World’s End Club (previously known as Death March Club), is a collaboration between Danganronpa writer Kazutaka Kodaka and Zero Escape director Kotaro Uchikoshi, and surprisingly, it’s coming out on the Apple Arcade on September 4.
The game is the second project from Too Kyo Games, which Kodaka and Uchikoshi formed after leaving Danganronpa and Zero Escape developer Spike Chunsoft back in 2017. Given the pedigree of both creators, it’s not much of a surprise that World’s End Club is a kind of death game, yet, somehow the characters involved have gotten younger, so be aware of that if you’re a Zero Escape or Danganronpa fan, which focused on adults and high school students respectively, and might feel uneasy about that. Thankfully, the Apple Arcade listing seems to imply the game won’t be as graphic as either of its creators’ other games, earning a 12+ rating for “Infrequent/Mild Realistic Violence” and “Infrequent/Mild Cartoon or Fantasy Violence.”
Here’s the plot synopsis:
“In an elementary school in Tokyo, there’s a club called the ‘Go-Getters Club”, made up from oddball kids from all over Japan. Reycho and the other members are somehow different than the other kids around them. Then, one day, during the summer…while on the bus for their class trip, they get into an accident.
When they wake up, they’re in a theme park under the sea. Reycho and the others are trapped inside this strange, long-abandoned place. Suddenly, from out of nowhere, a mysterious clown appears and orders them to play a ‘Fate Game’! Before any of them can figure out what’s happening, they’re fighting for their very lives. Will they be able to survive and make it out of this weird place? The kids are all lost and confused…But then, extraordinary powers begin to awaken within them. While at the same time…’Abnormal events’ are occurring all over the Earth.”
Check out the TGS trailer with English subtitles from when the game was still called Death March Club:
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Given the twists and turns of both Danganronpa and Zero Escape, you can probably expect World’s End Club to go to some unexpected places, as well. In the grand scheme of things, Danganronpa‘s elaborate explanations were relatively more grounded than Zero Escape, but World’s End Club already looks like it has some sci-fi or fantasy elements going on, so it’s probably delving into some uncharted territory. Which is good, and probably fitting, as it’s a completely different type of game despite the similar setup. While Danganronpa and Zero Escape were visual novels with investigation and escape room gameplay respectively, World’s End Club is a side scroller with puzzle elements.
Before World’s End Club, Too Kyo’s first game was Death Come True, a choice-based FMV game that came to mobile devices, Switch, and Windows back in June and July, with a PlayStation 4 launch planned for sometime later this year.
