Schrödinger’s Call Review: Trapped Between States Of Being
Identity sits at the core of the story of Schrödinger’s Call. You wake up in a strange room with only a phone present, not knowing who you are or how you got into this strange liminal space. Quickly, though, you learn that your name is Mary and that you have been named The World’s Last Confidant, here to help people accept their death and move on to the next world. It’s good that you’re there, because there’s about to be plenty of business. The world is about to end
Life And Death
If the stakes sound high here though, they really aren’t. You aren’t tasked with saving the world or stopping this from happening. It’s too late for that. The moon is literally falling to Earth and will kill everyone alive in exactly twenty-one nanoseconds. There’s no time to fix it, and Mary wouldn’t be able to stop it even if she had more time. Her job is quite different. It’s to help souls trapped in despair accept their fate and move on to whatever comes next. Mary and these other souls are trapped somewhere between life and death in these final moments, but Mary has a final chance to help.
Most chapters in Schrödinger’s Call start more or less the same. The phone rings and Mary answers. Someone is on the other end, confused by what is happening and thinking they’re talking to someone they know. Mary explains who she is and what is happening, which they sooner or later accept. Once they do, Mary gets to hear the last call they had prior to the moon falling, getting some insight into what they need to accept their end. She then speaks with them about their issues, but Mary isn’t the only one who the end of the world is causing memory issues for. These callers remember more of who they are than Mary does, but they still need help with jogging their memories. Luckily, Mary also gets to talk to some people who knew them in life, and by working with them, she picks up hints she can pass along to the original caller.
A Traditional Take
To be clear though, when I say working through it, I mostly mean watching conversations play out. Don’t think of Schrödinger’s Call and imagine Ace Attorney. This is a far more traditional visual novel, not the hybrid adventure game type that has become more popular in recent years. You’re not driving the story; you’re mostly watching it. There’s some gameplay involved, but it is mostly an illusion. You choose who to call next, but there’s always a single person you’re supposed to be calling. Try calling anyone else, and the call will fail. Mary is faced with questions with multiple options at times, but the answers either don’t matter, or you’re not allowed to choose the wrong one. Do so, and you’ll see a reaction and then be asked to choose again.
I’m not a huge fan of a visual novel acting like I have some level of agency but not actually giving me any, and that’s ultimately my biggest knock against Schrödinger’s Call. There’s a single moment later in the game that sort of amounts to a puzzle to be solved, but it is fairly simple. I struggled with it briefly only because the game had conditioned me up until that point not to have to figure anything out, to the point that I initially thought I had just missed something, but once I realized I needed to do so, it was an easy enough process.
A Feast For The Eyes And Ears
Whether this lack of player agency is a positive or not is really in the eye of the beholder. If you want a more traditional visual novel, Schrödinger’s Call tells a wonderful story and does it extremely well. The cast of characters is absolutely filled with memorable characters, with Mary being perhaps the least interesting for much of the game simply because she’s such a blank slate. She’s assisted by a mysterious cat named Hamlet who comes and goes as they please, always seeming to know more than they let on. The various callers, though, are fascinating as well. The first chapter of the story concerns a grieving mother, her young child who does not know her, and a rich owl who is the child’s guardian. They’re all wonderfully realized, and that continues all the way through the game. Be prepared for things to get quite dark at times, but the characters kept me hooked to this story.
While the story is well written, what really elevates Schrödinger’s Call is how the story is told. This is a visual and audio feast for players, using color, style, and animation in ways I simply was not expecting. While there’s a sort of gothic style that is present throughout the entire game, different chapters adapt this in different ways, and the result is incredibly striking
Conclusion
Schrödinger’s Call tells its emotional tale with a sense of style that few games in the genre can hope to match. It looks and sounds wonderful, and the characters and their unique histories kept me hooked until the very end. I do ultimately wish that it had either given me some true agency or stopped pretending I had any, but I still think this is an excellent option for those who want to branch out beyond the more adventure-game-styled entries in the genre into something a bit more traditional.
Final Verdict: 4/5
Available on: PC (Reviewed), Switch; Publisher: SHUEISHA Games; Developer: Acrobatic Chirimenjako; Players: 1; Released: May 27th, 2026; ESRB: E for Everyone; MSRP: $17.99
Full disclosure: This review is based on a copy of Schrödinger’s Call provided by the publisher
Andrew Thornton
Andrew has been writing about video games for nearly twenty years, contributing to publications such as DarkStation, Games Are Fun, and the E-mpire Ltd. network. He enjoys most genres but is always pulled back to classic RPG’s, with his favorite games ever including Suikoden II, Panzer Dragoon Saga, and Phantasy Star IV. Don’t worry though, he thinks new games are cool too, with more recent favorites like Hades, Rocket League, and Splatoon 2 stealing hundreds of hours of his life. When he isn’t playing games he’s often watching classic movies, catching a basketball game, or reading the first twenty pages of a book before getting busy and forgetting about it.
