It seems that Nintendo and PlayStation are having one of the most fearful wars ever seen in life, the war of which company is the one who releases more remakes or remasters, because the insane amount of unecessary games that these two companies release at times, it´s amazing. However, doesn´t matter how cynical sounds what I said, it melts my heart when a niche franchise has its time to shine, this is what happened to Another Code, a videogame franchise forgotten even by God himself, it had not only one, but two remakes of its respective games. Another Code was developed by Cing on the Nintendo Ds, a company who went bankrupt long time ago, so it was almost impossible to see a remake of this IP, however, here we are.
We play as Ashley, who is in her thirteen years, she´s having her fourteen birthday at february 25th, she recieved a letter from her father who disappeared when she was a little child, the letter tells her to get to certain island where he´ll meet here, that way, she´ll have a chance to meet her father and to spend a birthday with him, she´s having mixed feelings because of that, because even if she wants to meet him, she feels uneasy because her father abandoned her. Anyways, it´s impossible to translate the Ds experience to the Switch, so they had to do a remake of the whole game. The remake includes new scenarios, voice acting, the possibility of moving ashley through the environments, new puzzles, remastered soundtrack, etc. The Ds game had an isometric view with a limited movement, but this time, we´ll be able to move Ashley through the island as much as we want, there won´t be an isometric view, the game uses the classic camera over the shoulder thing.
Ashley has at her disposal, a tool left by her father when she was a child, called DAS, she´s the only one who can use it. The DAS allows us to take photos, looking at the profile of every character of the story, it´s mostly used to find memories, these ¨memories¨ will allow us to have a deeper look into the lore of the story, it´s also used to the resolution of puzzles, sometimes. I´ve got to admit that the DAS is a cool tool but I wish it had more uses into the game, there are a few puzzles that need its use and it´s important to get all of the lore if you want to reach the true ending and it´s important for the main story, but I wish it had more use into the gameplay, but not a big complain to be honest.
Talking about the puzzles, I said earlier that it was impossible to bring the DS experience to the Switch, that´s why this is a remake, there are new puzzles over the game, exclusive for the system, half of the charming the DS game had was because the puzzles that needed the touching screen, all of that disappears in these remakes, the newest puzzles are normal puzzles which don´t exploit any kind of gimmick, they are cool though and it´s understandable they had to get rid of all of the puzzles from the DS game, but it´s a shame that part of the experience doesn´t exist here, still, I must repeat myself, they are pretty cool by their own merits, some of them I found them to be even a little harder.
If I had to point out a thing I liked about Another Code: Two Memories, I´d say its great atmosphere. Most of the time, you´ll be exploring a Mansion all by yourself with someone else who is not much alive if you catch my drift, this mansion was, once, inhabited by a rich family, the closer you explore this abandoned mansion, the more you´ll learn about the background of this ceased family. Another Code Two does a good effort to make you feel alone, in a big place you shouldn´t be, all of this accompanied by a melancholic yet beautiful soundtrack, it helps that the backgroung of this family isn´t exactly the most friendly, they were people who had tragic lives.
The main idea of Another Code: Two Memories is collecting memories of your character, also you´ll be collecting memories of D, a child ghost who can´t rest on piece, he doesn´t remember who he is and he doesn´t even remember how he died, so the more lore we unlock about the family and you, the more we´ll be able to see his background, who he really was and actually how he died. I have a small complain about this D character, because he feels more of a plot device than a character, although don´t get me wrong, he does have a story behind and stuff, but most of the times he feels like he is just there to tell you good job or something, or that´s how I felt about him.
There are a few characters around the game that you can talk with and they are cool but nothing too great, it´s understandable since the main focus are Ashley and D, but most of the time, it´ll be only you and your ghost friend. Personally, I´d say that I´d like to see more characters, but I understand that´s not the point of the game, it´s more than enough with the dead people you investigate through the mansion.
At the end of the day, Another Code: Two Memories central theme is about the memories, especially how is better to accept the truth no matter how harsh can be since we tend to forget things as a defense mechanism and I think that´s a cute message, I think the whole game could elaborate a little more on that but it´s fine. Another Code is not an excelent game, it has many flaws but even so, it has a charm which I feel dificult not to feel atracted to, maybe because all of the love they put into the remake, but I seriously had a lovely time playing this.
All of the screenshots were taken by me