freaky face. The Nitro+ CG team did save it a bit, but then the 3D backgrounds didn’t help at all. On the other hand, there are certainly a lot of CGs, and a lot of special effects to spice things up. The BGM was just ok, but I love the opening and insert songs, by Kanako Itou and Sakakibara Yui respectively.

Overall, Chaos;Head is definitely a VN with flaws, but more than enough good points to overcome them. Recommended for people who like their raburabu in convoluted and non-raburabu ways.