9 R.I.P Sequel - Review

I've had my fill of spooky season with this...

 Genre: VN.

Developer/publisher: Otomate.

Platform: Switch.
Official Site: https://www.otomate.jp/9rips/

VNDB: https://vndb.org/v52276

Release date: 25-9-2025 

 

I was a bit surprised when a sequel was announced for 9rip.

I mostly wanted to get this for Koyou but I will admit my memory of the OG

is already waning, thankfully there was a recap and plenty of callbacks!

As per usual I tried not to set my expectations too high and the only thing I am

disappointed by was the short length of the god after, I enjoyed mostly everything else. 

 

Disclaimer: This is purely my own opinion and it could be different from yours

this is not meant to be some kind of all-truth, just an opinion that came from playing this.

If you don't like what you're reading then close the tab, move on and just idk play it yourself. 

 

Pro's

- Wraps up the story and concludes the saga for relatively well.

- Heaven afters are of decent length.

 

Grey area

- Focuses more on the heaven side than the god side.

-  Art mostly good but... you can notice the usual otomate shenanigans here or there.

 

Con's

- God afters except one are way too short.

 

Storywise it really varied whether an after story was interesting

and ultimately may come down to preference but that's just my opinion. 

 Each character has an after story for the heaven end and the god end.

With 9 routes, I realized by route 7 that not everyone was as relevant to the main

storybeats and the ones that executes them well (heaven side) were Seiya and Minami.

A lot of the others just didn't feel very... relevant or had some random plot. 

As for the OP I think it suited the heaven side more, its kinda funny but it is what it is. 

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System.

This doesn't really follow the usual after story/continuation template

where you just select a character and get their story. Here you start a new game

and then via choices at the start get to the routes. It only takes a minute, you get a brief recap

at the start of the after too which was really helpful.

Actually its really similar to how you end up on routes in the original. 

 

My first route was blind and I decided to do Kureha. After that I used guides.

There are bad ends or... premature endings in some of the heaven routes.

I managed to avoid those first time thru Kureha's so I when I looked up a guide I was

a bit shocked choices actually seemed to matter. Always trust Koyou!

God after's have only one ending so you can enjoy that without worry.

 

They probably could have removed the map selection part as it felt pretty useless

there were times with more than one location but if there's only 1 spot why bother? /shrug.

Turns out some points are missable, 9 in total which unlock locations in a special mode

where Sayaka sends you all over town to find the perfect hiding place. 

Thankfully Choro's guide listed the locations you could recover

but if you miss them its nothing to worry out, the special mode

does NOT even have a CG just a fun scene for your efforts.

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Pacing was not too slow but it felt like there wasn't much time for anything especially

during god afters like it sure did try to deliver something but some didn't satisfy me.

The heaven afters felt like they were a bit more fleshed out and I enjoyed it the most.

With some like Hibiki I wasn't interested in the plot and new side character(s). 

 

In terms of length each god after was like 1/2 hours & heaven 4 so its 6 hours per character

you can probably already see what the problem is here so I will shut up about this.

I could probably have finished this sooner but that is no good for my menhera(mental health). 

 

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The heaven side feels like where most of the effort got put into and for some

it felt like it fleshed out more stuff. Others such as Kureha or Hibiki felt like a remix. 

I did think some had better outcomes but i'm gonna be real they just turned a less than

good end into a happy one.😅 I realized they didn't have all that much material to work with

and only a few of them were actually interesting, mainly Seiya,Minami and to some extend Koyou.

Wasn't sure if it was the writing but it kinda dipped and peaked for some of the heaven afters.

There were some new characters introduced, I couldn't care about most of them. 

Now I understand in the original heaven ends some things are up in the air so what

we get here is that the majority of the time is spend trying to make something of it.

 

God After's
Okay gonna remind everyone that over half the cast is dead

and Misa basically acts like an ankle bracelet for them, this shit is tragic.

Going to heaven doesn't sound like a bad deal for some. Its actually expanded

upon why certain things happened. So, no its not just random R.i.P bozo. 

Characters like Koyou, some demon or the ayakashi's got off better than certain others.

Shucks but it'll keep you warm for a minute.

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Uh yea have some mini character babbles.

Kureha's heaven after did have a unsettling vibe at times which is in line with the original.

I couldn't help but want to pray things would end up relatively well...

I wasn't convinced by his god after and for some reason prefer his heaven side.

I don't think there was nearly enough time to have much of substance and wish they just

focused their energy in one place. Now its like you get a burger but its divided in half.

There's moments that I like but before I knew it, it was over. Sad. 

For Hibiki... i'm mostly indifferent for his heaven after and I like slept through half

of it only to jolt right awake in time for the end and I loved the 深 ending so much! 

Hibiki's god after was kinda meh, shucks for Minami tho... he just keeps taking L's just like me.

I'm once again not completely sold here but what sort of better outcome would there be

for Hibiki and Misa when all's said and done? so at the end of the day it was OK at best.

 Like its definitely an after story but the majority of the time is spend reminiscing. 

