Famicom Detective Club: The Two Case Collection

Genre: Compilation / Visual Novel

Players: 1

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Review:

Famicom Detective Club: The Two Case Collection is a 2021 Compilation of the 2021 remakes of two Famicom Disk System games from 1988 and 1989, Famicom Detective Club: The Missing Heir and its prequel, Famicom Detective Club: The Girl Who Stands Behind, each also released separately on Nintendo Switch.

Here’s what I thought of each of the games in this collection:

Game	Genre	# of Players	Grade
Famicom Detective Club: The Missing Heir	Visual Novel	1	C-
tl;dr Famicom Detective Club: The Missing Heir is a remake of a 1988 Visual Novel originally released on the Japan-only Famicom Disk System. This game’s plot follows an amnesiac detective investigating the death of a wealthy matriarch while trying to regain his lost memory. The presentation here is top-notch, with fully-remade visuals and sound. Unfortunately, the gameplay remains infuriatingly locked in the past, forcing players to repeatedly try every menu option to find the one the game wants you to pick. It’s so frustrating that it’s hard to recommend to anyone other than those curious about this game’s history.
Famicom Detective Club: The Girl Who Stands Behind	Visual Novel	1	C+
tl;dr Famicom Detective Club: The Girl Who Stands Behind is a remake of a 1989 Visual Novel originally released on the Japan-only Famicom Disk System. This game is a prequel to The Missing Heir and its plot follows a junior detective investigating the death of a student who was looking into a legend of a ghost at her school. The presentation here is top-notch, with fully-remade visuals and sound. And while this game still has some of the same problems of the first game, those issues aren’t quite as pronounced here, making for a better overall experience. Even though this is the second game in the series, this may be the better place to start if you’re considering trying out this particular piece of videogame history.

These two games are pretty similar, both featuring a great presentation that updates the original Famicom games to look more like excellent modern entries in the genre, some of the same characters, some good writing… and to a large extent, the same flaws that make both games frustrating to play and leave players clicking through every menu option until they luck into the one that progresses the plot. Thankfully this is less of an issue in The Girl Who Stands Behind, but it still rears its head on occasion. Both of these games also have a similarly sluggish cursor, don’t make use of the Nintendo Switch touchscreen even though the game would greatly benefit from it, and can transfer save data from one to the other (the name you entered in one carries over to the other).

There’s one remaining issue to address here, and that’s one of value – this collection shaves $10 off the price of buying both games separately. However, that’s not to say that this compilation provides you with a unique opportunity – buying either of the games on the eShop will grant players a $10 discount off of the price of the other game, meaning there’s little benefit to buying the two together like this. You’re better off buying one of the games on its own to see if you like it and then making use of the discount to buy the other one. It’s not like this compilation comes in physical form either – all you’ll get buying this game from a third-party retailer is a download code.

In the end, the Famicom Detective Club games are a wonderful piece of Nintendo’s history, but as modern Visual Novel games they leave a bit to be desired, especially The Missing Heir. If you absolutely must own this piece of lost (for Westerners, anyway) Nintendo history, you may find some enjoyment in the excellent stories and presentations as long as you can tolerate the flaws in the gameplay. However, there’s no reason to buy this collection – simply buy one of the games on its own and if you still want the other game after that just make use of the discount and buy the other separately.

tl;dr – Famicom Detective Club: The Two Case Collection is a Compilation of two remakes of classic Famicom Disk System games that are finally making their debut in the West. The presentation of both games is fantastic, but the gameplay is flawed in ways that are needlessly frustrating by today’s standards. What’s more, there’s no good reason to buy this Compilation package, since buying one of the games on its own gives you a discount on the other game equal to the dollar amount you save in this package. Unless you know without question you want both games, there’s little reason to get this package.

Grade: C-

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