Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club Switch Review

Gameplay

Graphics

Audio

Value

Summary: Emio – The Smiling Man tells a thrilling and engaging story. It’s a visual novel, so don’t expect complex gameplay there – and I’m sure you’ll be satisfied.

3.5

Addictive detective

Mario and Kirby don’t excite me, and I tend to officially admit that I don’t like Switch exclusives. But I change my mind from time to time. Like now. Thanks to Emio – The Smiling Man, I started to adore Ninny’s console again.

Famicom Detective Club is a series of adventure games which launched in 1988. Emio is a fourth entry. The story revolves around a string of murders involving a mysterious killer who wears a paper bag with a smile on his head and also decorates his victims this way. We follow a young detective and his assistant, who need to catch the murderer and solve the case.

I know that no one is perfect, but I think that the main character could be a bit deeper: he appears to be entirely stripped of personality. He doesn’t even have a name – we need to type it down by ourselves. This probably aims to help us identify with the hero, but if the hero lacks any traits whatsoever, there is no chance to identify with him at all.

The Smiling Man is a visual novel. This suggests that you won’t find unique mechanics or complex gameplay there. What we actually do in the title, is interrogating characters, browsing through notes and searching locations. For in-game control, we use a panel on the left side of the screen. It contains such commands as “ask/listen”, “look/examine” and “think”.

Although sometimes the investigative process requires trial and error, the likelihood that we’ll seriously get stuck at any point is little to none. The game has a non-pushy clue system: when we start to go astray, the character shyly indicates the correct command. This helps us avoid unnecessary frustration and focus entirely on the story.

And the story in Emio is totally gripping, strangely mesmerizing and overwhelmingly engaging. I like both the thrilling topic and the way the plot unfolds. Once I started playing this title, I couldn’t tear myself away from the screen. The narrative haunted my imagination and I couldn’t help myself – I carried the console around with me. Thankfully it was just a Switch; with PS5 this wouldn’t be so easy.

“Where am I?”, “Why I’m there?” and “Who are they?” are important existential questions which many of us ask ourselves sooner or later. But most often such inquiries arise when we return to a game after several months and we try to work out what is going on there. This is not the case with Emio. Not only because the title is so captivating that you’ll want to know the ending as soon as possible.

The game may recap the narrative to the point we stopped. And we can read the synopsis every time we return to the story. It’s a simple – though immeasurably helpful – feature.

Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club looks beautiful and charming. Some of the locations in the game are so picturesque that they could be printed as postcards. The screen remains static for the most part, but characters move and their facial expression changes. If you like the anime style, you’ll certainly love this title.

The player’s actions are accompanied by atmospheric music. Apart from that, we hear voices in Japanese. Normally I don’t mind playing Japanese games with Japanese dubbing, though of course I understand no word. But what I find problematic in Emio, is the quality of voices. I don’t mean actors – they actually do their best. The issue seems to be purely technical: sometimes protagonists sound as if they fell into a well. I hear a strange echo in the background.

Final thoughts

Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club is a shining gem amongst interactive novels. I greatly enjoyed the narrative and visuals in this title. On the other hand, the main protagonist seems to be quite shallow, and the well where the voiceover was recorded appears way too deep – but these flaws don’t spoil the overall gaming experience.

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