AI: The Somnium Files is a 2019 visual novel you have probably heard about, if only because I have like ten unhinged posts about it on this blog. Initially described to me as "Ace Attorney but 18+," it's damn good and I WILL tell you why.
Before I go on though: this is the kind of game that is best experienced completely blind, so if you trust me, stop reading this right now and go to play it for yourself. If that's not enough to convince you however, worry not! I love talking about things I love.
That being said, while I normally I give the trigger warnings at the end of my manifestos, I’m hoping people will stop reading this post here and go play the game, I’ll give them upfront: the game features gore, eye trauma, background age gap relationships, background child neglect/abuse, and many many sex jokes.
Now, onto the manifesto proper.
The Premise
A woman’s corpse is found displayed on a Merr-Go-Round, her left eye gouged out. That sucks on its own, but this woman happens to be someone you, Kaname Date, special agent at the local police, used to know. Straight detective work isn’t normally what you do, but this case is personal.
Kaname Date?
That’s you! One handsome looking man! You’re missing your left eye, though you have no memory of how that happened- in fact, you don’t remember anything past six years ago. That’s fine though, they gave you a fancy prosthetic that doubles as an AI to help you do your job.
Your job?
As mentioned earlier, you’re not technically a detective. No; your job is to dive into people’s dreams. Dreams are made of unrestrained memories. By investigating dreams, you can pick up clues and secrets the subject might not even be aware of consciously.
The Gameplay
AI: The Somnium Files is, as I said earlier, a fancy visual novel. Most of the game will be about reading (or rather listening, the voice acting for this game is fantastic) characters banter and theorize about what’s happening. The cool thing though is that the route you will stumble in doesn’t depend, as for most visual novel, on choices you might pick in story- rather, they depend on how you handle Psynching.
Psynching is what it’s called when you dive into someone’s dreams. During those sections you will have to investigate various people’s memories, repressed trauma, and all that stuff. Depending on how you handle all that, you will learn different things, which will lead you to take different decisions. For exemple, in one Somnium, depending on what you do, you will either learn what the murder weapon was (so you will look for its owner) or a characteristic of the murderer (so you will look for people with that very trait.)
Psynching is a really fun mechanic because it’s not as straightforward as exploring people’s memories; you’re exploring dreams. Which are often distorted or exaggerated compared to reality. (One exemple is a Somnium that is entirely in black and white except for places associated with memories of one specific person, because she was quite literally the light of his life at a time where he had severe clinical depression.) Parsing out what someone has witnessed or done based on metaphorical depictions is half of your character’s job. It also makes for a really fun replay bonus, since you’ll pick up what this or that thing actually means now that you know what is actually going on.
So that’s my pitch on what AI: The Somnium Files is about. Why, then, should you play it?
The Plot
Kind of a given for a murder mystery game, but the story is masterfully crafted. Every route had me frantically adding new theories to conspiracy board, feeding me more and more clues as to what is going on. Some of my theories even turned out right, because while this is a game about pulling insane twists, it’s also one that properly foreshadow them. Every single event in this game, even the tiny ones that seem unrelated, are tied together into a web of joy and tragedy. You will weep for what could not be saved and you will cheer when you manage to keep someone alive.
The Characters
Let’s say it right off the bat: all the characters are weirdoes. You might think “maybe this one in the back is normal” NO. The one in the back is breeding cliones in the fridge.
That makes them all really endearing and, weirdly enough, realistic to me. They all have layers! They have their own lives and hobbies and backstory going on independently from you! Even the characters I love to hate have surprising depths to them. This also make for some stellar character interactions, as they each bounce off each other’s oddities in a delightful way. The dialogue in this game is hilarious generally speaking.
The Themes
Love me some themes and symbolisms. AI: The Somnium Files is a game, primarily, about love (It’s in the title! “Ai” means “Love” in Japanese) It’s about what love does a person, what a lack of love does to a person, what one would do for love (as in their loved ones) and what one would do for love (as in to get some some love) in a very broad way. There are characters who kind of suck but still rise as heroes for the sake of love, and characters who are generally good people doing awful things for love, and every shade in between and outside of that.
There’s also a recurring theme re: mental illness, how it affects a person, how to cope with it, how to help your loved ones through it, and while there are very interesting discussions to be had on whether or not this is well handled, I personally thought the subject was brought in in a much more nuanced and thoughtful way than I expected.
The Horror
While AI: The Somnium Files isn’t a horror games, it has some juicy horror moments. The dreams you dive in being more metaphorical than literal, it is very common for them to feature disturbing imagery that wouldn’t be very realistic- but it’s a dream, so we can go all out. (An early exemple goes to a witness of the Merry-Go-Round murder, whose dreams features the horses of said merry-go-round writhing in pain as if stabbed by the column going through them.)
While the dreamscapes have surreal horror going on, the real world also features copious amount of blood and gore and other horrifying elements. You will witness someone get bisected on-screen if you fuck up hard enough.
Additionally, some of the twists in the story recontextualizes a lot of the story in a horror way. Some endings that appear neutral or good become a lot more tragic as you uncover the mystery.
Perhaps not a selling point for some, but I personally enjoy when stories commit to what they’re doing, horror and silliness included, so the fact that they make a point to make it as fucked up as the situation calls pleases me
The Game Design
Ok I know this is a weird one to include in a manifesto to get people to play this game but bear with me. What is the single, most important feature a visual novel has? Think. What is the one thing they absolutely must pay attention to?
The answer is the skip button.
I’m not kidding. Visual novels are, by nature, games that are made to be replayed- you can only get the full story by exploring every route and gathering all the info as to who or what is everyone’s deal. But since visual novels are quite lengthy, it is imperative for them to have an easy way to skip the bits they’ve already seen- there is nothing more boring that reread 10 hours worth of gameplay three times in a row for maybe five hours of difference later on.
How does this tie back to AI:TSF, you ask? Easy.
AI: The Somnium Files has a feature that allows you to jump to any point of the story you’ve already seen. At any time. Instantly.
It is bliss. You don’t even have to hold the skip button as you redo the early game over and over- you can just jump right to the branch path and make a different decision! No need to make 267 save files to do the other routes. Hell, you can even jump to redo a scene you particularly liked ten years prior, and then jump right back to wherever you were at the time! God I love this feature. Wish more visual novels had it.
Conclusion
You should play AI: The Somnium Files. I tried to keep it mostly spoiler-free, hence why it’s a bit vague, but I hope it convinces at least one of you to give it a try the next time it’s on sale on Steam ^^