Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE was one of the better story-driven games of 2023. It had all the tense mystery-solving and minigames gamers would expect from the Danganronpa series but with a slick Unreal Engine 4 presentation with fully animated 3D character models cinematography.
On the Nintendo Switch hardware, Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE stressed the console to its limits with its impressive shaders, textured materials, and atmospheric effects while also having many characters on screen at any moment. The game ran as well as one could hope, but the biggest drag in the experience was the load times that were frequent enough that their length was felt longer than they were.
On PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, can Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE be everything it was meant to be? How are the bonus DLC scenarios? It was always an awesome game, but how much better can it be? Find out in our Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus review!
Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus
Developer: Spike Chunsoft, Too Kyo Games
Publisher: Spike Chunsoft
Platforms: Windows PC, Nintendo Switch (as Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE), Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 (reviewed)
Release Date: October 1, 2024
Price: $59.99
Kanai Ward is a city suffocating under the despotic control of the Amaterasu Corporation. This company, a monstrous conglomerate with tentacles reaching into every aspect of life, dominates the town like a tyrannical overlord. At the heart of this corporate dystopia lies the Peacekeepers, the Amaterasu Corporation’s ruthless security force.
They control the flow of information, suppressing the truth and ensuring that the company’s narrative reigns supreme. With no independent detectives to investigate crimes or uncover the truth, Kanai Ward is a city filled with unsolved mysteries and the ghosts of those who have been wronged.
Kanai Ward is a city trapped in eternal gloom, where the rain never ceases and the sun never rises. It’s an industrial cyberpunk dystopia that feels like Midgar as imagined by the venerable Danganronpa designers. Neon signs and graffiti mix languages like Cyrillic, English, and Japanese, illustrating a globalist tyranny.
Everywhere you look, there is either vulgar decadence or bleak despair. Kanai Ward is a city of extremes; areas can be as dark and dank as a dungeon or lit up in glaring ostentatious signs. The oppressive atmosphere is palpable like you must watch over your shoulder and wipe the constant rain from your face.
Kanai Ward is nearly isolated from the rest of the world. No one has cell phones, and the internet is unusable due to severe interference. This won’t deter the World Detective Organization from sending their top talent to investigate. Unfortunately, most of them were assassinated on the train journey.
Yuma Kokohead is one of the few who made it into Kanai Ward. The problem is, he’s not a master detective like the others. In fact, he can’t remember anything about himself. However, he has a natural talent for investigation. Unlike other master detectives, who possess a “Forensic Forte” (a kind of superpower), Yuma has no apparent special ability. Thankfully, he has made a pact with a death god.
Shinigami are often depicted as deathly abominations, but this particular Shinigami is quite sexy. She usually appears as a floating purple nodule with horns, but when Yuma needs to solve a mystery, she transforms into a stunning beauty that would make even the Ultimate Despair envious.
The mechanics of the mystery dimension are as ludicrous as they are fascinating. When more mysteries remain unsolved, people are more likely to resort to murder. Labyrinths appear whenever a crime occurs, and Yuma must uncover the truth by interpreting abstract representations of the crime through various minigame modules.
Yuma isn’t here to administer justice. The fact is, there is no justice in Kanai Ward and there may very well never be justice. The best Yuma can do is discover the truth with the help of Shinigami. When deducing who the killer is from the inside of the mystery dimension, Shinigami administers her own brand of justice and takes his or her soul; like a reverse Death Note.
Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus’ story is as gripping and twisted as fans of the Danganronpa games would hope for. Ingenious seeds are sown, with shocking payoffs later. Many characters are not always as they appear, and it seems as though anyone could die. Players will feel as if they are in a state of constant doubt, and when they let their guard down, something truly bad can and will happen.
The narrative is some of the finest mystery writing in video games, but it does have some flaws. Like with many visual novel games, Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus is still plagued by excessive aizuchi dialogue. It is understandable since this is a Japanese game and certain cultural aspects are unavoidable, but in RAIN CODE, it gets out of hand and needlessly pads out already long dialogue scenes.
The filler dialogue not only slows things down but also features numerous instances of information being repeated in consecutive scenes. This creates a sense of repetition, making viewers question the significance of certain scenes, as Kodaka’s games typically feature very deliberate moments.
While the pacing of the dialogue can be overly drawn out or repetitive at times, the writing is genuinely witty and sharp. The dialogue is full of hilarious lines that are perfectly delivered by the cast members, all of whom sound natural and well-suited to their roles. Yuma, the lead, is convincing as a naive and youthful junior detective.
The meat of Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus’ gameplay is exploring Kanai Ward and making sense of bizarre killings. When entering the mystery labyrinth, the gameplay shifts to various kinds of setpieces and minigames like the ones used in Danganronpa.
The deathmatches are a highlight and are a little bit like Punchout-style debates in the killing games’ trials. Yuma can side-step, duck, jump, or slash away at distracting information, but he must attack the lie with the truth in the form of a sword. Other sequences involve reconstructing the murder and figuring out the order of events or enduring a gauntlet of quick-time events where the player has to choose the correct prompt.
Some holdovers from Danganronpa return, such as the final denouement manga reconstruction but with some modifications to eliminate the guesswork that made them troublesome. Even the dreaded hangman’s gambit returns, but it’s a lot easier to figure out the correct word since players can get hints, and letters can be grouped for easier conclusions.
Understanding the environment of the murder scenes is crucial to solving the killings. Observing characters’ behavior is also essential for identifying the killer and their motive. As the story unfolds, the solutions always seem tantalizingly close, on the brink of revelation.
Jun Fukuda and Masafumi Takada’s soundtrack perfectly captures the mood with its smoldering jazz and trip-hop elements. The music flawlessly complements Kania Ward’s noirish atmosphere, and Euro house influences add intensity during moments of panic and mania.
RAIN CODE Plus on PlayStation 5 runs at a perfect 60 frames per second and has razor-sharp image quality. This was always a very lurid and intense-looking game to go along with the high-stakes drama and the aggressive imagery looks as good as it possibly can. While the visuals will look great no matter which version you play, the added fluidity does give the PlayStation 5 and Series X|S versions an edge.
More importantly than the frame rate, RAIN CODE Plus‘ load times have been drastically reduced. The original version on Switch had players trek all over Kanai Ward during cases and even with fast travel it could be tedious to sit through the load screens frequently. As expected, RAIN CODE Plus on PlayStation 5 brute forces through the load times so fast that the load screens are blink-and-you’ll-miss-it.
Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus also comes with five bonus DLC chapters. While they are entertaining, and further flesh out the rest of the WDO agents and Yakou in their own side stories, they are very brief and each one is less than an hour long. These extra stories were ultimately unnecessary in the grand scheme of the plot and hardly felt worth it. At best, they give some backstory and explain the characters slightly more.
If you have a hankering for some mystery-solving with a strange and fun cast of characters, cheeky puzzles, and light fan service, then Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus will deliver on all fronts. It looks better than ever and has less downtime while exploring Kanai Ward’s soaked and dank streets.
Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus was reviewed on a PlayStation 5 using a copy purchased by Niche Gamer. You can find additional information about Niche Gamer’s review/ethics policy here. Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE Plus is now available for Windows PC (via Steam), Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S, and PlayStation 5.
