Visual novel aficionados who are tired of games with fixed choices they don’t want to pick and prefer a more intuitive experience will find Crimsooon Sun right up their alley. Inspired by the 1998 PlayStation mystery visual novel Mikagura Shoujo Tanteidan, which uses “contradiction spotting” gameplay in favor of typical branching narratives, this game will have you scouring files and dialogues to unravel a linear mystery.
Taking place in Shirase, a fictional city in Japan’s Tohoku region, Crimsooon Sun’s narrative revolves around Mio Fujimaru, a university student who suddenly reappears almost six months after she went missing. Though Mio remains silent about her disappearance, an unsettling video shown at the university festival reveals her being pushed down a wedding aisle in a wheelchair by a faceless man. Moreover, Dual Suns can be seen reflected outside a window, a meteorological phenomenon that should not be possible.
While the game has you talking to relevant characters and reading important files in a linear, text-driven fashion, Crimsooon Sun sets itself apart from other visual novels by way of its Trigger system (bearing resemblance to Mikagura Shoujo Tanteidan’s own Inference Trigger system).
When you stumble upon details that contradict previous information you discovered (or if you just think that something feels sus), you can “pull the trigger” to earn Information Bullets (clues) toward solving the case. Even if you fail to trigger a key point, the story continues uninterrupted, and there are no game overs. In the final stages, a deduction segment awaits, where you use the 26 clues you’ve gathered to piece together the mystery.
Crimsoon Sun’s lack of branching narratives and multiple endings may affect its replayability, but they also allow for more focused storytelling, which the developers liken to reading a classic detective novel. Not everything can be deduced from the files and conversations you read, and you’ll have to make educated guesses to get to the game’s ending. If something or someone seems suspicious, chances are you should use your Information Bullets to find out more.
Developed and published by solo developer Buri Kino under their indie circle Old Retina Museum, Crimsooon Sun was originally released for iOS and Android in 2025, and is set to get a Steam release for Windows, SteamOS, and Linux in 2026. It should be noted that AI-based translation tools were used for localizing the in-game text and store page descriptions, which were reviewed by the developer afterwards.
