The visual novel is a non-canon follow up to the movie “The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya” but you don’t have to really watch the movie to play the game since it recaps it, and picks up the story from the end of the movie. It is recommended to watch the series up to now. Like in Haruhi Promise, you have to go around the school and ask your fellow classmates, in this case, cast members from the Haruhi Series questions about what's going on and choose the topics wisely if you want to progress through the story. There are many references for older Haruhi fans to enjoy in this game.
Kyon gets stuck in the same alternate universe as in the movie, and he has to find a way to escape or else he’ll be stuck in another endless loop. There is a lot of back tracking so keep in mind you may have to replay different routes over and over again.
There's a lot of different endings in the game about 21 of them to get so there is going to be a good amount of replay value. Sometimes you may have to revisit and start over a part just to advance the story so do keep that in mind. In addition, a lot of minigames like the endless eight is where you are placed in a Final Fantasy style JRPG battles where you fight endless waves of enemies.
The game has a lot of different branching paths depending on the route you choose and the dialogue choices you made. You can also bookmark certain points in the story so you can explore other routes as well. Be careful on which decisions you make or else you will be through another endless 8. Each day is divided into multiple parts and you can choose what you would like to do on that day.
One mini game is called Kisekae Block Kuzushi which is basically block buster and you can choose any of the 3 backgrounds from Yuki, Haruhi or Mikuru while you break the blocks.
The next mini game you have is Yuki #365 ichi where you watch Yuki tell the time and do various things. Nothing really much to do but look.
You can also decorate the room Yuki occupies and if it's your birthday, Yuki will wish you a happy birthday.
The original voice cast is back to reprise their roles. The upgraded animation and expressions for the PS3 were really great while the 3D graphics looked awesome. The artstyle and background designs are superb as well.
The visual novel was an overall pretty good addition to the series.
It gets 4 out of 5 stars.
Hopefully the light novels after the disapearance arc will be adapted by Kyoto animation as no other studio but them could do this.
And also to end this review on a high note, happy 3 years of rogue otaku gamer!!! and ALL HAIL YUKI NAGATO!!!!!
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