Dark Auction – PS5 Review

I feel like visual novels have to go some distance to impress me. In terms of presentation, they can feel static and I need a story right in my wheelhouse before truly getting behind it. Dark Auction form Izanagi Games does try to sew some intrigue with it’s intricate plot centred around a long-dead despot. It’s a pity that focus is lost in the final furlong but the rest of the journey had me interested.

What a Dark Auction entails is an opportunity to win highly-prized objects. Rather than being a traditional bidding war, only lucky person is strapped to a chair to have their memories extracted. Once satisfied, the auctioneer considers the process successful and awards the participant. It’s a bizarre and clandestine spectacle that mainly serves as a means to flesh out the cast.

You play as Noah Crawford moments after his father has just blown his chance at the auction. He’s obsessed with a moustached dictator and wants a piece of his legacy. To do that, he’s entered a macabre auction that ultimately ends his life. We pick up the tale as his son Noah, determined to find out what went south whilst aiding his fellow bidders succeed. They’re all after items of personal significance which all have ties to the former leader.

The game takes place within a fictional Germany. It’s gone through the very real horrors of war and it’s still in living memory. Whilst the cast can’t claim any direct involvement, the previous generation can and their histories all intersect with a former dictator. It is not subtle about it but it also doesn’t try to demonise Nazi members. In fact, I’d say it tries to distance itself from what they may have got up to. There’s vague illusions to missions, scientific experiments and the more occult leanings of the leadership.

Whilst it’s clearly trying to provoke difficult questions about the German people’s involvement but I don’t think it fully pushes those buttons. Instead, the turmoil is confined to family matters or, at best, glimpses of the Dictator’s aides seeing the last gasps of the regime. If anything, the inclusion of a real-life parallel feels cheap and they could’ve easily replaced the central dictator with someone wholly fictional.

The game does have a fairly routine setup. Noah shows himself as a persistent snoop so he’s always gathering information. This sees him act as the auctioneer’s assistant, trying to know the participants as much as possible. The auction requires a mentor whose role is to piece together the memories and spot lies when they present themselves.  It makes each chapter feel segmented and can be broken down into manageable chunks.  Each chapter takes roughly a couple of hours to beat so the whole package can feel very substantial.

Each auction requires four stages to beat and the format doesn’t change. As such, I got a solid idea of how each chapter would play out and, despite being someone who likes to blast through dialogue, it made me pay attention for key facts and details. Whilst there is a failure state for each auction, there’s plenty of room for error. Everyone starts with 100 health and each wrong answer takes 10 away.

Dark Auction has plenty of flair. It makes good use of 3D models and environments. The castle itself can be roamed around and, whilst these interludes aren’t gripping, it’s commendable to see the effort being made. There’s some lavish areas to explore but they shine best when the perspective is fixed. A few scenes do repeat but the inclusion of actual character models does help set them within a tangible world. The castle has a great sense of place and the story helps lock the cast in place until the job is done.

Each stage of the auctions are well-framed and there’s hints of the Persona series in how each character’s room is dressed. It’s a little on the nose but those areas offer insight into person and do offer some environmental variety. Interactivity is still very minor and dialogue scenes have a distinctly linear path. There’s no moments for the story to branch so you are strapped in for the narrative the writer wants to deliver.

There’s a lovely piano score permeating throughout. Whilst it rarely raises the tempo, it fits with the methodical gameplay. I rarely felt pressured when playing and it makes more sense for the soundtrack to be relaxed. The voice acting is solid enough. It does suffer from the typical anime habit of over-explaining. I would’ve preferred some nuance. Part of the investigative process requires diligently learning about the bidder but it leaves very little room for mystery. By the end of the auction, the truth is out.

I enjoyed these little subplots and it’s fun to see them intertwine and mingle. Whilst this is essentially a room full of strangers, the ties they do have are surprising. They have their own personalities that do sometimes clash. There’s also an ongoing thread about exposing the organisation behind the auctions. That doesn’t quite hold up as much as the memory diving main course. It serves up a bonkers conclusion that really jumps the shark.

And I think that ending takes the shine off things. For a game focused so much on the personal, it explodes into this sci-fi conclusion that, whilst brewing in the background, doesn’t really land. I still think this is something worth checking out. The missed opportunities with post-war generation can feel like avoiding a more interesting conversation, but they still managed to weave something intricate and thoughtful.