Summary
- Emio - The Smiling Man is a departure from Nintendo's family-friendly games, tackling violent themes like murder, abuse, and self-harm. Rated as M for mature.
- Players will solve a murder case where a junior high school student was strangled by the suspect connected to an urban legend.
- The game's graphic content includes violent scenes like a father hitting his children, a corpse hung by a tie, and self-harm.
Emio - The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club, an upcoming Nintendo Switch exclusive, has been rated by the ESRB, and it contains a surprising amount of shockingly violent content. First teased with a cryptic video in July, the game was revealed to be a revival of the cult classic Famicom Detective Club series, as it is the first new installment in 27 years, set to release August 27. Emio - The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club is one of Nintendo's biggest departures from its typical family-friendly affair, being a visual novel adventure game that deals with the player solving a murder mystery.
The Famicom Detective Club series tasks the player with solving a crime, with the major incident always being murder. The same thing can be expected in Emio - The Smiling Man, as the story sees the Utsugi Detective Agency being asked by the police to solve a murder case. The incident involves the death of a local junior high school student, who was strangled to death and found with a paper bag on her head. The main suspect is believed to be connected to the local urban legend of Emio the Smiling Man, a paper-bag wearing man who murders teenage girls. Before the game's August 27 release, an ESRB rating was revealed, and it didn't pull its punches on what to expect.
Emio - The Smiling Man: The History of the Famicom Detective Club Games Explained
Nintendo's new M-rated game marks the revival of the Famicom Detective Club series of games, Nintendo's long-forgotten murder-mystery franchise.
The ESRB rating for Emio was released by the organization on its website, rating the game as M for mature, and detailing the violent content and imagery that the visual novel will explore. Besides the murder, there are also scenes of a father hitting his children, a human corpse being hung by a tie, and a man using scissors to slice his own face. Other violent scenes include corpses lying in blood, along with plots that explore the topic of child abuse, suicide, and self-harm. As such, Emio could be one of Nintendo's most notable M-rated games.
Past Ratings of Famicom Detective Club Games
Prior entries in the Famicom Detective Club series, including the remakes of the first two titles, dealt with similar topics before. Just like Emio, the player is tasked with solving a murder case, and the corpses are rendered in a similarly unflattering and violent manner. However, The Missing Heir and The Girl Who Stands Behind were rated T for Teen, rather than M for Mature, like Emio.
Despite its anime style presentation, it's very likely that Emio - The Smiling Man will not sugarcoat the depictions of murder victims, on top of the violent themes. Emio is one of the biggest Nintendo Switch releases of 2024, releasing ahead of other exclusives like The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom and Mario & Luigi: Brothership.
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 76 /100 Critics Rec: 64%
- Released
- August 29, 2024
- ESRB
- M (Mature) for Blood, Language, and Violence
- Developer(s)
- Nintendo
- Publisher(s)
- Nintendo
- Engine
- game engine
- Franchise
- Famicom Detective Club
WHERE TO PLAY
Who is Emio – The Smiling Man?
Solve the tragic death of a student, where a creepy clue recalls cold cases from the past and an urban legend about a killer with a disturbing modus operandi.
“I can give you a smile that will last forever”
Student Eisuke Sasaki has been found dead in a chilling fashion, with a smiley-faced paper bag over his head. This unsettling visage bears a striking resemblance to a recurring clue in a string of unsolved murders from 18 years ago—as well as the urban legend Emio, a.k.a. The Smiling Man, a serial killer said to grant his victims “a permanent smile.”
Does the Smiling Man really exist…or is a new culprit continuing his legacy?
As a member of the Utsugi Detective Agency, you’ve been tasked with investigating the events that led to Eisuke Sasaki’s death. Along the way, scrutinize the clues and testimonies you gather for potential connections to the gruesome events of the past.
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo Switch
- Genre(s)
- Adventure, Simulation
