Yomawari: Midnight Shadows

Two young girls, a dog, a lot of upset ghosts, and some twisted gods... Yomawari: Midnight Shadows is the perfect kind of sequel, taking absolutely everything that worked about Yomawari: Night Alone and expanding on it to deliver a more fun and refined gameplay and narrative experience than it's predecessor; unfortunately, it kept some of the frustrating elements too.
The gameplay is greatly expanded and improved upon from what came before, no longer are enemies simply roadblocks most of the time meant to indicate to you that you're going the wrong way but actual threats meant to be engaged with; and boy does everything want to engage. Everything wants to kill you in this game; Chairs. Tables. Paintings. Fog. There's still a lot of generic enemies with very basic mechanics but the amount of special or boss type enemies and encounters is massively increased as well as the depth to these encounters; from tricking a fire enemy into shooting itself with it's flames to rushing past the raised arm of a giant skeleton, the intensity of the encounters is tenfold anything seen in the first game. Instead of side quests simply being fluff, this time around they reward you with charms that can improve one of your stats, stuff like having more stamina to run longer or being able to hold more of an item.
Unfortunately, we do retain some of the frustrations of the original as well; you still die in one hit to every enemy in the game which is perfectly fine but can cause some frustration when you aren't actually sure why you died or what you did wrong, and run backs to where you were killed can be brutal. Sometimes it feels like you have nearly no indication of what to do during some special encounters, like you're meant to die a few times to figure out how to win.
The story is brutal. It's sad out here man. Yomawari: Night Alone's story was very simple, vaguely conveyed, and really took a backseat to the other elements of the game which is another thing the sequel improves on. This time around the narrative is a constant element, with much more talkative and charismatic protagonists you really get attached to and want to see safely through this nightmare. This is a story about loss, letting go, and forgiveness. It's hard to really explain the story of Haru and Yui without spoiling it and I think it's best experienced for yourself, so if you're interested in this game, just know you're in for a compelling and tragic story about two young girls going through the suffering gauntlet.
I compared the first entry to Silent Hill in terms of atmosphere and storytelling style and the same is true of this sequel; once again you don't have any steel pipe karate to beat your way out of any bad situation, instead it's majority puzzles and exploration focused. There's references to it's predecessor as well which is always appreciated, you'll visit the downtown area from the first game; after completing the story you can even meet Kotomo, the protagonist of Night Alone, which is really cool.
Yomawari: Midnight Shadows is a cute, violent, sad, and overall fantastic sequel; one I highly recommend if you like psychological horror, little girls having really bad not fun times, or just interesting and tragic stories.
Also I really like the animation when the girls get jumpscared and then fall on their butts, cracks me up every time.

This is a review I felt like I need to do- now that I bought the game twice (here, and on the switch). I used to have a love-hate relationship for this game: it's not like the first game, blabla.
Now that it's been years, I feel like I can objectively talk about it.
I want to say that I enjoyed the first Yomawari, but it's not needed to complete it to play this one. There's only one easter egg (a really cute one) for people that have played the first one. If anything, I recommend this one over the first, as the gameplay is much less frustrating.
Unlike the first game, this one has a long and complex story. I mean, the first had a story too, but clearly not as complex as this one (you have 2 different PoVs after all!). On top of that, you get more systems like bonus items. This comes with a big problem: you are handholded through a good chunk of the game. And this is why I could never fully love this game; The first game letting you explore felt really immersing as you desperately tried to avoid monsters and ghosts and get lost in an oppressive night, but this one locks you into specific paths to make sure you cannot avoid to go to the next part of the story. I enjoyed the story and it's honestly one of the best I've seen from how emotional and tragic it is (especially with legit 8 yrs old children??), but to go from the sandbox first game to this was something I couldn't readily accept.
Besides that, the game also introduces new ghosts on top of the ones from the first games. I personally liked them. The level design though was fantastic- as long as you properly used the Jinzo statues (the temporary quick save points). This makes it this game can be very hard to put down: not in the sense that it's gripping, but because you need to save the game (at the house only) and you just cannot, because you are too deep inside a level. My personal favourite was the haunted house as the game uses its atmosphere perfectly.
Gameplay-wise, it's similar to the first Yomawari Night. However, due to its nature of being separated by chapters, the game is much less punishing than the first one, who was... rough around the edges, and much less polished. It is still very much a die and retry, but I'd still recommend it over the first due to all the QoL and polishing it got. The graphics are however, very much improved, with a lot of shading to each asset compared to the first Yomawari. The game is a treat to look at and I loved taking screenshots of it, especially the train level!
On a final note, I really do recommend this game the most over any of the other Yomawari games, as it is genuinely a really good game (if you don't mind the die and retry), and a good first entry point into the series (even if realistically, none of the games connect to each others deeply).

