A Visual Novel Masquerading as an Adventure Game
Released September 5th, 2025, Shuten Order (Shuten Kyodan) claims to the be the “ultimate adventure game” on its website. Shuten Order is the collaborative work of Too Kyo Games and DMM Games, with development by Neilo and published by Spike Chunsoft Co., Ltd. This collaborative piece had a positive reception, but with time reviews became more mixed. Shuten Order is an outlandish game with bold characters and themes. These complex themes combined with the self-proclaimed five-in-one adventure means expectations for Shuten Order are astronomical.
To make this review as impartial as possible, I entered the game with no prior research. The only knowledge of the plot I had was the description given by Steam. Let’s see if Shuten Order can convert us to their ways. Will we pray for the end of the world, or just the end of this game?
Shuten Order is a unique story of religious devotion, hereticism, and betrayal. The game begins with a shocking opening scene, as dismembered remains fall from the sky onto a dystopian city. We watch from a distorted perspective as limbs rain down to earth, a single witness looking on with delighted confusion. Thus the prologue begins. We wake as protagonist Rei Shimobe, in a strange hotel room with no memories. With the assistance of two self-proclaimed angels, Rei discovers that they were the Founder of the religious cult – Shuten Order. The same Founder whose fragmented body parts were scattered across the Central Park in the introduction. Revived by divine power, Rei’s current body is only temporary.
To complete her resurrection she must complete God’s Trial and solve the her own murder. She has only four days before her temporary body dissolves and she experiences a true death. The suspects? The Ministers of the Shuten Order – the five people with the access, knowledge, and skill to commit the murder. The consequences? In 168 days, the world will end unless she can crack the case.
The narrative of Shuten Order is one of the most unique storylines I’ve ever played. It explores themes of theology and fate, as well as agency in organised religion. Despite the complex undertones of morality and misguided virtues, the high-level plot is still riveting and packed with action and humour. A minimum of thirty two hours commitment is required to complete the game (according to How long is Shuten Order? | HowLongToBeat). I, however, an employed so this was spread out over multiple weeks. For a visual novel game this can get tedious, so patience is required to progress the story. As a player who absolutely loved the narrative and was invested in the outcome, even I had moments of frustration with some scenes.
Visual design of the game is stunning. The illustrations are bold and impactful, fully conveying the stakes and emotion of each scene. Characters designs are unique and memorable, their appearances starkly reflecting their personalities. The bright and cheerful colouring is a complete contrast to the story’s themes. This creates a dystopian feeling of forced normalcy in an oppressive society. Colours are also used for easy distinction of dialogue. Our character’s internal thoughts are written in blue, all spoken dialogue in black, and words spoken with emphasis in orange.
Following the prologue, the game branches into five paths – one for each potential suspect. Each suspect comes with a different game system and varying game mechanics. Choosing Inumgi Kishiru, for example, entails a point-and-click detective story where you piece together clues to solve a series of murders. Other game systems include escape rooms and multi-perspective horror. Regardless of the game mechanic, Shuten Order continuously surprised me with the plot twists in each storyline. The absurdity of some situations also made for great entertainment – I would never expect to be held hostage by a VTuber, forced to choose between my moral beliefs and survival.
The multiple game systems ensure there will be a style suited to each player. All five paths must be played to complete the story. At a glance, there is no overlap in these stories, however they all align to the overarching plot. ‘Keywords’ are earned by completing specific scenes and objectives, giving important information for deducing the truth of Rei’s death. Keywords are saved and accessible from the menu, which is great because I have terrible memory. Strangely though, the menu is accessed using the tab button, and not escape. I managed to forget this every time I entered the game, leading to much confusion.
Actual performance of the game was good. It ran smoothly and I had no problems with the game freezing or crashing. The soundtrack looped almost seamlessly, leaving no awkward silences other than those intended. Controls were straightforward and simple, as expected of a visual novel. Certain actions required not-so quick-time events, which were frustratingly slow. This could arguably be an accessibility design, but I often found myself pressing a key too quick for it to register and subsequently missing the sequence.
Overall accessibility for Shuten Order is great. Game settings include text display speed and text skipping, incredibly helpful for customising game pace. Players can also scroll upwards during gameplay to reveal the line-by-line transcript, great for trigger-happy text-skippers. You can also replay audio by selecting any line. Audio is only available in Japanese, however it is a Japanese game so no complaints from me. English translation is available for text. Translation are mostly good, however oddly translated phrases will appear throughout.
With the exception of cut-scenes, text will stay on-screen until the player has clicked to move on. This ensures there is no pressure to read at a certain pace to keep up with the game. There are times, however, where the dialogue bubble (and consequently the text) are extended off-screen. Occasionally, there is no text at all other than an ‘x’. Highly inconvenient, sometimes frustrating, but it happens in isolation so players can at least piece together the missing or hidden dialogue from context clues.
Ultimately, Shuten Order is not an adventure game. The storyline has themes of adventure and escapades, but I would not label it as anything other than a visual novel. Player participation was limited and not even necessary at some points. I entered the game blind, meaning I can forgive Shuten Order for not meeting the big adventure game expectations. Many players, however, got stuck on the concept of an adventure game and that has limited their ability to enjoy Shuten Order for what it really is – a visual novel.
I really enjoyed my playthrough of Shuten Order, largely because of the narrative and visual design. Shuten Order is a game I would recommend to players looking for a low-stakes, low-involvement game to pass time. As much as I liked the game though, I would not consider myself converted. I remain a heretic, but to the game fans out there do not be discouraged by those around you. Blessed be the Shuten Order.
The game code for this review was provided by Spike Chunsoft. This review has been cross-posted to OpenCritic.
