Set in England in 1930, Rule of Rose pits brave teenager Jennifer against the members of the mysterious Red Crayon Aristocracy. Still grieving for her parents, who died in an airship accident, Jennifer finds herself in the Rose Garden Orphanage where the word of the Aristocracy and their Prince is law. After chasing a young boy around the orphanage, she is attacked by a gang of girls and becomes subject to the rules of the rose. Jennifer has the status of a beggar and must find items for the Prince; failure to bring said gifts will resort in a grisly punishment.

Much of the story is told via gorgeous pre-rendered sequences, which are a big improvement on many seen in other survival horror games.

While talking about Rule of Rose, it’s hard not to mention Capcom’s Haunting Ground as the games are incredibly similar, from both the genre to the English location. Most notable amongst the similarities is the addition of a canine companion - Brown - who is introduced after about half an hour into the game, tied up and hanging from the ceiling. After Jennifer cuts him down, he becomes completely devoted to her and is able to ferret out items and warn her when weird monsters are coming their way.

Brown can be controlled using the face buttons and three commands: ‘Go’, ‘Stay’ and ‘Come’ are at the player's disposal. These are however very limited and Brown has little autonomy of his own. Regardless of how far away from Jennifer he is when when she opens a door, he is instantly by her side, sliding sinuously past her into the space beyond. Brown also has his own set of items including chicken drumsticks and bacon, which Jennifer can use to return him to full health. Unfortunately, Brown is simply not as endearing or as controllable as Hewie, Haunting Ground’s canine companion, and his purpose in the game seems almost redundant. He wanders around barking, following Jennifer and has little AI of his own. At least controlling Hewie was entertaining and added value to the gameplay. If you removed Brown altogether, Rule of Rose would still be perfectly playable.

The monsters themselves are not humans, mutants or zombies but doll-like midgets with masks or goat heads, who chase Jennifer and can be vanquished in moments with little effort. They don’t bleed in the realistic sense, but wounding them results in an old-fashioned splatter effect. Jennifer begins the game fairly defenceless, which makes it difficult to battle the midgets, but as she makes progress, more powerful weapons become available including knives and various guns.

Rule of Rose should be a good game but, at the end of the day, it’s simply a matter of checking all the doors until you find the correct route and the villains and boss are not a challenge. On a more positive note, the complexity of some of the locations – particularly the airship – do add to the tension, and the same can be said for the creepy inhabitants of Jennifer’s world.

The most unsettling aspect of the game has to be the Red Crayon Aristocracy: a collection of sadistic children who will maim, murder and be generally unpleasant and have adults – including Jennifer – under their control. The game itself is mainly concerned with these twisted kids and their nasty pastimes, Jennifer being the unfortunate focus of much of their attention. As Jennifer follows the girls, opening doors will often lead to one of the hiding throng slamming it in her face which never fails to be extremely creepy.

The 1930s setting is not all that apparent, aside from Jennifer’s clothing and the airships, but this time period does lend itself well to the soundtrack and three vocal songs that accompany the game. All of the audio is in English which means Rule of Rose is much more accessible than many other Japanese games. The maps have English text and the files Jennifer collects are also in English with a Japanese translation provided on screen.

The font used for the locations and items can be a problem: it is based on a child’s handwriting, which makes it very irritating and even harder to read than normal Japanese. The item menu is done in a similar style, but with English words rather than kanji; this is slightly easier on the eye but still not the easier interface.

Split into separate chapters focusing on achieving a specific goal, Rule of Rose is actually rather short. The tasks aren’t impossibly hard and require a good memory and some logical thinking. There are plenty of save points scattered liberally around and whilst Jennifer can only hold a number of items, each save point normally has a dustbin where she can stash surplus items and pick them up again later at the next save point. This is a very useful feature but all the health items and more basically weaponry really aren’t needed once you have a more powerful weapon.

While not the best example of the genre, Silent Hill and Haunting Ground fans would certainly find the story appealing and the gorgeous cut-scenes instil the chilling atmosphere that every horror game needs. It’s just a shame that the gameplay is what ultimately lets Rule of Rose down.