9 Best 3DS Visual Novels

Resolve was directed by Shu Takumi, the creator of the Ace Attorney series, and produced by Motohide Eshiro. It came out on the 3DS in Japan in August 2017, and Android and iOS versions followed in April 2018. The story picks up four months after the first game, when Susato Mikotoba returns to Japan and finds her best friend accused of murder.

The best new idea is the Dance of Deduction. Herlock Sholmes studies a crime scene and the witnesses, then announces a theory that is wrong in places, and you fix his mistakes for him. He is a detective who is never quite as clever as he thinks, and that is the joke. On the 3DS it was a Japanese release, so this is the pick for players who import.

Hakuoki is a text-heavy otome visual novel with a Japanese historical theme, set around the 1860s. Chizuru Yukimura heads to Kyoto to search for her father and is attacked by mad men, until members of the Shinsengumi cut them down. They mistake her for a boy and take her in for questioning. Her father, it turns out, made an elixir called the Water of Life that turns the people who drink it into bloodthirsty berserkers called Furies.

The story pauses at decision points until you choose, and each choice pushes the plot in a different direction. Along the way Chizuru grows close to the Shinsengumi and its aloof member Toshizo Hijikata. It was later adapted into an anime series by Studio Deen and two films. The players who name it put it among their 3DS favourites, next to Fire Emblem and Shin Megami Tensei.

Zero Time Dilemma is the third and final Zero Escape game, and it very nearly never happened. The first two were commercial failures in Japan, and by February 2014 the third game was on hold indefinitely. Work started again the following year because of fan demand and because the pause had become big news. This time the developer was Chime, and the story scenes are animated cutscenes instead of the visual novel screens of the first two.

You still get puzzle rooms and a story that branches on your choices into multiple endings. Kotaro Uchikoshi is back as the writer, and so are character designer Kinu Nishimura and composer Shinji Hosoe. Players rank it below Virtue's Last Reward. If you finished that one, though, you need this one to see how the story ends.

Apollo Justice is the fourth Ace Attorney game. It came out on the DS in Japan in 2007 and in the West in 2008, and the 3DS version arrived in 2017. Series creator Shu Takumi had wanted the series to end with the previous game, so this one moves the spotlight to a new defense attorney, Apollo. His trick is spotting the small visual cues that show a witness is lying.

A team of 28 made it, with Mitsuru Endo as director. The DS original sold around 250,000 copies in its first week and 515,417 by the end of 2007, and critics mostly liked it. Players who go through the series in order recommend it as the step between the first three games and Dual Destinies. One called it "good for bedtime like a visual novel", which is the highest praise a handheld game can get.

Corpse Party began as Corpse Party: NewChapter, a game for Japanese mobile phones released in chapters from 2006 to 2007. That was already a remake of a 1996 game for the NEC PC-9801. It is set in 2008 at Kisaragi Academy, a high school built on the remains of Heavenly Host Elementary School, which closed after a series of murders and disappearances. The 3DS version adds improved graphics and extra chapters.

You walk small 2D sprites around the cursed school. Long dialogue scenes with full character portraits make up a large part of the playtime, and that is why some people call it a visual novel outright. Critics praised its sound design and complained about the drawn-out wrong endings. Players name it among the horror games worth playing on the 3DS.

Spirit of Justice came out on the 3DS in Japan in June 2016, and in North America and Europe that September. Phoenix travels to the Kingdom of Khura'in to see Maya Fey and runs into a court system where defense attorneys have been deemed unnecessary. Verdicts come from a mystical vision called the Divination Séance. Khura'in is a deeply religious nation where spirit channeling began, which makes it a very Ace Attorney place to go on holiday.

The new trick is Spirit Medium Vision. You see a victim's memories from the moments before death and look for contradictions across their five senses. One Japanese reviewer thought some plot developments were too "out there", and that is fair. It still shows up on players' lists of their favourite 3DS games.

Level-5 and Capcom made this crossover together, and Shu Takumi helped with the scenario designs. It came out in Japan in November 2012, then in Europe in March 2014 and in North America that August. Layton, Luke, Phoenix and Maya end up in Labyrinthia, a medieval town where people live in fear of witchcraft. You solve puzzles around town to gather information, then prove your client's innocence in court.

The trials add group cross-examinations, where you play one witness's testimony against another's. It was also the first Ace Attorney game with voice acting and animated cutscenes, and those became the new standard for the series. Tomohito Nishiura and Yasumasa Kitagawa wrote the music together and arranged themes from both series. Players put it high among their 3DS favourites, next to Kid Icarus: Uprising and Metroid: Samus Returns.

Dual Destinies is the fifth main Ace Attorney game and the first one on the 3DS. Phoenix shares the cases with Apollo and Athena Cykes, and each has a talent. Phoenix sees psyche-locks over witnesses who are hiding something, and Athena can hear conflicting emotions in a witness's voice. The team moved the series to 3D graphics but worked to keep the look of the older 2D art, and the camera now pans around the courtroom right before a dramatic reveal.

Janet Hsu directed the localization, and her team was part of development from the start. Critics loved the audio and character art but complained that trials sometimes refused answers that made perfect sense. There is even extra content in which Phoenix defends an orca accused of murder. Fans of the series tend to recommend all of its 3DS games together.

Virtue's Last Reward was originally released for the 3DS and PlayStation Vita, and it exists because its predecessor, 999, was an unexpected critical success in North America. Kotaro Uchikoshi wrote the script, and Aksys Games localized it for North America. A group is told they need nine bracelet points to escape a facility, and the only way to earn them is to take part in the Ambidex Game. A memo function and an auto-advance text mode help you keep track of it all.

The Escape sections are puzzle rooms seen in first person. A flowchart lets you return to any section you have finished and pick a different option. Critics praised the story and characters but were divided on the Escape sections. It was a commercial failure in Japan, which led to the temporary cancellation of its sequel. Players recommend it more than any other 3DS visual novel. Most of them name it together with 999.