Ghost in the Pool is a very short Japanese-horror style visual novel, reminiscent of the immortal Junji Ito. So much so, in fact, you’d be mistaken for thinking this was by Junji Ito, it is not. The story revolves around Yaru, a high school swim star who goes to a school with a haunted pool. During the day, the pool is crowded, so she sneaks into the pool at night, where there’s horror afoot. And that’s pretty much all I can share with you, as the game is short. There are several branches leading to few different endings. After you get one, the game allows you to go back to the important branches and get the others. You’ll still be done in an hour, at max.
Ghost in the Pool has an interesting aspect where at certain points, you can look around a scene and interact with certain objects in the scene. This is cool, but entirely stoppable if you so choose. Other than that, this is fairly typical visual novel. The question is, then, should you buy this? Well, the story here is very good, again, reminiscent of Ito. But the game is short, at less than an hour. It is $6, which is pricey for a game this short, even though the quality is high. So I’m going to do what I did with Moonless Moon. I will give Ghost in the Pool a Your Mileage May Vary with an eight back-end score. For what this is. its good, just the length may be a turn-off.
Overall: Ghost in the Pool is a short, but good visual novel that is a lot like the work of Junji Ito. The length and the price may be a turn-off though.
Verdict: YMMV
| Release Date | 10/10/24 |
| Cost | $5.99 |
| Publisher | CASCHA Games |
| ESRB Rating | M |
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Zom
Short games are a frustrating paradox. If they are great games than that is infinitely better than long shitty games. However, the matters of price versus length and, value for money (relative to other games available in the market) must be weighed by each person. Not everyone feels the same as to where that middle ground is.
mordridakon
Hence why I gave it a YMMV verdict!
Zom
Short games kinda annoy me because if they are good…then I want more. However, if they are shit then they were Both a waste of time and money. Very long games are also problematic currently “primarily” because of live-service monetization which is purportedly due to ballooning budgets [this is a fair point although I think the budgets are mostly inflated due to sloppy management in those companies]. Also, long games are prone to being good at the beginning and crap at the end.
TLDR: I concur with the verdict of YMMV.