The second game in the Yomawari series. Compared to the first entry's open-ended nature, this one feels like an over-correction into a much more linear experience. At the same time its narrative is a lot more involved and grips at the heartstrings, so it's no wonder to me that it's so beloved. Personally it was my least favourite of the trilogy to play, but I'm still glad I stuck with it to see these two girls' story to the end.

Important notice: I ran the game with no issues on one of the computers that couldn't run the previous episode. In general, fortunately, it seems to have fewer reported issues or, at the very least, they took care to fix them.
From the opening moments, and remembering how the first game started, I'm pretty sure one of the creators suffered a serious trauma related to a dog as a child.
Then it gets even more shocking. And it's just the tutorial.
It's one of the valid reasons this game got an M rating, compared to the T rating of Night Alone.
Not much has truly changed in the couple of years (only one year for Steam users) between episodes. The trouble with aligning with interactable objects is mostly gone, and most encounters with yokai felt a bit fairer while playing, with fewer chances of being jumped on with no chance to react; more of them also act according to whether the torch is on or off. It's more generous with essential coins for saving and activating fast travel points, as I often found more than I could hold. Objects on the ground, whether consumables or collectibles, are still represented by twinkles but are more visible, and when a collectible is found, there is now a prompt to see it directly rather than having to find it among the others.
The "boss fights", which are rather escape sequences or avoiding attacks while interacting with objects, are still one of the weakest spots, as due to often dubious hitboxes they can easily turn frustrating and force numerous repeats, not helped by how sparse save points can be at times. Some regular encounters can still be unfair, and the coding is not 100% clean: I had to reset a couple of times due to the character getting stuck into objects, and once I had to backtrack a lot because an event hadn't triggered earlier (luckily it was a matter of returning to that location through quick travel). On top of that, the slow movement speed and the frequent backtracking can again leave the impression of padding out a short game.
But if Midnight Shadows won't last many hours, it's still fairly longer than the predecessor and offers a wider variety of locations, not just urban outdoors and woods; there are several indoor areas where Jizo statues are replaced by phones. Among the exterior areas, I found the concept of exploring a partially dried-up artificial lake most interesting.
The graphics, already pretty to begin with, benefit a lot from this increased variety, even accounting for most yokai being recycled; of special note are some scenes, like the opening, where movement is mostly limited to left and right, and multiple layers of parallax are used to great effect. The child drawings of maps, inventory, and diary are always delightful.
The sound design scores another win as, once again, it is based entirely on sound effects; the only music you will listen to is in the ending credits.
Even if a few instances of more "explicit" horror are present, the atmosphere still counts mostly on tension, melancholy, and a strong sense of solitude. Just be aware that this is a really sad game, much more than the predecessor; not very recommended when feeling down.
Once again, not a title I'd go as far as calling a "masterpiece", but certainly better than the original and expanding on its potential; most deserving of cult classic status.
Among a sea of horror games, Yomawari keeps standing out as a fresh take.

x-- 8/10 --x

Amazing horror game, despite the cute graphics there are some genuine moments that scared the heck out of me.

The story here gets an huge improvement compared to the first entry and the game is longer. If you liked the first this one is simply an improvement my only critique being the eccessive number of boss encounters in the second part of the game that maybe took away from the exploration aspect. It's hard to explain exactly what i mean but wile i learned the first game city map i diden't in this... Best game in the series overall and one of my favorite 5 games in absolute.

9 von 10
i think part of why im drawn to this game,beyond its beautiful art direction,is that i've always loved walking alone at night...even when i was little.