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A game, Sid Meier once famously said, is a series of meaningful choices. There'll be those who'd argue that Virtue's Last Reward - an extension of Chunsoft's visual novel series that began with 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors - isn't really a game at all. But its choices, when they eventually arise, are as meaningful as any you're likely to come across in the medium. Virtue's Last Reward is a direct sequel to 999, and another rare example of a visual novel making its way to the West. It's not surprising that they're so slim in number over here; their reams of cloying text, their candy-coloured characterisation and their hyperactive melodrama ensure they travel poorly outside of Japan, and they're impenetrable to all but the most stubborn of players.
Virtue's Last Reward is no different, on the surface at least. It's the not-so-distant future, and you awake in a strange, cold complex and thrown in with an array of mysterious characters who all slot into existing archetypes. There's a prickly pixie, a devilish dandy and the requisite amnesiac, though they all share the narrative darkness with you.
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