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PS2
Rule of Rose -
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NCS
Game Synopsis
©NCSX▪
Set in 1930 England, players adopt the role of a 19
year old woman named Jennifer who is caught up in a
surreal 3D adventure tinged with touches of madness
and the preternatural. To combat the wicked and
seemingly winsome, Jennifer's weapons include a
fork, a pipe, hypodermic needle, and spaded shovel.
Jen eventually befriends a dog name Brown that may rush ahead in
an attack reminiscent of Shadow Dancer (or Hewie
from Demento) while Jen
brings up the rear with a walloping whack of the
shovel to dislodge attackers. Among the enemies that
creep around in the darkly lit game world, evil white rabbits in
black jackets attack by hopping on Jennifer but she
may grab them and hurl them to the ground. Jennifer
keeps track of objects and items in the game on a
chalk-lined blackboard. Her gifts to the cast of
girls may also be tracked on the blackboard as she
hands them out each month throughout the course of
the game.
Text from
The Little Princess book
Once upon a time, there was a precious little girl.
Her friend, the Princess of the Red Rose.
Then one day, her mummy and daddy died suddenly.
Until one day, when she was sent away to a strange
house.
Supporting cast include:
Diane - a red haired girl with a wicked smile
Meg - a girl with glasses and blonde hair
who is the curtsying type
Amanda - A portly girl with braids and crooked
smile. In a cinema, she attempts to put on lipstick
but messes up badly.
Elenor - A girl with a mushroom haircut
Wendy - Blonde girl in bowler hat who carries
a handheld rose and wears a pastel blue dress
NCS Game Notes & Spoilers
* In the intro to the game, a violin plays and roses
are assembled in the foreground while Jennifer
sleeps in the background. She slowly rouses herself
awake and spies Brown in the distance. The dog walks
up to her but Jennifer's attention is captured by
two children playing in the distance. Jennifer looks
down and Brown is gone. Overhead, a massive object
of some sort casts a shadow over the grounds and the
the camera turns to an ominous house now encompassed
in shadow. Inside the house, children are in some
sort of vaudeville sequence where the girls pose
themselves. A girl named Meg pricks her finger on
rose thorns and bleeds but is comforted by a red
haired girl named Diane. The two girls are inside a
bathroom stall. Brown wanders around, sniffing at
Meg's spilt blood and investigating for its own
pleasure. The next scene shows Amanda, the fat girl
attempting to put on lipstick. She misses her lips
but still smiles at herself in the mirror. Next,
Diane, Meg, and Eleanor are lying on the floor
drawing a picture of a pig. The scene shifts to a
view of the three girls hammering away at something.
A coffin? The camera pans away again and Jennifer is
asleep on the floor. Brown walks up to her and wakes
her up and the two walk a short distance before Jen
gives Brown a doll to sniff and they're off to
investigate. In the distance, someone is watching
them from the shadows. In the next scene, Jennifer's
packing heat and Brown retrieves keys from a hiding
place and the two explore further and eventually
reach a bathroom with multiple sinks and stalls.
With gun clutched in both hands, Jennifer walks up
to a door and tentatively pushes it open when Brown
start growling. Wheeling away, Jennifer faces Brown
but a hand emerges from the door she just pushed
open and she is pulled downwards, bound by ropes,
and falls into darkness.... A quick succession of
scenes ensues where the girls seemingly torment Jen
with a rat pushed up to her face, someone steps on
her face with a chubby foot, girls stand around her
with torches, she falls into a coffin, Amanda writes
on her clothing with lipstick, etc. The intro ends
with an image of Jen and Brown near a bench amidst a
torrent of rain while a sky whale swims in the rain
towards the house. The camera turns back to two
children in the garden where a boy says "My name is
Joshua, I will serve you Princess. Just kiss me
please" and they push their foreheads together while
holding hands. The roses appear again. Title screen
appears. Intro over.
* Upon pressing start, the selections are: New Game
/ Load Game / Options. In the options menu, players
may set audio levels for BGM and SE and set the
brightness, noise, and vibration (Dual Shock). Noise
refers to the graininess of the video and you may
set it to 1 for nearly no grain and noise or 9 for
massive grain and static.
* Once in a new game, the Little Princess text
appears and a narrative (in English) recounts the
tale of the Little Princess. Jennifer is on a bus
with a smoky light bulb and she's sleeping in the
back. A little boy asks her to read the story from
the Little Princess book but the pages are blank and
Jennifer queries, "What's this?" The bus stops and
Jennifer chases after the little boy that was just
on the bus. She steps outside and the bus closes its
doors and leaves her there in the middle of nowhere
with only a single lamp to illuminate her
surroundings.
