Rule Of Rose

''Rule of Rose'' is a survival horror video game developed by Punchline for the PlayStation 2. Set in England in 1930, the plot revolves around a nineteen-year-old woman named Jennifer, who becomes trapped in a world ruled by young girls who have established a class hierarchy called the Red Crayon Aristocrats. It was first released in 2006 by Sony Computer Entertainment in Japan. After Sony Computer Entertainment's American and European branch did not express interest in localizing the title, it was published later that year by Atlus USA in North America and by 505 Games in Europe.

Development on ''Rule of Rose'' began after Punchline was asked by Sony Computer Entertainment to make a horror game. Punchline wanted to develop a "new type of horror game" with an emphasis on psychological horror. This decision led to the concept of childhood, specifically the "mysterious and misunderstood" nature of young girls. The team drew inspiration from the classic Brothers Grimm fairy tales for the narrative, and the '' Silent Hill'' series for graphics and art style. The entire score was produced by studio musicians in order to bring a human element to the game's atmosphere.

''Rule of Rose'' was the subject of a moral panic in Europe prior to its publication there, based on rumors of its alleged content. These rumors ranged from erotic themes to obscene brutality. Various European authorities condemned the game and called for its banning. The game was cancelled in the United Kingdom, despite the Video Standards Council calling the complaints "nonsense". ''Rule of Rose'' received mixed reviews from many publications; reactions to the story, music, and horror elements were almost universally positive, while the gameplay was panned. The game has been compared to ''Silent Hill'' and '' Haunting Ground'', due to the psychological horror used throughout and because the main character is accompanied by a canine companion.

Gameplay

''Rule of Rose'' is a survival horror game in which the player guides Jennifer through exploring the game environments and advances the plot by accomplishing tasks while sporadically encountering enemies and bosses.

Described as "essentially an interactive movie" by its director Shuji Ishikawa and associate producer Yuya Takayama, the narrative of ''Rule of Rose'' centers on the traumatic childhood memories of Jennifer, "an ordinary, vulnerable girl"; these memories sometimes manifest in exaggerated ways.

Combat is almost exclusively melee-based, with a variety of improvised weapons available, such as kitchen knives and pipes. Jennifer is a timid character: her melee attacks are neither powerful nor long-ranged. Evasion of enemies is often a more viable strategy instead of fighting. With the exception of a handful of bosses, all enemies in the game are imps—skinny, dolllike creatures the size of small children. Different animal-headed imps appear throughout the game, alongside regular imps.

Every level of the game takes place over a month. Each chapter begins with the reading of a homemade storybook related to the plot of the chapter.
During each level, Jennifer is tasked with finding a specific object that will be gifted to the Aristocracy.

Early in the game, Jennifer encounters and rescues a dog named Brown. Brown accompanies her throughout the game and responds to the player's commands. Brown can be ordered to track items by scent, be commanded to 'stay' and be called to Jennifer's side. Brown cannot attack enemies, but will growl to distract some imps and bosses, allowing Jennifer to retreat or attack without fear of retaliation. He can be injured to the point of collapse, causing him to stop distracting enemies or track items.

Brown's ability to locate items is an integral part of the game, and is used in every chapter to progress further. The same system allows the player to find health restoratives and other items which, while not essential to complete the game, can help the player survive enemy encounters. Players select an item from the inventory for Brown to locate, which is then connected to the 'find' command until changed or removed. Every item selected this way can be used to find at least one type of item. When tracking items, Brown will lead the player through the game environments, scratching at doors in his way, signaling the player to open the door. Most health restoratives and all tradable items are hidden and must be uncovered by Brown, though the player can choose to avoid searching for these items to progress quickly. Restorative items include snack foods, candy, and chocolate. The different types of restorative items heal varying amounts of health. Bones and other items can be used to restore Brown's health if he becomes injured. Other items such as marbles and ribbons have no immediate use, but may be traded with non-playable characters in order to obtain food, rare items, and weapons.

Most levels are puzzle based. The primary puzzles require the use of Brown's scent-finding ability in order to find objects that are related to one another in order to solve a larger puzzle. Others require finding markings on the wall in order to solve the chapter's puzzle.

Plot

During a bus ride along a rural road, 19-year-old orphan Jennifer is awakened by a mysterious young boy who presents her with an unfinished, homemade storybook and asks her to read it. The boy runs out of the bus before Jennifer can return the book to him, and she follows him to the dilapidated Rose Garden Orphanage. In the courtyard of the orphanage, Jennifer witnesses several masked children beating a bloody sack before dragging it inside.

