Kowloon High-School Chronicle

Obtuse? - nope.
Cryptic, demanding, thought provoking and best of all yet ironic -
Archaic by design of its reintroduction - totally.
Phenomenal dungeon crawling and puzzle solving from 2004 direct from Japan and Atlus thanks to Arc systems.
Entwining mysteries and deciphering ancient civilizations through the lens of high school students moonlighting as adventurers.
By day drama plays out as class and teachers take precedent in visual novel format, an affectionate system of conversation is simple yet emotive enough in all manners , and expect to get retorts of varying degrees.
Nighttime is for spelunking and archeology, gearing up and dungeon diving through interconnected tombs.
Shortcuts are found, walls can be blasted, floors crumbled etc.
Inventory management and crafting.
Monster diversity and status effects. Leveling, skill and ability points, and you are able to farm.
Kowloon High School Chronicle is a solid experience and the dungeons hold great trepidation and ambiance.

10/10, would get a hamburger by spinning counter clock-wise in front of a door in a forest with mirrors to display as a side decoration at the currently planned expo for a british museum again.

Kowloon is a game that genuinely tries things I haven't seen in other games. As a half visual novel half DRPG hybrid it's weird, creative, and at times downright cryptic. It's very easy to get stuck fumbling around with the mechanics at the start as they aren't properly explained. I literally had to look up what the dialogue cross said online because the font was barely legible to me. Once I did finally figure things out however, the game started to make a lot more sense and exploring the ruins felt like second nature. The combat also has a great feel to it and there's decent variety in the builds you can make, some of them more exploitable than others.
Overall, the game just has a lot of personality coupled with a very distinct presentation that keeps the player interested. I'd say the story is more of a slow burn but there's plenty of twists and turns that helps it ramp up into something that's hard to put down. It's also primarily episodic so I can see it feeling a bit more digestible for someone who doesn't like to play rpgs for long hours at a time.
There's so much more I'd like to say, but Kowloon is such a bizarre blend of ideas and genres that you really just have to experience it firsthand to fully appreciate.

Definitely clunky and outdated in some aspects, and I imagine this game won't appeal to a ton of people. If you're reading this review for an obscure game though, more than likely you're at least adjacent to this game's target audience. From there your enjoyment of the game will depend on how much you can tolerate a little bit of jank here and there.
Gameplay: Dungeon crawler / visual novel. But the dungeon crawling is more puzzle focused, and combat focuses more on positioning than stats. If there's one thing I'd tell anyone who plays this, max out agility/geology asap so you have more points for movement. The game is pretty easy to break though, if that's your thing, and the puzzles are pretty easy. The visual novel sections are what you'd expect, although the dialogue wheel thing is definitely confusing, and might take a bit to get the hang of.
Story: The game plays out sort of like an anime. Each chapter is a monster of the week type plot. There is an overarching plot, but that doesn't really come into the spotlight until the last couple chapters. The characters are fun to be around though, and the game being fully voiced like I mentioned helps convey their personalities.
Graphics: Character sprites are nice and dungeons have varied environments. This game originally came out in the early 2000s, so it definitely is retro.
Music: Unexpectedly good. Mash up of genres, but the combat music is jazzy.
Overall I do recommend, and if this game looks like it'd appeal to you at all, I recommend trying the game out and giving it a little bit of time to click.

So, I pretty much put all Arksystem works games on my wishlist. Never would I have thought this game would be made by the studio behind Tokyo Majin Kenpuchou. Well, at least I have played one of those games now. BTW this game has nothing to do with Kowloon or Hong Kong. I guess saying Nine Dragons isn't fancy enough.

As for the game it is pretty fun. The setting is a weird mix of Indiana Jones plus some mix of 90's anime with transfer students, student school council and Ooparts. Story is mainly told visual novel like with full voice acting. I also liked how it is told in a 13 episode format like an 1 season anime show complete with opening and ending.

Gameplay is first person dungeon crawler with the combat playing out in turns. Later on you can clear entire rooms within 1 turn as long as you build your character right.
The puzzles and systems of the game are really vague though. I highly recommend using a guide to play through the game if you don't to waste your time. The problem though is that the good guides are in japanese. I recommend the one on spwiki.net/kowloon.

Please release the Director's Cut and other games in the series!

Fun and unique game. A shame this isn't way more popular.