* It is March 1930 and Jennifer looks at the book
again which recounts the Little Princess tale and
text is shown on four scrawled pages. Use the D-pad
or L-analog to flip through the pages. There are
blank pages after the story. Press X to exit.
Control is handed over to the player and Jennifer is
manipulated through the d-pad or L-analog. The
R-analog does not pivot the camera but L2 or R2 may
be tapped to switch between one of two available
camera angles. The road is dark and crickets play in
the background but there is little other stimuli at
the moment. She's on the side of the road so move a
little to the left and then go up the road. Controls
are measured and deliberate. Jennifer moves and
sashays like a prim and proper English matron. Sort
of. As she makes her way up the road, the camera
changes angles to a closer distance and focuses
behind her instead of overhead as it was earlier.
She'll eventually reach a fence with an opening and
a strange sound starts squeaking somewhere in the
distance. She'll reach a shack and upon entering it,
she'll look around and spy a sparkling thing on the
ground. After picking it up, it's a gold colored
ticket by some children with the following text
scrawled on it "Boarding Pass / Red Crayon
Aristocrats" Below the Boarding Pass text is a
scrawled picture of a fish with an undercarriage
attached to its belly. An imprint of a red rose lies
beneath the Red Crayon Aristocrats text. Jennifer
will also pick up a belt at this point. Childish
laughter sounds off and a whine of a dog may be
heard after picking up the two items.
* Jennifer continues her jaunt and eventually
follows the boy from the bus to a house. Peering
through the fence, she sees two children wearing
paper bags over their heads. One of them is hitting
a sack on the ground with a stick while the other
one stands behind the sack. A child at the doorway
looks at the scene and closes the door. Jennifer
can't gain entry to the house through the fence and
she'll have to walk around to the other side of the
outer wall. Use the boarding pass to open the wooden
door. After she opens the door, a laughing child
inside the wall runs away.
* When Jen reaches the front of the house where she
witnessed the sack beating, there is a good amount
of blood on the floor where the beating took place.
A cut scene also shows the sack being drawn into the
door of the house before it is shut. Against our
better judgment, we sent Jennifer into the house.
After entering, the door slams shut behind her and
locks. A child laughs somewhere in the distance...
* After entering the foyer of the house, a cut scene
shows the boy from the bus running up the stairs
followed by laughter uttered by multiple
individuals. The house is dark but moonlight shines
through some of the windows to provide spooky
illumination. In one of the rooms, there's a
terrarium which contains a recreation of the house
with two plants inside which waver to and fro.
There's a door that Jen opens but she'll exclaim 'Ahh!"
and it'll shut itself followed by the laughter of
individuals.
* Jen may chase the boy up the stairs but he'll
continue to evade her. One of the doors at the top
of the stairs contains an old black and white photo
of a group of children (including the cast of girls)
in the game and three adults. In the same room that
the photo is located, there's a tattered mummy
dressed in a school dress of some sort that's been
tied up to a wooden beam. After viewing the dead
girl, its head drops and laughter sounds out in the
distance. To save your progress, walk to the corner
to the right of the mummy and you'll be prompted to
save your progress to memory card.
* Inside one of the rooms at the top of the stairs
is about 20 small bunk beds for children with
ladders on the side so that the top bunkee may climb
up. There are pillows on the beds but no sheets.
They've also been unused for a long time based on
the grime and dirt on them.
* If Jennifer walks around a lot without stopping,
she will pant and hold her chest while she catches
her breath. To alleviate her condition, stop her and
she'll eventually return to a normal breathing
pattern.
* After chasing the little boy through doors and
floors, Jen eventually reaches the vaudeville show
spot from the opening cinema where the little boy is
seated atop a makeshift stage prop while candles
provide illumination around him and roses are dotted
along the fabric used in the prop.
* A cut scene plays outside where girls are standing
around a new grave site and they're whispering
something amongst themselves. Afterwards, the little
boy disappears with more laughter and a dog may be
heard barking. Jennifer may walk outside to where
the grave site is and she'll dig it up with a shovel
Once she hits something solid, she'll drop and then
open up the casket to find the sack that was beaten
from earlier inside. As Jennifer is staring at the
bag, four hands dip vessels into water to fill them
up. Behind her, four children in paper bag hats walk
up to her. After the leader says "Just look at you,
you're filthy," they all pour water on Jennifer
while she just lies there on her knees. After that,
a female announcer from overhead talks about
boarding passes. Next, Jen falls into the casket and
the gals whisper-chant "Dust to Dust, Ashes to
Ashes" and proceed to carrying the casket while Jen
looks up and sees the moon above. At this point, its
possible to save progress again.
