Yume Nikki: Dream Diary

There's a certain irony in attempting to remake Yume Nikki, in that much of the original game's charm is thanks to its primitive, almost aleatory gameplay and visual design. Yume Nikki, in and of itself, is a huge mystery, and it's one that's ultimately ruined when you attempt to codify its qualities into a remake.

This is pretty clearly evidenced by Yume Nikki: Dream Diary. In place of the original's massive, freeform world design is a slew of generic 2D platforming levels, exascerbated by hamfisted action segments and dull attempts at horror. The magic of losing yourself in an abstract world is lost thanks to the remake's gatekeeping design, condensing the entirety of Madotsuki's dream world into a paltry six levels (compared to the original's 36).

Another major issue with the remaster is its visuals, not on a technical level but from a methodological. The remaster's updated graphics take away the original's visual ambiguity, giving an unnecessary sense of certainty to the game's world that makes everything feel relatively dull and lifeless despite an improvement in fidelity. Even Madotsuki herself looks distinctly off.

Overall, it's pretty lame. There's a few aspects of it that have promise and seem to have a solid grasp on the original's atmosphere (some of the soundtrack is really good for example), but ultimately, Yume Nikki: Dream Diary fails to be compelling both as a reimagining of the original game as well as a seperate game in its own right.