Mask City

Mask City: Chapter Zero is a stylish superhero-themed visual novel built around a gripping murder investigation. It’s written by sci-fi and fantasy author Aaron Crash, a writer known for blending action scenes with spicy adult sequences and gifting his heroes with a harem of beautiful allies. Mask City is no exception to that: our protagonist is a crime photographer by day and a street-level superhero by night, relying on raw super strength to fight injustice. When a series of seemingly connected murders surfaces in the city, he teams up with four distinct women to track the killer’s trail from scene to scene. Being a sucker for superhero stories, I jumped in immediately and was pleasantly surprised to find that this is no conventional murder mystery. There’s a psychic twist to it, which made the whole thing considerably more fascinating for me.

First and foremost, the presentation is amazing. The artwork is stunning, with a visual identity that stays true to the comic book aesthetic: bold linework and vivid colors. The character art is also very expressive, with the characters changing postures and facial expressions every couple of lines or so. Comic book panel sequences are used to bring action scenes to life. These are framed exactly as they would be in a printed comic, complete with dramatic interjections splashed across the screen: “WOOSH” when the superhero lands, “POW!” during an attack, and so on. It really makes you feel like you’re not just reading a story but living inside a comic book panel.

The plot itself unravels at a good pace, and it’s written with a catchy tone that keeps you on your toes all the time. Don’t let the “Chapter Zero” in the title mislead you into thinking this is a short prologue or an appetizer for a larger series. This is a complete, full story that will take you roughly eight hours to read through. The “Chapter Zero” in the name refers to something specific and deeply integrated into the plot itself, but it also suggests that this game is the origin story of the hero, with potentially one sequel planned for the future. I won’t say more than that, except that once it clicks, you’ll appreciate the choice of title far more than you did at the start.

On the gameplay side, Mask City is essentially a kinetic visual novel, though it has a generous number of choices throughout. There is only one ending, so regardless of what you pick, you’ll always come back to the main path. Most choices simply branch into a few alternate dialogue lines that resolve immediately, though 3-4 of them carry mild repercussions later in the story, subtly reshaping certain exchanges without altering the plot’s course. Several choices are also tied to mutually exclusive achievements, which gives completionists a reason to replay (or just load a save from a few moments earlier).

Despite not being built in a dedicated VN engine like Ren’Py, the game supports up to 50 manual saves, letting you save before branching choices to explore alternate dialogue. One notable downside is the absence of a skip-unseen-text function, a common limitation outside of Ren’Py, which means a second playthrough to explore all the choices you might not have picked already requires a fair amount of extra clicking. Thankfully, an auto-forward text feature is available, and both its pace and the overall reading speed can be tuned from the settings menu. Sadly, there’s no history of seen text, which means you also can’t go back to the previous line.

For an additional $2, there’s an optional NSFW DLC. Whether it’s worth picking up really depends on what you’re after. Achievement hunters have no choice, since without it, 100% completion is off the table. For those who enjoy lengthy, interactive explicit adult scenes, it delivers solid value: nine fully animated and voiced sequences, each offering multiple choices (positions, actions, finishers) and an animation speed slider. After being unlocked in the main game, spicy scenes can be revisited from the Gallery menu, which is otherwise unavailable to non-DLC owners. The content itself is substantial for the price, though the writing during these scenes is a really weak point. The dialogue (consisting mostly of dirty-talking) is basic, repetitive, and lacks the energy of the main story. A few animations also look rough around the edges, though the majority are well done. Without the DLC, these scenes are replaced by a static kiss image with looping audio, which is a noticeable step down.

All in all, Mask City: Chapter Zero is a well-crafted visual novel that earns its place in the genre. The murder mystery at its core is very engaging, with the supernatural elements giving it a distinct edge. The comic book presentation is really stylish, making it an addictive read.