* April 1930 The Unlucky Clover Field - In the
second chapter, Jen wakes up while tied to a post
and she struggles against the ropes that bind her.
She looks around but only a candle provides
illumination. Once control is handed over, Jen may
struggle some more by swishing the L-analog around
while she grunts and sighs while straining against
the post. A voice from nowhere goes, "Good Morning
Jennifer. How do you feel? Let's have a chat shall
we?" and "Hm. Good girl, Jennifer, you know you've
been a bad bad girl and bad girls need to be
punished don't they?" and "HMM. You're a brave girl.
Anyway, I'll be the one giving orders around here,
okay?" Hm, clever girl... Now, I'm going to give you
your first order. Every month you'll need to find a
gift and bring it to the Aristocrat Club. Otherwise
I'll kill you. Is there anything about this that you
don't understand?" The Prince continues to explain
that there are two types of people in the world,
those who give orders and those who take them. He
then laughs up a storm and sends a pair of scissors
down to clip her bindings so she is free to go. To
save your progress again, take the bucket from the
casket and put it on top of the broom and you'll
create a save point.
* After exiting the room , follow the Aristocrat
signs to reach the Aristocrat Club. A sign reads
"The Rule of Gifts: Find a gift of the month / All
members must participate / Tardiness, Stealing and
Cheat are prohibited / Junks, Toys, and more! No
Refunds Only Exchange - Red Crayon Aristocrat."
There are four doors in the hallway but whenever Jen
opens one door, a little girl with a paper bag
helmet peeks from below the opened door and slams it
shut again. After checking out the door with the
mailbox in front and the first gift to be gotten for
the month - a butterfly, Jen may go back to the
doors and witness a strange scene where an old guy
sitting at a desk mutters, "Dirty Wretch" while a
morose girl seated at an examination table asks,
"How Dirty?" Jen may also peep through the keyhole
to watch Meg and another child sitting at a table.
* There's another sign in the Club area which reads
as follows:
Sociale Rank
Refined Class
Duchess - Diana
Countess - Eleanor
Baroness - Meg
Lower Class
Poor - Amanda
Beggar - Jennifer
So, you've been inducted into the Crayon Aristocrats
and afforded the title of beggar...
* After leaving the club, Jen spies a green
butterfly on the floor and it flutters away. The fat
girl named Amanda gives chase and plods off into the
distance. Walk ahead further and Jen eventually
finds Brown tied upside down from a harness behind a
cage with machinery inside.
* In another room, Jen meets Wendy who is coughing.
There's a pig in a pen in the same room along with
other cages. If you talk to Wendy, she'll clue you
in on a butterfly she saw on the first floor and
also offers tidbits on loneliness.
* When Jen finds the green butterfly again, it's
crushed on the floor while a child cries over it.
When Jen approaches the scene, the child stabs a
fork into the floor near the butterfly and says,
"You deserve to be crumpled up." At this point, Jen
finds her first weapon in the fork and her first
gift - the green butterfly. When she approaches the
area near the club, she'll run into a crying child.
However when it raises its head, it is deformed and
ghastly and proceeds to chase Jennifer. To stab it
with the fork, equip it first and then press R1 and
O to take a few pokes at it. With each stab, the
body of the little bruiser explodes with blood.
After about 5 stabs, it'll shriek and fall dead
while blood pools around the middle of its body and
spreads out.
* Next, go back to the club and tribute the green
butterfly to the mailbox door and insert it into the
shoved out shelving. Afterwards, a key may be picked
up near the green chairs and Jen meets a guy who
holds a tattered book titled, "The Clover Field."
After a bit more exploration and opened doors, Jen
will obtain the pair of rusty scissors that were
used to free her from her bounds at the beginning of
the chapter. She'll also find a map which affirms
that she's on some kind of massive vessel.
* Please note that the subtitles in the game are
entirely in Japanese. The voices and speech in the
game is entirely in English. The menu options inside
the game are also in English. Is the game playable
for gamers who can't read Japanese? In our opinion,
yes, but you will miss out on the intricacies of the
storyline and miss clues as to what the children
are.
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This document is ©NCSX 2006. All rights reserved. No
reproduction in whole or in part of this document
may be made without express written consent of
National Console Support, Inc.
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