Nintendo Switch Critic Reviews

Yurukill: The Calumniation Games combines puzzle solving with bullet hell action to create a unique gaming experience. Its dark premise is handled with humor and an engrossing mystery that’ll push you quickly to a rewarding end, and various difficulty settings will make sure fans of both genres can get there.

Yurukill: The Calumniation Games blends visual novel story and Shmup gameplay to create a very engaging experience.

Yurukill: The Calumniation Games does a fantastic job of marrying a dark murder mystery with a rewarding shoot 'em up. IzanagiGames has managed to get the formula just right and I hope they invest in the series with a sequel that has an even larger scope.

While a murder mystery survival scenario may not be the most unique concept ever made, Yurukill manages to twist things on its head by going all in to make one of the most unique Visual Novel experiences. Even the SHMUP sections don’t feel unforgiving with multiple difficulty options that allow players to make things as easy or challenging as they’d like. The characters are all endearing in one way or another, and the story keeps being invested with every group and wanting to see just how everything will tie together in the very end. Whether people survive or struggle to make it is up to them and putting the pieces together correctly. Yurukill: The Calumination Games is well worth playing for those who love the mystery that awaits even if they’re hesitant about taking flight and shooting down enemies.

Mixing things so different might seem like a bad idea, but Yurukill made us believe that a bullet hell and a visual novel are a match made in heaven. It's also a fantastic game on both sides, meaning we have a great visual novel and a great shoot 'em up, all in the same package.

I’m not sure whether to think of Yurukill as a decent shmup with a good adventure game attached, or a good adventure game with a decent shmup minigame inserted into it. Perhaps it doesn’t matter, as the two disparate flavors taste great together all the same.

Yurukill: The Calumniation Games is an ideal game for fans of Japanese mystery games who are looking for a different experience from the usual. Mixing puzzles with shoot 'em up we have found a very original title that, without standing out too much in anything, has turned out to be an enjoyable experience.

Despite our relative indifference toward the shmup sections and our frustration with some of the puzzles, by the time we cleared each team’s attraction and really got to know the eccentric cast before the intense final chapters, Yurukill: The Calumniation Games had thoroughly hooked us. Individually, the puzzle-solving and shooter elements aren’t anything particularly special, but they come together with some ridiculous characters to form a game greater than the sum of its parts. We’d go so far as to say we like pickles on ice cream now, and – while you might think us as crazy as Binko – we think you might, too.

Yurukill: The Calumniation Games is certainly an oddity, but it’s not without its charm. It definitely shares some characteristics with the Zero Escape and Danganronpa games, even if it doesn’t quite hit the same highs.

Yurukill: The Calumnation Games has a decent storyline, and is a solid time, but for the price point, there are far better options.