Thank you KEMCO for sending us this visual novel to review!

Decollate Decoration starts off with a matter of fact statement: You, an unnamed girl, are dead. You find yourself disembodied at the house of the guy you love. As such, your mission becomes clear: if you want to enjoy the afterlife, then you need to bring the man you love with you. If that involves him dying, you're sure he'll understand!

The main part of the game consists of you finding yourself in his apartment. Here, you see your floating self, your love interest, and a part of his living space. You see his entryway, the door to his bathroom, and his kitchen. You can look around, talk to yourself or him a bit, and choose one of four real-world influencing actions that take a week of your energy up for each action. Since you enter paradise in 49 days, you have about seven weeks and seven choices to make in order to influence what happens next.

Each day goes by pretty quickly, so you can see a possible ending in as little as fifteen minutes. However, out of the over sixteen thousand possible combinations, there are only six endings. I tried a few different ones semi-randomly, but eventually gave up and just used a guide to make sure I saw all of the endings. There is a hint system in the pause menu, and obscure hints based on certain symbols in the upper right corner, but I've never been very good at stuff like that, so I just gave up and looked up what you need to do.

Obviously I really don't want to spoil the endings, though some of them were seen on my YouTube stream:

As you can see, I got through a couple of endings in that time. I'm not sure if it's after you get them all or if it's when you see the True ending, but after one of those conditions is fulfilled, you unlock the side stories: the prologue and epilogue.

The prologue is probably the longest part of the game depending on how quickly you get the six endings. It's a charming story that talks about what happens before the events of the main game. I don't want to spoil too much here, but it's a really well done section that plays mostly like a visual novel. There are still some choices, but I don't think you can drastically change what happens.

The epilogue follows what happens after the True ending, and is another visual novel section. It's not as long as the prologue, but it's an interesting conclusion nonetheless.

The pixel art is quite charming, and every character really pops on screen. The music, while mostly repetitive, is also nice. I would say that if the game lasted much longer that it is so repetitive it might be a problem, but because the game is short it doesn't overstay it's welcome, and nor does the music. It's high-quality chiptunes that matches the pixel art well.

As you might expect, the game runs perfectly on pretty much everything. That includes Steam Deck, or even on my Android phone via GameNative. (Of course, that's not supported.) If the game can launch Steam, it can play this game. It also supports a lot of control options. It works well with just the keyboard, a mouse, or a gamepad. While it doesn't officially support touch screens, on Steam Deck it does work, because it emulates a mouse.

Morally, this game is a mixed bag. As you might expect, the supernatural plays a central part in the game, as you are a ghost. As a disembodied spirit, you can try to talk to the guy you like (and if he knows you are there, he can hear you), and you can appear in his dreams. On the darker side of the spectrum, you can try to curse him (Japanese style), or haunt him with physical manifestations (called 'poltergeist', despite it not being a verb).

On top of that, there is violence, blood, and the cause of your death which I will avoid spoiling. As you can imagine there are some gruesome scenes. Some endings can lead to his death if you succeed in your stated goal. I do not recall any foul language, and there is no sexual content.

Decollate Decoration is a quirky but fun little game, if you don't mind the subject matter. There are a lot of little hidden hints and subtle humor. For example, your character is always referred to as 'You'. However, it's hinted that her name is 'Kimi Anata' if you follow the clues and menus. When I searched for what those words meant, it turns out that both are pronouns in Japanese that mean 'You'! The closest approximation I can think of would be like calling someone Thou Thyself in English. Very clever!

If this short little story sounds like something you would enjoy, then I can recommend it. It's priced well given what it is, and it's a cute and charming adventure. If the supernatural setting and other moral concerns don't bother you, then I recommend this game.