London Detective Mysteria: The route report

I finally decided to write a report of the five "good" romantic endings I managed to clear. Follow me down LDM's murky maze of love entanglements, dear fellow gamers! (Massive spoilers ahead!)

Holmes: Young Holmes' route, derivative is thy name. It's simply impossible to play that route and enjoy it on its own merits after playing Code:Realize, which stars the exact same protagonists in the exact same relationships. Sure, it's not Karin's fault that Sir Conan Doyle's and Maurice Leblanc's works do feature Holmes' friendship with Watson and rivalvry with Lupin, and it's even less their fault that Code:Realize treaded that exact same ground with much more success; but with Otomate's input being the most popular otome take on the Sherlock Holmes lore, Karin's version comes across as a sorry retread despite actually predating Otomate's one by a full year. To make matters worse, Karin's Holmes is rather milquetoast, he gets his thunder stolen by pretty much everybody around him (starting with his own father, the much more charismatic and bonkable Holmes Sr.) and his relationship with Emily never fully takes flight. Even if you choose to ignore the class difference factor, those two people seem to sap each other rather than strengthen each other. Heck, I can totally see them drift apart as soon as the physical passion cools down and end up getting on each other's nerves.

Lupin: Described by many LDM players as the best route in the game, the gentleman thief's route left me cold. I see it as a giant missed opportunity, with the dichotomy between flamboyant Lupin and shy Lupine being painfully underexploited. The writers could have expanded upon Lupin's inner struggles and made him a genuinely conflicted character, torn between his father's expectations of him and his own desire to live a normal, thievery-free life; instead, they went the easy way by making Lupine a sheer decoy, nullifying his whole character in the process. Not that the romance itself is any better, mind you. First, you have that nude scene, which is both weirdly raunchy and utterly implausible in the story's context. No matter how horny Emily is as a healthy teenage girl, there's no way she would enjoy suddenly finding herself buck-naked in the arms of a guy she hardly knows; more like she'd get utterly hysterical — this is Victorian era England, after all. And then you have the teeny-tiny issue of Lupin being a giant prick who spends his whole route blowing hot and cold and toying with Emily's heart. How am I supposed to root for that pair in earnest, when Emily herself calls Lupin out for being sleazy and manipulative? She'll probably toss him out once she gets bored of his scheming ways, or beauty-obsessed Lupin himself will ditch her for a prettier dame.

Akechi: Unlike his two predecessors in this post, Akechi is blessed with a truly fascinating personality and stellar character development. His route is rife with mystery and action, including (but not limited to) a bout of confinement, a duel under the moonlight and a boat travel overseas. Cherry on the top, his whole arc touches upon genuinely interesting and occasionally heart-wrenching topics, from the hardships of being an expatriate to the sacrifices one must make to protect others. What a pity, then, to see l'amour fail utterly in that otherwise brilliant route! With Emily and Akechi both being loyal and serious characters and having unescapable duties to fulfill in different continents, there is simply no way their budding love story can endure. The game itself doesn't even try to give us a glimmer of hope regarding their future together, preferring instead to describe in exquisite details the many differences between them and the countless obstacles that keep them apart. This is a different brand of depressing: Lupin and Holmes' routes give us poorly assorted couples that can be together, while Akechi's route gives us a well-assorted couple that cannot be together. Oh, the torture! Unless they can make do with bonking each other once a year, their relationship is pretty much over before the credits even roll.

Jack: If you can stomach all the gore and grime packed by this route, you're in for a touching and bittersweet love story that's marginally more believable than the ones above. Jack is a tainted character through and through and the biggest roturier in the whole game, which should automatically disqualify him as a love interest for pure, noble Emily; and yet, their common history beautifully illustrates how the noble and low classes can learn from each other and help each other. There is something weirdly poignant in Jack's rebirth as Emily's butler: this feels like the most torturous situation ever, and yet one cannot help but think that this is exactly the atonement Jack deserves for his crimes. With the game firmly implying that Pendleton was once Emily's late mother's very own Jack, we can only hope that Jack himself will grow into as badass a butler as Pendleton. On the other hand, there seems to be little hope as far as romance is concerned, with Jack's sole prospect being to love Emily from the shadows for the rest of his life. There's not even the slightest guarantee that the lady will be able to return that love at all; although Emily claims that she'll stay single forever for Jack's sake, that cute youthful resolve probably won't last long in the face of House duties, desire for offspring and the like.

Watson: It's hard not to see the apprentice doctor as Emily's canon mate. Not only do they interact an awful lot during the common route, but they genuinely care for each other and don't mind showing it. To crown this all, they met once during their childhood — although only Watson remembers it. Their love story has 'fate' written all over it and is deliciously heart-warming; what a pity, then, to see that sweet love story unfold in what is arguably the weakest route in the whole game! Most of Watson's route consists of unplausible events and out-of-character behaviours: like, why the heck would Emily foolishly follow Watson alone in the East End after she was nearly attacked there once? Why would Watson avoid Emily for days on end after they developed such a close relationship? To create fake drama and fill in the blanks, of course! After all the fulfilling interactions between Watson and Emily in the common route, their dedicated romantic route somewhat feels like filler, which is the most pitifully ironic thing ever. Very little is said about their future romantic prospects, but I guess their situation is the least desperate here: not only is their love genuinely strong, but Watson has the potential to become a talented doctor and thus a palatable mate for Emily. Sure, that still wouldn't make him nobility; but a doctor would still be a better potential husband for a lady than, say, a thief or a murderer.

LDM was not an unpleasant ride, but let's face it: I got more enjoyment out of the lovely art, the gorgeous music, the beautifully written text and the constant mentions of tea than out of the story and the romance. I toyed with the idea of purchasing the original PSP version at the beginning of my run, but nothing could be further from my mind now. Will I ever pick up LDM again and clear the rest of the routes, only time will tell! Thanks for reading, and be my guest anytime!