The mystery visual novel Alternate Jake Hunter: DAEDALUS The Awakening of Golden Jazz will receive its PC release via Steam on the Fourth of July, as announced by publisher Arc System Works and developer Neilo.
Originally launched for the Japan market, Alternate Jake Hunter: DAEDALUS The Awakening of Golden Jazz is the prequel for the Jake Hunter Detective series, which was first made available for the PlayStation 4 and the Nintendo Switch in December of last year. It was released digitally in the West just this past May.
Known as the Detective Saburo Jinguji series in Japan, the series revolves around the aforementioned 32-year old private detective who operates a private detective agency in Shinjuku, Tokyo. Alternate Jake Hunter: DAEDALUS The Awakening of Golden Jazz is set during his youth when he first worked as an assistant detective in New York.
The plot is driven forward by the death of his grandfather, Kyousuke Jinguji, who was living in New York. This motivates Jake Hunter to travel to New York and sift through his late grandfather’s belongings to investigate the murder, which is made more curious by the fact that he discovers that his grandfather’s last words were “Daedalus”. Through uncovering clues, reliving memories and conversations with the oddest sorts of New York, Saburo Jinguji (as Jake Hunter is known in Japan) will organize and make sense of all of this information in the “Orchard of his mind”. Piecing this vital information together leads you closer to solving the mystery at hand.
The Detective Saburo Jinguji series enjoys considerable success in Japan, currently celebrating almost 30 years of consistent popularity, starting with its first game Shinjuku Chūō Kōen Satsujin Jiken, which was released in 1987. It can be argued that the point and click, visual novel genre is a very niche, since its first western release didn’t come until 2008 in the form of Jake Hunter Detective Chronicles for the Nintendo DS.
For fans of the genre, Alternate Jake Hunter: DAEDALUS The Awakening of Golden Jazz is still a welcome addition to the PC. For newcomers who seem intrigued, a demo is currently available on Steam for those who want to snoop around before cracking their first case.
