Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
It’s time to get your detective boots on,
because we’re about to take a delve into a world of mystery, kidnapping, and
goofy shenanigans! Kaname Date and the gang are back in the latest Somnium
Files game. Forced to play an escape room game for their very lives, will they
perish, or will they use their third eye to open a path forward! Time to find
out in No Sleep for Kaname Date!
I should preface this by letting you know
that if you haven’t played either of the first two games, there are both
spoilers and probably some confusing moments you’ll come across in No Sleep for
Kaname Date. A sort of “Somnium Files 1.5”, this game takes place between the
original Somnium Files and Nirvana Initiative. Seriously though, you should
probably at least play the first game before coming to this one. Adding some
escape room style challenges in the style of the Zero Escape series, a series
also produced by Spike Chunsoft, No Sleep for Kaname Date will see the cast of
characters alternating between trips into the Somniums (mental subconciousness) of various characters
and doing room escape puzzles.
No Sleep for Kaname Date starts out rolling
with Iris, a local internet celebrity/streamer, being kidnapped by aliens
(maybe)! She is challenged to escape the spaceship using only her wits and the
tools around her by a mysterious being who claims to be an alien. Thankfully
she can call on someone for help, and who better than Kaname Date! Ok, maybe
there are a lot of better options, but at least he’ll try his best. So the game
begins as Iris and other kidnappees must escape, while Kaname Date must figure
out who has kidnapped them. As mysteries and egos collide, can you figure out
the mastermind behind the kidnapping and help Iris escape?
Largely speaking, No Sleep for Kaname Date
is pretty much what Nirvana Initiative was like just with added room escape
sequences and less investigations. While you will be traveling to different
locations as Kaname Date and interacting with people and environments, you will
also be delving into people’s subconscious through psyncing with them. That is a
process where a person will enter someone else’s subconscious mind to try and
find out the hidden secrets they have. The psyncing has remained the same as
Nirvana Initiative, where you have a set amount of time to explore the subjects
mind. You must interact with objects, perform actions, and break the mental
locks on the subjects secrets so they might be revealed to you. Each
interaction will cost time, and some interactions will give you a Timie, which
acts as a modifier to the time cost as a one-off usage. Your goal in these
segments is to get some sort of indication or information to help you solve the
case.
On the other hand, the escape room games
are, for the most part, not timed and you will be investigating items around
the room you’re trapped in and solve puzzles to help you escape. I’m glad to
say that the escape game puzzles are, predominantly, very reasonable. One of my
biggest issues in escape game style puzzles is when a puzzle is given with a
solution that requires some sort of external knowledge or has some subtle
solution that is counterintuitive or doesn’t match with what is available for
your understanding. Spike Chunsoft has done really well with this in the past,
and I’m happy to say that there aren’t any puzzles that require solutions so
out of left field they are only solvable if you happen upon the answer by
chance. There were only two puzzles that stumped me for a bit, one was a poor
wording choice, but not incorrect, and the other was something I was just
solving in a different manner that wasn’t the intended solution. Both are at
least reasonable, so no worries there!
If you are having issues, whether in the
Somniums or escape room puzzles, there are different difficulty settings you
can choose. For the Somniums, you can select a difficulty before starting, and
after completing one you can choose an “unlimited time” mode to see all the
interactions and get all the collectibles. Although you can’t use this for the
“finish with more than 0 seconds remaining” challenge, easier difficulties
reduce the time penalties from choices, meaning these goals are a little
easier. For the escape room sequences, easier difficulties mean you can scan
the room for interactable points, get more hints, and increase the time limit
for any portions where you are on a timer. Honestly, the variety of different
difficulties is really great for players who struggle with one mode or the
other while still maintaining the gameplay you want.
The soundtrack and graphics for the Somnium
Files games have always been pretty decent, and thankfully the game runs well
on the Switch, even in handheld mode. While some of the character models may be
a little…chunky, let’s say, in handheld mode, the performance was still really
good and I never had any crashes, stuttering, or other performance issues. The
soundtrack is a lot of reused pieces from the other games, but it still works
here, and why change something that works well? There are new and old environments
to explore, and the escape rooms are some interesting designs to check out.
While No Sleep for Kaname Date is
definitely on the shorter side, requiring a lot less time than either of the
previous games in the series, probably about half the time to complete, it is a
lot more exciting and a lot more player involvement and has a lot less
exposition. While I could figure out the plotline pretty easily from the
beginning, there are still some twists and turns, and it isn’t a boring
direction. Additionally, there are a lot of alternate ending routes you can
find, which are usually pretty funny and can range from serious shootouts to
Date deciding to go on extended vacation instead of solving the case.
Overall, No Sleep for Kaname Date is a
really enjoyable addition the Somnium Files series. The addition of the escape
room style sequences is a nice addition and were well put together, and the
Somniums were interesting with just as many gag interactions as I’ve come to
expect and love from the series. While this entry is definitely shorter than
the rest, that doesn’t mean it’s any less fun. If you’ve played either of the
other two games, I highly recommend you check out No Sleep for Kaname Date!
Score: 8.5 / 10
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