Summers of Horror Romance: 7'Scarlet and World End Syndrome

[echoslam]

I've wanted to do a writeup of my experience playing these two visual novels since ages ago, but never got around to it until now. They have a special place in my heart, and I've always wanted to talk about the connection between them because it's something I've never seen discussed at length anywhere else.

Some background: 7'Scarlet and World End Syndrome are both billed as horror visual novels with romance elements. In 7'Scarlet, the protagonist is female and the love interests are male, while in World End Syndrome you play as a male protagonist and the love interests are female.

The games are both written and directed by Tomio Kanazawa* but differ in their art direction.

*(who also produced Deadly Premonition, which is another of my favorite examples of slice of life-y horror with a touch of jankiness)

7'Scarlet's character designer is Chinatsu Kurahana of Fire Emblem: Three Houses and Uta no Prince Sama fame. The game was originally released for the PS Vita in 2016.

World End Syndrome's character designs are by Yuki Kato, known for the BlazBlu fighting game series. It was released for Switch and PS4 in 2018.

World End Syndrome was recommended to me by a friend, and I believe it was the first game I ever played on my Switch (along with Untitled Goose Game, lul). They thought it would be the kind of thing I would enjoy, and indeed it was!

With 7'Scarlet, I definitely feel that I was primed for maximum enjoyment. Some years after finishing World End Syndrome, I got 7'Scarlet on super sale and started playing it, not knowing anything other than that it was an otome game with mystery elements. Before I was halfway through the prologue I was already going, "Yoooo this is the same story!!" (well not quite as I'll explain).

I was so amused by the fact that I seemed to coincidentally be playing the prototype of something I'd already finished before. IMO, there's fun to be had in a twice-told tale, and I relished being able to play "spot the difference" with the plot and characters.

It's very clear that World End Syndrome is wholly derived from 7'Scarlet. The story beats are much the same, and the characters, while not being exact one-to-one mirrors, definitely originated from the same drawing board.

However! One thing that really kept the playthrough interesting was that the plot twists are different! In fact, while playing 7'Scarlet I was completely blinsided because a certain plot device was used on a different character than the one I had anticipated based on my WES playthrough.

The settings are also slightly different. Okunezato is a remote hot spring resort town in the mountains while Mihate is on the coast.

The horror in both games revolves around the fear of the living dead who come to roam the town during the summer season. In 7'Scarlet these beings are referred to as Revenants or "shisha" - literally "the dead", and they come down from a chasm in the mountains, whereas in World End Syndrome they originate from the sea and are specifically called Yomibito.

There are also gameplay differences. 7'Scarlet is a straightforward VN with dialogue choices as the only form of interactivity. World End Syndrome is a stat raiser, and you up each girl's affection by going to certain locations on the map on particular days and spending time with them if they're available. WES is also a somewhat more polished game and has a few nice bonus features, like sidequests that can be completed over the course of the story and a more detailed, nicely illustrated UI.

So how else do they compare? The cast of characters map onto each other practically 1 to 1 with only a few exceptions

Both games contain:

-A kuudere love interest
-A tsundere love interest
-An idol love interest and their overbearing manager
-A guy who runs a cafe by himself
-A hypercompetent young teen who just wants to be treated like an adult
-A novelist
-An obnoxious photographer
-A flashy panda mascot (World End Syndrome utilizes theirs a lot more)
-A dude voiced by Sawashiro Chiharu

More stuff:

Both games love dropping literary quotes for Vibes: In 7'Scarlet, the game opens with the tagline "To say goodbye is to die a little" from Raymond Chandler's The Long Goodbye. Analogously, World End Syndrome closes out with "They were good days. Yes, they were good days" from Curtain, the final Hercule Poirot novel by Agatha Christie

As for more similarities in narrative, both have:

-A lighhearted riverside barbeque scene with all the LIs
-A reveal about the protagonist
-An intro featuring a picturesque ride to the town
-A creepy "something is watching me" scene in the prologue
-An amusing tongue-in-cheek glossary section (a fave part of both games for me)
-A title screen that features one of the VAs ominously whispering the name of the game at you

Additionally, the intro theme song in 7'Scarlet is actually titled "World End Syndrome".

Unfortunately, the PC port of 7'Scarlet also has some pretty bad performance issues and would crash regularly, which was annoying. I did manage to finish it without too much backtracking on account of being neurotic about making saves.

I do have a soft spot for 7'Scarlet's protagonist Ichiko and find her underrated, especially in the context of what gets revealed about her backstory. Love me a reckless heroine. One thing I've seen is that her eyes are kind of memed on for being creepy looking (they are Edelgard's eyes...)

And although it definitely strains credulity, the childhood first love stuff is just the kind of silly bullshit that I enjoy. Oh, and it was extremely satisfying to finally find out what 7'Scarlet actually means.

The games had great atmosphere, and I really adored that aesthetic of hot summer days, sipping tons of mugicha and having emotional moments where cicadas cry. The romance was icing on the cake, but I would have to say it takes a backseat to the plot in both titles.

Overall, I had great time with these mysteries, and the True Endings of both games made me cry. I definitely think that the experience of playing and comparing the two enhanced my appreciation for what each of them does well.