Re:Kinder

(warnings for childhood depression, death, just, just all the things, all the things all the time)

This review will get....a little unhinged. There will be what looks like spoilers but really aren't, because no context could explain what is going on here. I also want to recognize that that yes, I have given this neocities 2000's high-contrast filter lookin' anime abomination 5 stars, and yes, I completely believe it deserves it. Re:Kinder is artsy but not in a way that I can't recommend it to a wide audience-- It has a vibrant sense of humor that keeps you on your toes. The TLDR is that Re:Kinder is a mechanically impressive, well-designed psychological RPG that stays fresh and entertaining for it's entire run Watch out, this is about to be long. My sanity can't hold out for much longer.

FIRST PRINCESS: THE FLOW OF THE NIGHTMARE

The story starts off with our hero, the third-grader Shunsuke, cheerfully heading off to his grandparent's house. Whatever happened there isn't too exciting, so we just cut back to his return....And the town has gone to hell. His mother is dead, his neighbor has been zombified and trying to exit the town will result in a comical author-sent explosion. Shunsuke now must team up with a gang of surviving children to defeat three princesses and escape the nightmare that is the "Friend's Game".

This game, despite being made in 2004, feels great to play. Everything you need to succeed is right there-- Saving is always an option, the run button will send you flying about at light speed, the text skipping button is a welcome addition and there's even a final-boss insta-killer if you so wish. Children will die often but never in frustrating, nonsensical events. The map is small and you'll always know where to go. Re:Kinder doesn't want to hide anything from you, and it's miraculously better for it.

Oh man I sure hope everyone will get out okay :))

Let's address the battle system: The issue with battle systems in these kinds of games is usually that they get in the way of you and the story. Yes, I gotta get that big reveal but no, I don't really wanna play through half an hour of random encounters to get there. Games like (controversial opinion time) OFF and Undertale would've been fairly more engaging (to specifically me that is) if they would've lightened up on the RPG stuff, at least for the normal enemies. But Re:Kinder? That's the good shit. That's the kind of battle system that works.

RK-- with the exception of one segment-- has no random battles. All battles are staged within the story, and thus have strong emotional presence. There is no leveling up but you have unlimited use of your character specific abilities, which are not only reflective of each personality but are important keys to each fight. Blocking reduces damage by 75% and there are several fights that make this feature essential. Basically: Every battle is a puzzle, and you already have every piece.

There were only two segments in the game I googled some hints for-- The password in the apartments as well as the boss fight there-- But otherwise, I'd say the game is very generous with what it provides you. RK is an open book. There are points where it felt like I was missing something, but the answer was just cleverly hidden off in the menus. A very subtle form of meta.

Random shock deaths are common in the genre (Misao, anybody?) but RK graciously avoids them. There are three scenarios in which you may purposely end it all-- Leaving the town will result in an explosion, jumping off the bed in the hideout will have you diving through the floor, and sleeping in the suicide bed is....what it says on the tin. You can always say no. Except the suicide bed (I think the "yes" and "no" might've accidentally been switched in translation). Yet again, saving is plentiful and encouraged, so there's no progress to be lost.

SECOND PRINCESS: THE PERKS OF LATIN JAZZ

Very early into the game, one of the children die. It's a shocking moment where the characters, already filled with fear, struggle to react to the splatter of red in the phone booth. A friend is gone. It could've been prevented. It could've--

Suddenly, a spicy Latin beat plays.

Within every miserable epiphany, every heartbreak, every senseless tragedy .... is a whoopee cushion, waiting to make itself known.

Dark comedy is a difficult beast because it relies on the author's skill to communicate both genuine despair and human absurdity at the same time. It's very easy for one mood to overtake the other, or with the two feelings to never truly mix. Humor is subjective. Despair is personal. But personally, subjectively, I think RK hit it's mark with a fucking bazooka.

There are scenes where an abused child relays their memory of catching their father cheating which also reveals said father has an adult baby kink, which is then followed by some very astute observations of a child's role in a broken family but also dramatic tellanovella music has been blasting in the background the entire time... Layers of sadness are drenched in out-of-left-field comedy to such a degree that the two become inextricably tied. Chatting with the characters and exploring the rooms is always fun because you'll always get a good slap in the face. The misery never leaves, but neither does the humor. This is true to (somehow, in someway, for better and for the best) the very end.

PRINCESS 3: ANIME PEAKED IN THE 2000'S

We gotta address it. The presentation.