Jennifer infiltrates the orphanage, and the boy from the bus leads Jennifer to a room in the attic where he addresses her from atop an altar and requests that Jennifer finish reading the storybook he gave her. After Jennifer finishes reading, a voice over the loudspeaker announces that a funeral is about to begin. The boy informs Jennifer that the funeral is for her "dear friend". At the funeral site, Jennifer senses something important to her buried there. As she digs up the coffin, Jennifer discovers a bloody sack inside, but before she can open it the orphans of Rose Garden surround Jennifer, pouring water over her. The voice on the loudspeaker announces that an airship will be taking off soon, and the orphans force Jennifer into the coffin, lock her inside, and carry her away.

Jennifer wakes up tied to a pole in the bowels of an impossibly large and luxurious airship. The boy who led Jennifer to the orphanage introduces himself to her as the Prince of The Red Rose. The Prince forces Jennifer to join the Red Rose Aristocracy as the lowest ranked member of the Aristocracy's class hierarchy. The three high-ranking members - Meg, Clara and Eleanor - use classical English Aristocratic titles such as "Baroness". The only other low-ranked member, Amanda, frantically tries to ingratiate herself with them. All members are ostensibly under the command of the "Bear Prince" and "Princess of the Red Rose", although the Prince seems to only interact with Jennifer and the Princess is represented by a doll. The members are required to provide a monthly gift in order to be admitted to a ritualised club meeting at which the lower ranking members are humiliated. In addition, the airship is populated by other children unconnected to the club; Martha, the cleaning lady; Mr Hoffman, a strict teacher; a mysterious man named Gregory who passes storybooks to Jennifer; and strange animal-headed child-like monsters called "imps" wander the halls of the airship, attacking and ambushing Jennifer as she moves around.

Jennifer continuously finds herself in conflict with the Aristocrats as she attempts to fulfill their gift demands. At the first meeting, Amanda is forced to push a stick with a rat tied on the end into Jennifer's face, although the rat does not attack her. Jennifer later finds a tied-up and suspended golden retriever in a storage room, and rescues and adopts it. The dog, Brown, assists her in finding gifts. After Jennifer is able to find a gift before Amanda, Jennifer is "promoted" to Amanda's position and is forced to push the rat on a stick - which has since died and become infested with maggots - into Amanda's face. This causes Amanda to become hatefully obsessed with Jennifer at being promoted over her. Jennifer also meets a sickly girl called Wendy who is looked after by the Aristocrats in the Sickbay and does not participate in their game, and learns that she has been telling them stories about a mysterious monstrous man called "Stray Dog", who devours children.

The higher-ranking Aristocrats start to issue requests which put Jennifer into positions where she can be blamed for stealing or destroying things belonging to the other members. She is framed for killing a bird belonging to Eleanor, beheading a fish Mr. Hoffman kept in his office; and finds signs that Mr. Hoffman may have been abusing Diana. The Aristocrats continue to torment and humiliate the other children on board the airship by sealing Jennifer in an "onion bag" in which insects and other unpleasant substances are dropped by the other members; and locking her in a room in which another girl, Clara, has been turned into a "mermaid" by having her legs tied together and is repeatedly winched up to the ceiling and then dropped at speed, causing her to vomit on and thrash at Jennifer.

After apparently living for several months on the airship, Jennifer appears on the ground again in a rose garden near the orphanage. She approaches a nearby house owned by "Gregory M. Wilson" and goes inside, where she discovers him contemplating suicide, and finds his diary in which he describes writing stories for his son Joshua, without whom his life consists entirely of growing peas in his garden. Jennifer enters a basement bedroom in Gregory's house and is locked inside; there she finds a stuffed bear and a series of letters between Wendy and a boy named Joshua, in which Wendy offers to help free Joshua from the basement; they address each other as "Prince" and "Princess". Suddenly, Wendy arrives at the basement window and releases Jennifer, and they escape back to the rose garden after stealing Gregory's gun to prevent him from committing suicide. Before leaving, Wendy trades a rose-shaped brooch for Jennifer's bear, and names the bear Joshua after the unknown boy.

Jennifer reappears on the airship where the club is tasked with finding the stuffed bear, Joshua, after it goes missing. The reward for finding the bear is a Red Crayon, an official invitation to the higher ranks of the Aristocracy. Although Wendy is originally suspected of stealing the bear by the other Aristocrats, Jennifer eventually discovers that Amanda was the thief and attempted to frame her, and that she has sewn a life-size doll of Jennifer which she furiously beats with a stick. Amanda returns the bear to Jennifer while crying that it is inevitable she will become "Miss Popular". After returning the bear to the Aristocrats, Jennifer nearly receives her Red Crayon but the Club meeting is stormed by imps, who apparently kidnap Jennifer.