This tells me, we don't know what to do with this but enjoy! also R.i.P.

Koyou: In a surprising way I actually ended up invested into his heaven after.

Dunno if good or bad, it scratched that supernatural itch. There was no Reika, since

she was already dealt with at this point! in exchange we got some weirdo spirit

that likes collecting dolls, thanks I guess. Koyou's god after was decent and for once

it felt like a proper after story...but even this felt like it was over in a flash...

Sena: Heaven after went on for too long about his past with S-crown, I sleep.

I loved his god after for some reason because it hit all the right tragic notes.😭

I don't even like Sena that much so that gotta say something. 

Seiya: I loved his heaven after cuz I got some vibes from the kdrama tomorrow so of course

I was eating that shit up though that was just at the beginning. Seiya's character can 

also be very entertaining so this was easy entertainment. They struck gold here amidst a sea

of bronze and silver. God after was more like the rest... 2ish hours of fluff whatever R.i.P. 💀

Minami: His heaven after was enjoyable, maybe it was because much like Seiya

there weren't many new side characters though Meimei did take some spotlight

but he never overstayed his welcome so I was fine with the creepy shinigami.

His god after was hilarious though but as per usual... over in a flash.

Koharu: I thought his heaven after was a little boring something happened

that wasn't on my bingo card. I have 99 problems and this isn't one of them. Very bakamitai.

Koharu is kinda dumb but a real man gotta be a lil stupid, I still love him but basically:

 If you can't handle him at his worst, you don't deserve him at his best.💀👍

His god after much like Sena hit like a truck and I thought it was one of the better ones

like I fully understood now why Misa ends up like that because they took the time to explain it.

I find it hilarious how with both Sena and Koharu I didn't like their heaven side much.😅

Yukimaro had a calm heaven after and it was pretty chill but it didn't have much

going for it and I thought it was pretty much a nothing burger.

OK maybe that's too harsh maybe a bun with cheese on it?

His god after was pretty good but uh not like they could have done a lot with that.

I liked how heartwarming it was, in these trying times I accept it with all my heart.💖

Touka only had one after, for his god ending. It wasn't paced like the others and was

a heaven after in disguise. Also suffers from truth route syndrome, but honestly

I didn't really like Touka that much, he actually made me uncomfy the more

time we spend with him  but of course Misa likes him so uh yea it is what it is.

Imma be real, this game turned me into a Minami enjoyer. 

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Me with over half of the LI's whenever a route ends.

Honestly while I am not satisfied with most god afters, an attempt was made and I accept it.

Though the heaven afters was where the meat of the game was.

Not sure if my expectations were wrong but was it wrong to expect more of the former?

I wasn't completely sold on the highlighted moments thing, since it leaves a lot

open to imagination but I wouldn't say it was awful either, just not my thing. 

They focused more on supernatural side of things because heaven afters

were far longer than the god afters which was really short.

Whether or not 9rip sequel is worth it depends on how much you liked the original

and if you want more content with Misa and ALL the guys.

---

It was nice they provided an opportunity to follow up on some things

or spend more time with specific characters, I could appreciate it for some

but after sitting through 1 character and a half I was like, damn have I really cleared

almost 2 characters already?! at this point I hadn't even touched Koyou my best boi.

Its only after I cleared my 7th route Koharu that some things that happened in other god afters

actually made sense. I guess you could figure it out but its nice there was an explanation.

--- 

Kinda sad one after or route can seem really short but I think its only normal

that with like 9 LI's you aren't gonna spend a lot of time with all of them. 

Overall if you do all it'll take you 50ish hours. That's still a good deal.

Much like the original nothing overstayed its welcome but I got tired by the time of 9th route.

I got the feeling the director wasn't especially focused on more romance focused

scenario maybe it not their thing and that's why everything felt so brief.

If I had to choose between no sequel at all or what we got, I'm still grateful we even got this.

7/10 

Its a little difficult to recommend if you only like one character but if you

really dig supernatural stuff and like the majority of the cast its actually OK.

To that end this is only something I could recommend if you liked over half the cast

but who knows maybe you didn't and still end up with a new favorite! 

 

This game will likely be localized and I will be disappointed if it doesn't.

Though with iffy I am not sure anymore, seems they're just bringing over

random games now while hoping its better received in ENG than Japan.

 

My play order: Kureha > Hibiki > Koyou > Sena > Seiya > Minami > Koharu > Yukimaro > Touka.

Like with the previous game I decided to keep the pairs together and go from there. There's no

restrictions and you can mostly do whatever but I recommend Koharu and Touka for last. 

 

Character rambles after the jump there's spoilers in there as well as some of my fav CG's

so stop reading here if you don't want any of that.

9 R.I.P - Review

 Genre: VN.

Developer/publisher: Otomate.
Platform: Switch.
Official Site: https://www.otomate.jp/9rip/

VNDB: https://vndb.org/v38068
Release date: 2023-06-29.

