By Jacob Malin
By Jacob Malin
love not knowing what ’ s going on . At least
I when it comes to fiction , I ’ m a sucker for the thrill of uncertainty . I don ’ t think there ’ s any work of fiction that ’ s satisfied that desire for me quite as well as the first two games in the Zero Escape series . 999 : 9 Hours , 9 Persons , 9 Doors and Virtue ’ s Last Reward both feature the same basic premise : the protagonist , kidnapped by a mysterious masked figure called Zero , awakens in a sealed facility along with eight strangers and is forced to play a life-and-death “ Nonary Game .” To survive and escape , the nine participants must explore the place where they are trapped , solve seemingly arbitrary puzzles , and , through teamwork or selfishness , fulfill the conditions to unlock the door to the exit .
Within the games , the characters discuss the way the Nonary Games evoke two responses at once : danger and epiphany . The unwilling participants are afraid for their lives , but that fear motivates them to solve the problems the game presents them with , to navigate the confusing issues of trusting strangers , and to understand what ’ s going on and seek a way out . The games drew me in so completely because they put me , as the player , in that same position ( or a somewhat safer version from the comfort of my home ). Everything constantly felt like it was on the verge of falling apart , and every choice felt impossibly precarious . Even so , I enjoyed exploring the various directions the plot could take based on what I did . I was always thrilled when I managed to find some new area or clue that hadn ’ t turned up before , and even if my worst fears often proved well-founded and everyone ended up dead , I was secure in the knowledge that I could eventually go back and fix my mistakes .
I typically avoid horror in all forms , because otherwise I can ’ t sleep at night . But even though the Zero Escape games had moments that were tense or utterly terrifying , they never seemed hopeless . Instead , the tension felt like a challenge to find a way through . As lost and uncertain as the early stages of both games made me feel , I enjoyed that feeling , because I trusted that the games knew what they were doing , that the way out existed somewhere . Interestingly , a big part of this trust was a certainty that I would be , in a sense , betrayed – that some of my deepest assumptions about the game and the characters would turn out to be wrong . And across both games they were , time and again . The character I trusted most