Jennifer awakens back in the orphanage in a locked room. After being freed by Brown, she explores to find all of the children from the airship, but her attempts at interacting with them are ignored. The Aristocrat Club appears as well, and she learns that the gift of the month is "Filthy Jennifer" as the building fills with hostile imps. When Jennifer encounters Wendy in the central courtyard, Wendy informs Jennifer of an important meeting between the Aristocrats; and Wendy, Brown, and the imps all disappear. As Jennifer searches for her friend and dog, she begins to hallucinate, seeing several stuffed animals lying in the orphanage as Brown. Jennifer follows a bloody trail to the orphanage's attic, where the Aristocrat Club now meets, and sees that the gift of the mouth has been changed to "Filthy Brown". Inside the attic, the Club surround a tied sack. Amanda informs Jennifer that her friend is in the bag. An unknown girl in a red dress steps down from the seat previously occupied by the "Princess" doll, revealing that Wendy was the Princess of the Red Rose; and deems that by sacrificing Brown, Jennifer has earned her place in the high ranks of the club.

Jennifer, abruptly shown as a child, furiously slaps Wendy, denounces the remaining members of the Aristocrats, and throws away her rose-shaped brooch. Wendy leaves the Orphanage humiliated. In the following month in the orphanage, the remaining members of the Aristocrat Club surround Jennifer, begging her to become their new Princess and to create a new game for them to play. They also destroy all legends and records of Stray Dog, denouncing them as "Wendy's lies".

They then see Wendy outside, rush out to greet her and are apparently killed. Wendy opens the orphanage door with Gregory Wilson on a leash in the role of Stray Dog having apparently killed the remaining orphans. Jennifer is forced to fight him. After knocking him down and escaping, Wendy reveals that she dressed as a boy and wore a wig to appear as the "Prince of the Red Rose" who led Jennifer to the orphanage, and to masquerade as Gregory's son Joshua. She gives Jennifer the gun taken from Gregory's house and asks her to use it to stop him; as she does so, Gregory recovers and sees Wendy without her wig and kills her since he no longer recognises her as "Joshua". Gregory begins to attack Jennifer again, but in a moment of self-awareness, stops to cry "Sorry, Joshua." Jennifer returns Gregory's gun to him as he does so, and Gregory shoots himself.

In the final chapter, Jennifer re-appears in the orphanage as a child and is able to explore freely without any enemies or objectives. Jennifer discovers the letters received by Wendy from Gregory's basement, revealing that ''Jennifer'' was the original "Joshua" who was trapped in the basement by Gregory as a replacement for his son, and saved by Wendy. Wendy brought Jennifer to the orphange for companionship and they swore the "Rule of Rose" together - "Everlasting True Love, I Am Yours". The two girls exchanged Jennifer's stuffed bear for Wendy's rose-shaped brooch as promises of loyalty to each other, and Wendy named the bear Joshua after Jennifer's former identity. Wendy formed the Red Crayon Aristocrats from the children at the orphanage, and the children would pretend together that the orphanage was an airship - real airships having recently been invented. After Jennifer obtained Brown as a puppy, Wendy became jealous of not being the sole subject of Jennifer's attention and turned the club against her, finally demanding that the club kill Brown. At the same time, the orphanage's cleaning lady Martha reported to the police that Gregory had been seen walking outside on all-fours, accompanied by a boy resembling Wendy. Jennifer also finds models resembling the "imps" lying in one of the orphanage rooms, realising that they appeared to her as manifestations of her own guilt and weakness.

Jennifer sees Wendy outside in the orphanage garden, but is unable to interact with her, and leaves the orphanage, closing the door on Wendy behind her. Jennifer recalls that she was taken from the orphanage by the police after being the only survivor after Gregory killed the other children. After she was also found to be a survivor of an earlier airship crash that resulted in the deaths of her parents and her kidnap or adoption by Gregory, her story was given media prominance and the news of the orphanage massacre was buried, leaving the children unremembered.

Finally, Jennifer leaves the orphanage and finds Gregory waiting at the bus stop, harmlessly asking her if she would like to make up a story, and Brown in a shed nearby. She puts a collar with his name around Brown's neck, promising to protect him and her memories for eternity. She writes the Rule of Rose on a chalkboard and leaves it in the shed after chaining Brown's collar to a pillar, then closes the shed's door on Brown, symbolically locking his memory deep inside herself.

