Zero Escape Volume 3? Awesome, I can’t wait!
For those of you who have no idea what Zero Escape Volume 3 is, allow me to back up a bit.
Back in the dark ages of 2010, 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors was released on the original DS. It was a text adventure about a college student named Junpei who wakes up on a sinking cruise ship with a bomb strapped to his wrist.
Finding eight more people in the same situation, players had to guide Junpei through multiple endings to try and find one where he survives the night. While doing so, he must figure out the motivations and hidden agendas of the other participants of the ‘Nonary Game’. Notably, the player could not achieve the ‘true’ ending on their first playthrough and would have to go through several lesser endings first.
The game was critically lauded for its story so a sequel was inevitable. So in 2012, Zero Escape: Virtue’s last reward was released; set one year after the events of 999. Zero Escape follows another college student called Sigma as he is abducted and wakes up in an abandoned warehouse.
Like Junpei, Sigma must play through a ‘Nonary Game’ with eight other kidnap victims to try and survive the night.
While these games don’t quite have the cult status of, say, ‘Steins Gate’, the deep and twisting narratives are famous for keeping players guessing as they unravel the mysteries of the ‘Nonary Game’.
Which brings us to Zero Escape Volume 3. No plot details are known at the minute, but it will release for both 3DS and PS Vita in North America during the first half of 2016. Unlike the first two games, the north American release is being worked on at the same time as the Japanese version; which hasn’t had a release window announced yet.