This game has deviantart anime character portraits with default RPG maker assets slapped on top of jpegs with anachronistic music shooting off at all times. To me, this is a beautiful thing. To others, it is understandably not. "Polished" is not a word I'd use to describe RK's aesthetics. But I have to say, isn't there something to love about the way the png's still retain their crusty white borders? Or how side profile walking sprites are somehow missing an eye? How everything looks like I shaded it with my mouse in GIMP?

There are some genuinely pretty vistas and the changing of mediums add a nice surreal element. You have all the ingredients, so why not just put everything into the blender? In the end, the game's look is for you to judge. I know I adore it.

YUUICHI: IT'S TOO LATE TO BE A PRINCESS

Yuuichi is the comical, nonsensical antagonist kid with a shit-eating grin. He might be one of the most accurate depictions of depression I've ever seen.

Depression in games (especially indie games) isn't as uncommon as it used to be. Everybody has their trauma and is trying to express it however they can. A teenager's depression, a young adult's hopelessness or a middle aged man's isolation are subjects you can find often in if not games, then books or movies.

But what about a child?

Children are often viewed from a peculiar outside perspective. They are things to protect, to control, to tend to and keep. In video games, they're normally an emotional lynch pin. But a child's tragedy is rarely ever tragic because of their own damaged psyche-- It's the guardian figure whose emotional state is prioritized. RK circumvents this by simply....murdering all the adults. The only evidence of their existence remains in the minds of the children, who now take center stage.

The moment I knew I was playing something special was when the youngest girl, Aya, says "One day, everything tasted like sand". It's a very real statement that could only come from somebody who has experienced the same thing. The lack of eating, the excessive sleeping, the sluggishness, the blank look, the urge to not die but "simply disappear". The constant exclamations of "it's pointless" and "I'm tired" that signify not sadness, but....nothingness. Because depression isn't just tears. It's a void that has no rhyme or reason.

Something I didn't mention before is that in the world of RK, mental illness is not considered real. Because of this, many of the adults in the story suffer untreated. The children grow up asking questions about such a mysterious illness, but are never taken seriously. Hospitals don't do a thing. It's an interesting detail that puts us in square in the place of kids-- I know that I myself as a child never realized that such a strange thing could exist, or even that it could exist within me in that moment. It wasn't until late high school that I begun to hear the words "depression" and "dissociation". How are you supposed to function in a world where you are unequipped, in both mind and body, to understand what is happening? And why it won't stop?

Aya's parents are divorced and the she's just moved to town, but it's implied that these are not the complete causes of her condition. She has depression because... She does. It happened. There's not a real explanation, but that's just how it works. Yuuichi, on the other hand, deals with his illness in a completely different way and boy! Do we love to see it!

The little bastard enters and exits with Latin music and explosions, shouting vamos cantar! to lighten up the mood after a brutal murder. He has violent mood swings amid moments of helplessness, he plays games while calling out for help. His traumatic home situation has twisted the way he expresses his feelings. He dreams of being reborn as princess so he can fall in love with a boy and be swept away from his life. Not understanding your own mind, your own queerness, or how your home has shaped you is the perfect recipe for a self-perpetuating trauma machine. First stop: "Fuck it, I don't care about the consequences are for the living!"

The children of RK are funny in the way of crude adults but tragic in the way of young kids. Yuuichi is a constant source of left-field humor, but his negative emotions are always taken seriously. The entire game is one big, confused cry for help and it's dictated by this messed up kid's fluctuating dopamine levels.

He's funny, he's tragic. And he's that way until the very end.

Komm, süsser Tod OR: A promise I will make to myself

The True Ending of the game elicited a series of emotional reactions that made me wonder if I was experiencing the right reality or if I had hopped to a different one. I was getting teary, only to be hit by a freight train of "what the fuck?" and end on a comforting, down-to-earth goodbye. The ending words do not aim to explain away the magical shenanigans nor does it go into depth on the future of the characters. Instead it ends with Shunsuke making a simple promise: "I will be kinder to myself."

I took a moment to figure out if I really liked that final scene or if it was stepping over itself too much. It was pretty whacky, after all. The answer came through ugly crying.

Re:Kinder is a game that offers no answers to the question of whether you should live or die. Another RPG maker game, Azusa 999, tried and failed with it's answers-- "People will miss you!" or "It'll get better!"-- and ended up looking painfully niave. For Yuuichi, there is nobody left to miss him. For Yuuichi, there's no guarantee it'll get better. So, in the face of such emptiness, what can you do? There is no fix-all, just the simple, heartfelt resolve to day by day, treat yourself a little kinder than you did before.

The game can be downloaded for free here.

A sort of memorial page for the creator, Parun.