The game is largely linear and the player cannot affect the story through their actions, although they are rewarded for exploration with secret items, additional details and combat upgrades. There is one genuine branch: if instead of giving the gun to Gregory, the player has Jennifer kill him herself (by shooting him with the gun or otherwise), text appears stating that Jennifer remained lonely and isolated - presumably as the result of being responsible for Gregory's murder - and the screen fades to back accompanied by Wendy's malicious laughter.

Development

The company Punchline, which had previously developed the video game ''Chulip'', developed ''Rule of Rose'' for the PlayStation 2. A group of twenty-five developers, Punchline began the project after being asked by Sony Computer Entertainment to develop a horror video game; not wanting to create a game similar to the survival-horror series ''Resident Evil'', Punchline decided on the goal of developing a "new type of horror game, one which wasn’t the usual zombie, ghost and slasher type," with an emphasis on psychological horror rather than "surprise- and shock-based horror." A proposed early draft by Yoshiro Kimura was a dark fantasy "boy's story" that centered on a boy abducted by "a big man" and his attempts to escape, while encountering the ghosts of previous victims. Keywords included "Kidnapping, imprisonment, children, bullying, dwarfs, airship, escape." This concept was turned down by the publisher on the basis of being "too dangerous a topic," and Kimura turned to the idea of examining the "fear between girls."

This decision led to the concept of "a game surrounding childhood and children," but from both viewpoints to show how children and adults can find the other one terrifying, with a primary focus on the adult's perspective. Though the game has garnered comparisons with William Golding's 1954 allegorical novel ''Lord of the Flies'', the developers did not draw inspiration from it, instead focusing on the "mysterious and misunderstood" nature of girls. The story formed through trial and error as the developers figured out how to create a sense of fear, ultimately adding the children's secret society, the Red Crayon Aristocrats. They also included Brown as a way to balance Jennifer's "helpless and unhappy" personality and make the game more enjoyable. Because of budget and time problems, the combat system was left a little rough.

''Rule of Rose''s graphics are heavily stylized, incorporating a series of visual filters similar to those used in the '' Silent Hill'' series. The developers researched the behavior of children, monitoring a group of European and American children, and photographed references for "the game’s textures and models"; for the motion capture, the team had Japanese children act. At the request of the developers, the group of children also expressed through drawings or written words what caused them to be happy or afraid. The company Shirogumi worked on the computer-generated imagery present in ''Rule of Rose''s cutscenes. The musical score was composed by Yutaka Minobe, who also co-composed the music of ''Skies of Arcadia'' and some tracks from the ''Panzer Dragoon Orta'' soundtrack. The entire score was produced by studio musicians, including the Hiroshi Murayama Trio, and vocals by Kaori Kondo. According to the game's developers, the music was intended to bring a human element to the atmosphere in the game. A 6-track promotional soundtrack CD was produced by Atlus, which was issued to customers from certain retailers when ''Rule of Rose'' was pre-ordered.

Punchline included several themes in ''Rule of Rose'', with the primary one being "intimate relationships between all people". A major theme in the game is the difference between a child's and an adult's way of thinking, and how children might treat adults if they were given power over them. Players are helpless to prevent their adult player character from being bullied by the children. Another theme is how attachment "to one thing can bring out the worst in people."

Controversy

Prior to its publication, ''Rule of Rose'' was the subject of a moral panic in Europe. At E3 2006 Atlus announced that it would be releasing ''Rule of Rose'' in the United States, following Sony's decision to pass on an American release, as the game "wasn’t really in sync with their corporate image" and the company had wanted the game to "be a bit tamer, if it were to have the Sony name in the U.S." The developers disagreed with this, saying that "the theme is supposed to be one of intimate familiarity" and that they had intended to portray how children behave "without the filter of guilt or sin." Rumors of violence towards children in the game tied into a larger discussion of morality and violence in video games appeared in the Italian magazine ''Panorama'' in November 2006, and were quickly picked up by the British media, which alleged that the game had scenes of "children buried alive underground, in-game sadomasochism, and underage eroticism." These allegations were untrue. At the time, ''Rule of Rose'' had already been rated by various video game advisory boards as suitable for an older teenage audience: in Japan, it was rated 15+; in the majority of Europe, 16+; and in North America, 17+.

