[Terukazu Yoshida's Illustrated Diary] "They're Strangely Knowledgeable About Bathroom Ghost Stories!" Listening to Seven Storytellers in “Scary Stories from School”

This time, I’m playing *Scary Stories from School*, a Nintendo Switch title released by D3 Publisher! This horror adventure game is set in a school, where you listen to ghost stories told by seven narrators. It’s a Nintendo Switch port based on the original version released for the Super Famicom in 1995.

It also serves as the origin of the *Apathy* series that would later follow. With various spin-offs created to this day, this title can be considered the starting point of a long-running series.

I’m a fan of the “Apathy” series, including this game, and I’m proud to say I even got an autograph from Takiya Iijima, the series’ creator!

◆Listen to school ghost stories from seven narrators…

“Let’s do a special feature on our high school’s Seven Mysteries in the next issue of the newspaper.”

With just one remark from the club president, the newspaper club—to which the protagonist belongs—decided to run a special feature on the school’s “Seven Mysteries.” Since the protagonist is a first-year student who just joined the club, he doesn’t really know what kind of scary stories are circulating around the school. So, he decided to interview people who are familiar with the school’s “Seven Mysteries.”

Did your school have any “Seven Mysteries”? At my school, there weren’t even any scary stories about the school, let alone the “Seven Mysteries.” Well, that’s just how it is in real life, I guess.

Just like in this story, the fact that there are seven people on campus who can talk about the “Seven Mysteries” is, in itself, kind of like one of the “Seven Mysteries.”

First, I decided on the protagonist’s name. As usual, I went with Uncle Yoshida.

I thought I’d gathered all seven ghost story tellers, but there are only six here. When I finish listening to all six of them, something happens…! You can listen to any of them, but the content of the ghost stories they tell changes depending on the order you listen to them in.

The first person I chose was Tomoharu Hosoda. I’ve been a fan of him ever since I played the original version—both because he’s chubby yet goes by the surname “Hosoda,” and because the ghost stories he tells are all set in the restroom.

According to Hosoda, this school—with nearly 500 students in his grade—is apparently a treasure trove of ghosts. And the school’s restrooms are no exception… Hosoda tells the story of how he became friends with a student named Nakano and went to the restroom with him.

Countless hands were reaching out from inside that restroom. It seems Nakano could see them too, not just Hosoda.

Still, the fact that so many hands were reaching out from the restroom with such resentment suggests that there must have been people in the past who lost their lives or harbored grudges related to this restroom. As many as there were hands, in fact.

Grudges related to restrooms… Could they be about not making it to the restroom in time, or there not being any toilet paper? Probably not.

At this point, I was faced with the choice of whether or not to enter the restroom. Realistically, the only sensible option would be to look for another restroom, but I wondered what would happen if I just went ahead and went in anyway.

This game features features like saving and loading anywhere, as well as a short-term rewind function, so it’s great that you can easily check the results of other choices.

After trying every option, I decided to go into the restroom anyway. Sure enough, Nakano-kun was attacked by countless hands that looked like sea anemones and got caught.

Then, Hosoda-kun shook off Nakano-kun, who was clinging to him, and fled alone. As Hosoda-kun punched Nakano-kun in the face and ran away, countless hands chased after him, as if to say, “That’s karma for you.”

Hosoda was cornered on the rooftop and finally chose to jump to the ground. However, the impact he had expected never came; on the contrary, he was enveloped in a soft, floating sensation.

Countless hands had enveloped Hosoda’s body as he jumped and carried him safely to the ground.

I guess the countless hands lurking in the restroom are supposed to be one of the school’s Seven Mysteries, but for anyone who witnessed Hosoda-kun floating gently down from the sky, he himself is bound to become a mystery in his own right.

Now, on to the second person.

The scary stories cover a wide range of topics—some involve being attacked by supernatural entities, like Hosoda-kun, while others involve harm from classmates or living people.

You can cut a story short and listen to someone else’s instead. It’s handy when you just want to give someone else’s story a try.

Though, from the storyteller’s perspective, it must be a real pain…!

I played for about an hour. Since each story takes only a few minutes to over ten minutes to listen to, it’s easy to play during short breaks, and the barrier to completing a full playthrough is fairly low. That said, if you want to hear every single story, you’ll need to listen to the school ghost stories multiple times.

The live-action visuals haven’t lost their luster even now and exude a unique presence. The combination of the familiar setting of a school and the somewhat eerie live-action presentation gave me a sense of fear creeping up on me little by little. Save, load, and rewind functions are also available, and it was convenient to be able to resume from any scene I liked.

However, since the game faithfully recreates the original version, there are some scenes where the font can be a bit hard to read.

I highly recommend this game to anyone who enjoys school ghost stories or classic live-action horror.

"Scary Stories from School" is currently available for the Nintendo Switch.

学校であった怖い話と晦-つきこもり -Switch
￥5,445
(価格・在庫状況は記事公開時点のものです)

Amazon

楽天市場

学校であった怖い話と晦-つきこもり限定版『晦-つきこもり』エディション -Switch 【Amazon.co.jp限定】特典 飯島多紀哉氏書き下ろしSS「必要最低限の女」PDF 配信
￥10,978
(価格・在庫状況は記事公開時点のものです)

Amazon

楽天市場