March 21st, 2017 
I found myself fascinated with Rule of Rose before it even released on PS2. It was certainly no secret that games often launched in Japan prior to North America, but never before had I felt the need to play a title as soon as it hit Japan in early 2016. Yet, here I was, with a Japanese copy of Rule of Rose about a month after its Japanese launch. Fortunately for me, the game was not heavy on written text and cutscenes were actually in English to begin with.
What was it that initially drew me to pick up Rule of Rose? It most likely had to do with the Japanese trailers that made their way out prior to launch. It’s pretty similar to the footage shown in Atlus USA’s trailer, as shown below. The key things that hooked me were that it was a horror game with style, it featured an almost exclusively female cast, and seemed to be pushing the envelope.