European Union justice minister Franco Frattini attacked the game as containing "obscene cruelty and brutality." He also called for changes to the PEGI rating system in place across Europe and for government officials to engage in discussions with industry representatives. Frattini received a letter from Viviane Reding, commissioner for the information society and media, who criticized his actions: "It is...very unfortunate that my services were not pre-consulted before your letter to the Ministers of Interior was sent out," reminding him of the commission-backed self-regulating ratings system called PEGI that has operated across the European Union since 2003. The PEGI system of classification, according to Reding's letter, offers "informed adult choice" without censoring content: "This is in line with the Commission's view that measures taken to protect minors and human dignity must be carefully balanced with the fundamental right to freedom of expression as laid down in the Charter on Fundamental Rights of the European Union." On March 7, 2007, a group of Member of the European Parliaments presented a Motion for a European Parliament resolution on a ban on the sale and distribution in Europe of the game and the creation of a 'European Observatory on childhood and minors'. The game was further suggested to be banned for sale in France, and to be kept from the public in Poland. At this time, the game had not yet been released in Europe; the public officials suggesting that ''Rule of Rose'' be banned had not played the game, only having read about its alleged content or seen the trailer.

505 Games' Australian distributor, Red-Ant, cancelled the game's Australian and New Zealand release, and 505 Games later cancelled the United Kingdom release as a result of complaints by Frattini and other EU officials, and "largely misleading" commentary from the British press, although review copies had already shipped to video game journalists. It was released in the rest of Europe. The British body which had granted the title its 16+ PEGI rating (the Video Standards Council) responded to the press and Frattini's comments: "I have no idea where the suggestion of in-game sadomasochism has come from, nor children being buried underground. These are things that have been completely made up. ..We're not worried about our integrity being called into question, because Mr Frattini's quotes are nonsense." The Council further noted that "there isn't any underage eroticism. And the most violent scene does indeed see one of the young girls scare Jennifer with a rat on a stick. But the rat's actually quite placid towards her and even licks her face."

Reception

The game received mixed reviews, according to video game review aggregator Metacritic. The reviewer for video game magazine ''Play'' wrote: "I think everyone should experience this game, especially horror fans, but in order to do so, you're going to have to suffer through times of sheer agony—just like poor, unlucky Jennifer." According to '' Official UK PlayStation 2 Magazine'', the game " ends the stuff of nightmares with stylish sound and graphics. Sadly, the developer should have spent longer on the gameplay." ''Edge'' found neither plot nor gameplay appealing: "It’s just a murky brew of meaningless, exploitative dysfunction filling an empty game, and it leaves a bitter taste."

It is generally agreed that the title has an interesting plot, with ''The A.V. Club'' observing that "aside from a few deep curtsies and an unlockable Gothic Lolita costume, the characters are more sinister than sexualised". However, the gameplay is widely lambasted as clumsy, archaic, and unrewarding. The press was generally divided upon how much the gameplay detracts from one's ability to enjoy the story itself. GamesRadar described Jennifer as "a cringing, passive non-entity" and stated: "There's no denying that ''Rule of Rose'' is extremely pretty, atmospheric and disturbing.... but as an adventure game, ''Rule of Rose'' just sort of wilts." Acegamez, on the other hand, not only admired the game's plot but also found the gameplay appealing if slow, "a wonderful psychological thriller that will draw you in with its bizarrely compelling narrative, atmospheric presentation and thoughtful story-based gameplay".

In a retrospective article on survival horror games, GamePro's Michael Cherdchupan listed ''Rule of Rose'' as one of the classics of the genre, writing that the game was a work of art that lingered long after playing through; he praised it for its delicate handling of its subject matter and Jennifer's journey as she processes her trauma. IGN listed ''Rule of Rose'' as one of the worst horror games created after 2000. While enjoying the "refreshingly adult take on sexual awakening and repressed memories that's consistently unsettling without ever resorting to cheap shock tactics," it criticized the game's "totally broken" combat and "thoroughly excruciating" backtracking, controls, and camera angles.

Because of the limited number of copies published, ''Rule of Rose'' has garnered a reputation as one of the more expensive video games to buy second-hand.

Future

In 2021, Tokyo indie game developer Onion Games expressed interest in remastering ''Rule of Rose''. Although they "can't guarantee that any of these initiatives will have more than a 1% chance of happening", they would like to give it a try after remastering a previous title for the Nintendo Switch called ''Moon''.

Notes

References

External links

* {{official website, http://www.atlus.com/ruleofrose/

2006 video games
505 Games games
Atlus games
Censored video games
Single-player video games
LGBT-related video games
Obscenity controversies in video games
PlayStation 2 games
PlayStation 2-only games
2000s horror video games
Psychological horror games
Sony Interactive Entertainment games
Survival video games
Video game controversies
Video games about dogs
Video games developed in Japan
Video games featuring female protagonists
Video games set in England
Video games set in the 1930s