 

Otomate's latest visual novel! I didn't get started on it right away because

I was busy with FF16 but I still wanted to give this game a shot since it seemed interesting

and they brought back some golden-era seiyuu's I hadn't heard in a while. Oh boy! they

got me nostalgic for Kakki, KENN, Nobuhiko and Shinnosuke Tachibana alright!

I am not too familiar with Azakami or Shun'ichi though but it is always good

to see otomate try to use less popular seiyuus. Other than that I went in very blind

I didn't even know it was gonna be an occult mystery with suspense!

 

Game/story is presented as an occult mystery about people being spirited away...

The heroine Misa ends up hearing some scary stories/rumors and then she had a strange encounter

in the school hallway, she was also worried over her education when an accident happens...

Due to that Misa finds out crossed over to the spirit realm, most of the love interests

are spirits and such. I don't want to say too much so i'll stop her since its really better

if you don't know too much and can find it out on your own.

 

Pro's

- Story/character driven, good amount of suspense.

- Art, cg's are very well done.

- Music fits the mood and theme of the game.

- Short but it doesn't feel longer than it needs to be.

- Great heroine, she takes initiative.

 

Con's

 - 1 route has no epilogue cg's.💀

- High amount of bad ends.

The game can have a little bit of suspense too... but at times it can also be relaxing.

There was enough time to get to know the characters during the common route parts but who

you meet there depends on an early game choice, this was good since it kept each playthrough fresh.

Also it is best going into this game blind as knowing too much could ruin the suspense.

 

First thing I notice is that there are 8(9 if you count the final) routes, well this can

go both ways but I hoped this wouldn't be too long of a VN and it wasn't

the pacing was okay, it moved at a good pace and there was hardly a dull moment!

so I was happy it respects your time, maybe the love process was a little fast

and most characters are nice and easy to like. Of course there are exceptions

and certain characters could not be your cup of tea atleast that was me with Minami.

On the other hand my favorite was Koyou followed by Koharu, Sena and Yukimaro.

Due to characters being paired up and share a common route it makes the most sense

to do the other characters route/end right after. Also even if they shared a common route

they did infact have a individual route and it didn't feel like one character took up more time.

I was relieved at this since I was worried of there being too much shared plot.

 

The heroine Misa was great and good at taking some initiatives, I didn't find her annoying

and considering what she goes through... she handled it pretty well.

 

This game does have bad endings so if you want to avoid those or not in the mood

a guide is recommended. I do think the bad ends were still worth doing even if

they had no CG, as sometimes they gave little details or for better or worse

showed another side of a character. 

 

System was your standard stuff but in one route they had you input your characters

name and you could do it manually which threw the entire jpn dictionary at you. xD

Thankfully you could autofill Misa's name which begs the question... why even bother?

The bad end gotten if you fill it in wrong can be gotten through another choice too...

this was a really dumb design choice that makes 0 sense.

 

Art, looked really nice and before I played I was more positive about it

than I initially was about tsuitsui, so IDK if that says something other than its good.

The CG's were all well done, even if the amount was low its 7/8 there are variations

so i'm on the side of i'd rather most be of quality than half of them be looking off.

9rip also has 8 routes and one finale which is more than the usual 6 or 7 so I think

that says a lot and there's nothing wrong with it. Cg's are nice but it shouldn't be

the whole reason to buy a game, then you're better of buying an artbook!

Music was fine, I had no complaints and it fit the mood. ED themes change

depending which pair of love interests you go after which was nice. 

I think I can recommend 9rip if you don't want a visual novel that is on the long side

but still want something with an engaging plot, don't mind it being an occult mystery

that could test your nerves a little (its nothing too scary) and one or more characters interest you.

This was a very good life/death character drama type of otome game

the only real down side I can think of is the number of routes since by the time

I reached the final route I was kind of burned, thankfully it wasn't as long

as a certain character from Tsuitsui but it was still a nice finish even if it was short.

9/10

I can't ironically give this any less than a 9 because of a bunch of facts

and how refreshing each set of routes was, it balanced everything out nicely.

My play order:

Koyou > Sena  >  Kureha > Hibiki> Koharu > Yukimaro > Minami > Seiya >???.

 

Recommended play order:

It was hard to come up with a recommended order I think this works nicely:

[Kureha > Hibiki]  > [Koyou > Sena] > [Minami > Seiya] > [Koharu > Yukimaro] >???.

You could switch some pairs up due to preference but things to note is that

Koharu/Yukimaro is a bit of a healing route and had more fluff compared to others... it can

either be done after Kureha/Hibiki or after Minami/Seiya. Finally Kojou/Sena may be best

done before Minami/Seiya... it just works better in terms of story elements

same goes for making sure Koharu is done after Hibiki. Of course you could

change something due to preference, like even my own play order works out.

There's not much choice but to do ??? last as his only unlocks after doing all

anyway I hope this information was helpful in deciding a route order.

Character rambles and my fav cg's after the jump! the spoiler free zone ends here.

I should add that 9RIP is one of those visual novels that is best going in blind

as route summaries/thoughts etc could reveal too much.

So if you want to go in blind stop reading here cuz there will be spoilers!

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