OMORI

Omori’s gameplay is inspired by traditional Japanese role-playing games. The gameplay is split between two settings: the imaginary world of Headspace and the real world, set in Faraway Town. In Headspace, the player controls a party of four characters: Omori, Aubrey, Kel, and Hero. In the real world, the player begins with only Sunny. Each party member possesses their own unique skills for use both in battle and in overworld traversal. The overworld portion is played from a top-down perspective. The game features side quests and puzzles for the player to solve, bestowing them with various rewards and skills upon completion.

In Headspace, many beneficial weapons and items can be obtained, with some being purchasable using the currency Clams. In the real world, the effects of items are more limited, and the player uses dollars. Battles are played out in a turn-based format in which each party member performs a move. After attacking, party members can work together to perform “follow up” attacks, which come from a shared pool of energy that accumulates upon taking damage. Characters and enemies have Heart, which functions as health points; if damage is taken, it decreases, and if it reaches zero, the character is defeated and turns into toast.

The Juice meter is used to perform skills, special abilities which aid in battle. Outside of battle, the party can save and heal by interacting with a picnic blanket, accompanied by Omori’s older sister Mari. Unlike most role-playing games, status effects are based on a three-pointed emotion system. A party member or opponent’s emotion can change throughout the course of a battle, usually due to moves by another party member or enemy. Neutral is the baseline and has no effects; Angry increases attack but lowers defense; Sad increases defense but lowers speed, as well as converting a portion of damage to Heart into damage to Juice; and Happy increases luck and speed but lowers accuracy.

Emotions are either strong or weak against each other – Happy beats Angry, Angry beats Sad, and Sad beats Happy. Additionally, higher-intensity variants of each emotion also exist. Omori awakens in “White Space”, a barren void he has lived in “for as long as [he] can remember”. He enters a door to the vibrant world of “Headspace”, where he meets his friends, Aubrey, brothers Kel and Hero, Basil, and Omori’s older sister Mari. They peruse Basil’s photo album, containing pictures of their shared memories, and decide to visit his house. Once they arrive, Kel and Aubrey scuffle, damaging the album.

Upon seeing a disturbing photo fall from it, Basil panics, and Omori is abruptly teleported back to White Space. He stabs himself with a knife, revealing the previous events to be the dreams of a teenage boy, Sunny, as he wakes up in the middle of the night. The player discovers that Sunny and his mother are moving. He goes downstairs for a midnight snack but is confronted by a nightmarish hallucination. He dispels the illusion by taking deep breaths and returns to bed. Awakening in White Space, Omori reunites with Aubrey, Kel, and Hero. They discover that Basil has gone missing and set out to rescue him. The four explore the various regions of Headspace in search of Basil, with Mari assisting along the way.

The group is continuously diverted from their search by various situations, leading their memory of Basil to fade away. Later, in the real world, it is revealed that Mari supposedly killed herself four years ago, leading to the friend group diverging. Though Kel and Hero recovered to varying degrees, Sunny became an estranged shut-in, Aubrey a delinquent, and Basil an anxious recluse. Three days before Sunny moves away, Kel knocks on his door in an attempt to reconnect one last time. The player can either ignore Kel or answer the door: by choosing the former, Sunny stays inside for the remaining three days, immersing himself in housework and his dreams.