Cross Channel (visual novel)


Cross Channel, stylized as CROSS†CHANNEL, is a visual novel video game developed by Flying Shine. It was originally released in 2003 for Microsoft Windows, and has later been released for consoles with various added content. An English localization was released in 2018 for Microsoft Windows.

Synopsis

Plot

Gunjo Gakuen is a facility designed to gather and isolate those students with a high adaptation coefficient, determined from an adaptation exam mandated by the government.
After a failed summer vacation with other members of the school's broadcasting club, Taichi Kurosu and some of the other club members return to the city, only to find that all living creatures within it except for the club members have completely vanished. In order to confirm the status of the outside world, Taichi decides to gather other club members to help Misato Miyasumi, the president of the broadcasting club, set up a broadcasting antenna to contact any possible survivors. However, Taichi soon discovers that the world is actually repeating the same week and thus all their actions are reset, with no loss or gain, no matter what actions are taken. Seeking himself and the restoration of broken bonds, Taichi must discover meaning to exist in this strange and lonely but, for Taichi, comforting world.

Main characters

The game was originally released for Microsoft Windows on September 26, 2003, and was ported to the PlayStation 2 with the subtitle To All People on March 18, 2004. A PlayStation Portable port of To All People version was released on February 25, 2010, and an Xbox 360 port with added content, with the subtitle In Memory of All People, was released on April 14, 2011. Another version, For All People was released on PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita on June 26, 2014, and Cross Channel: Final Complete was released for Microsoft Windows on September 26, 2014. A Microsoft Windows version of For All People was released in English on March 27, 2018 by MoeNovel.

Reception

Famitsu gave the PlayStation 3 version of the game a review score of 30/40, whilst the PS Vita version was given a score of 28/40.

Related media

Nanaca Crash!! is an online spin off game featuring characters from Cross Channel. The objective of the game is to click, hold and release the mouse button to determine the angle and velocity of Nanaka crashing her bicycle into Taichi, sending him flying across the screen. The score is determined by the distance of his flight. Certain characters he crashes into will greatly affect his velocity. On May 16, 2014, Nanaca Crash!! was relaunched as a part of Cross Channel with updated graphics and sound. The Flash version was updated and the game was made available on Android and iOS for the first time.