• Price: $19.99 USD
• Developer: Chosuido
• Publisher: PQube
• Release Date: May 23, 2023

A review code was kindly provided by PQube on behalf of Chosuido. We thank them for being able to cover something they’ve worked so hard on.

Warning: This contains some violent scenes and “[intentional] visual effects such as static and glitching” (effects can be turned off in settings). Part of the plot includes conflict with religious authorities.

I liked the look of the art in ghostpia Season One, and I was also intrigued by the premise of the game’s story. A girl named Sayoko lives in a town populated by self-proclaimed “ghosts”: immortal beings who are only active at night. These ghosts call their town a utopia, but Sayoko is skeptical of this claim; she wants to leave and return to her home country. There’s just one problem: the town is surrounded by a “vast desert of snow,” and there are no visible landmarks or towns in sight.

The story is depicted using kinetic visuals. Some of the static and glitchy effects mentioned in the warning above could be a little off-putting, making things a little blurry, so I turned off the CRT effect in settings. There are five “episodes” in Season One (a second season is planned with no release date yet). ghostpia’s website estimates a 7-10 hour playthrough for all five episodes, which seems to match my experience.

In this “ghost” town, Sayoko isolates herself, saying she “currently doesn’t have any friends,” but the friends she used to hang out with end up coming to see her. Anya and Pacifica tell her that a new person has arrived in town, which is highly unusual because the population has always remained the same. They decide to throw a party for the newcomer’s arrival, but she’s currently in the Church’s custody. And the Church essentially rules over the town.

Naturally, the recently reunited trio decides to stage a rescue for the unknown newcomer. Throughout the story, Sayoko gets into fights with the police, other townspeople, and even those who serve the Church. It seems like they’ve all been desensitized to violence because of the way they all come back to life if they’re damaged enough to die. People get slammed into walls, have their fingers broken unprovoked, and get shot. There’s also the occasional explosion. 💥

The town seems more dystopian than utopian to me, and I don’t know if I’d say anyone is particularly likable. Like the antagonists, Sayoko and her friends certainly do a lot of morally questionable things as the story goes along. But the violence is often trivialized with jokes that cut the tension, rainbow vomit, or a cartoonish body that’s been cut in half. The game’s art style is charming, and the music seems rather cheerful and lighthearted compared to the serious events that unfold.

It all just seems wacky and zany and a bit bizarre. I often found myself confused yet still intrigued by where the plot could be going. With all of the morbidly fascinating interactions, they really made me want to find out if Sayoko and her friends would succeed in their goal of leaving their isolated town, and what secrets lie beneath its surface… I think I’d categorize this as a darkly amusing sort of “slice of life” story with a lot of comical violence. Sayoko will fight the Church’s minions one day and then go job hunting the next.

Although ghostpia is certainly strange, I still had some fun coming up with theories about things such as where this town is located, whether some of the characters were who they said they were, and Sayoko’s dreams. I also really liked the neat visual effects involving character movement and the art panels. It’s got interesting ideas, and I did find myself wanting to experience Season Two when it’s eventually released because there were a lot of questions that went unanswered by the end of Season One.