Loopers

It was ported to iOS and Android devices, as well as the Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4. The story follows high school student Tyler and his friends who get caught in a time loop, continuously repeating the same day seemingly without end. Before long, they meet others caught in the same predicament who call themselves "loopers", and the two groups join forces to try to break out of the loop. The third of Key's "kinetic novels"—after Planetarian: The Reverie of a Little Planet (2004) and Harmonia (2016)—since its gameplay offers no choices or alternate endings. Instead, the player proceeds through the story solely by reading. The story was written by Ryukishi07 of 07th Expansion, and character design was produced by Kei Mochizuki. The game's soundtrack was composed by Shinji Orito, Sōshi Hosoi, Donmaru, Hisashi Tenkyū, Shōyu and Sumi.

• Title — Loopers • Developer — Key • Publisher — Visual Arts (Windows) Prototype (Switch, PS4) • Director — Kazuma Takada • Producer — Tōya Okano • Writer — Ryukishi07 • Artist — Kei Mochizuki • Composer — * Shinji Orito • Sōshi Hosoi • Donmaru • Hisashi Tenkyū • Shōyu • Sumi • Platforms — Microsoft Windows, Android, iOS, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 • Released — WindowsJune 27, 2023 Android, iOSJuly 20, 2021 Nintendo SwitchJune 2, 2022 PlayStation 4February 15, 2023 • Genre — Visual novel, science fiction, psychological horror • Modes — Single-player

A mother in a hospital is telling her son a story from a children's book about how giving someone your treasure can grant you a wish. The boy argues against giving away your treasure. Mom leaves for a medical exam. A girl in the adjacent hospital bed overheard their whole conversation. The boy decides to play a game with her. He pulls out a dinosaur eraser he calls his treasure and hides it somewhere in the next bed over, then tells her she has 15 seconds to find it. She doesn't find it in time. The boy's dad shows up and he's about to leave, but he decides to give the girl the dinosaur. Remembering the earlier conversation, she asks what he wishes for. He says a treasure map. She asks why not just wish for the treasure directly. He says he'd rather find it himself. Tyler is out searching for treasure in the middle of the night, but he got lost and has been wandering around for a while. Hilda and Leona see him and think he looks suspicious. Leona tells Hilda he's a vampire and he needs to be stopped, so Hilda confronts him. They eventually realize they went to elementary school together. Tyler explains he was out geohunting and got lost, so the girls decide to help him search. On the way they talk about an urban legend, about the "Searching Woman" who wanders the night looking for her lost heart. If you see her you have to tell her you'll help her, and you have to find it, or else bad things will happen. Hilda is terrified and trying hard not to show it. They arrive at the park where the treasure is hidden. Tyler and Leona are searching the sandbox, while Hilda is fretting about the Searching Woman. She's checking the bushes when she senses someone from a different direction than Tyler and Leona. It looks like a woman. The woman then turns to Hilda and says she's looking for something, then vanishes. She freaks out and the others come check on her, but they assume she was just mistaken. Leona shows them she found the treasure box. They open it, and inside is a logbook and a heart shaped brooch. It says you can take the treasure if you put something of your own back in. Leona jokes that they need to tell the Searching Woman they found her heart. By this point the sun is coming up. Tyler goes off to find another treasure, and the girls head back to the convenience store. Leona is still teasing Hilda for being scared and for finding the treasure first, so Hilda headbutts her. But Leona wildly shouts and collapses to the ground. Hilda thinks she's just faking it, because she's done that before and she didn't hit her that hard. So she gets upset and leaves. Elsewhere, Hilda is wondering if she actually hurt Leona or not. She keeps checking her phone but Leona hasn't messaged her and she doesn't answer when Hilda calls her. Then she hears an ambulance heading toward the convenience store, so she follows it. Paramedics are in front of the convenience store carrying Leona into the ambulance on a stretcher. Hilda is still in disbelief she caused this. Then Hilda sees a figure standing in front of the store that looks like Leona, shouting that she let her die over and over again. Then she vanishes. Hilda still can't believe she did this, so she thinks it must be the Searching Woman's curse. Meanwhile, Tyler is out treasure hunting after parting with the girls. He's at a telephone pole where he thinks the treasure is. He finds it attached to the back of the electrical box with a magnet. Inside, he finds a dog keychain. He swaps it with a treasure of his own, then logs his name. As he's getting ready to leave, he sees a guy in glasses walking by with a serious look on his face. Then he hears a commotion and goes to check it out. A police car and an ambulance are parked in front of a house. Someone broke into the house through a window and attacked the residents in their sleep, and the culprit is still on the run. Tyler heads back to the house glasses guy came from and there's an ambulance there too. He thinks he let the culprit walk right by him, so he heads in the direction glasses guy went. Tyler finds glasses guy at the park, eating a sandwich. He goes to talk to him. Glasses guy doesn't even try to deny being the culprit, but says it's not worth explaining it. He hopes this is the last time he has to do this sort of thing, and he's done it so many times he lost count. Tyler demands he turn himself in. Glasses guy says he has something he needs to do today. He offers to give Tyler his ID card, promises not to hurt anyone, and says he'll turn himself in tomorrow. Tyler refuses, saying the ID could be fake. Glasses guy is confused because that deal apparently worked before. Tyler tries calling the police, but glasses guy knocks the phone out of his hand and then runs. Tyler chases after him. Even after parkour-ing through an alley and over fences, Tyler is still right behind him. He finally stops and turns to Tyler, saying he's not paying attention. Then a girl in a hood jumps out and dropkicks Tyler. By the time Tyler gets up glasses guy is gone, but the girl is still there. He asks if she's an ally of his, but she says humans outside the vortex shouldn't be acting this erratically. She says he may have been swallowed by the vortex. She also already knows Tyler's name. And she says Hilda has been acting weird too lately. She calls herself Mia. Tyler suddenly senses someone behind him that felt like the Searching Woman, but when he turns there's nobody there. And by the time he turns back Mia is gone. Back with Hilda, she's still worried about Leona and blaming herself. She doesn't know which hospital Leona was taken to, or what to do. Suddenly she hears the Searching Woman's voice, but thinks it's just in her head. Then she heard Leona's voice and actually sees her there, so she goes to check. Leona screams and rampages like she's possessed, then disappears. Hilda can still hear the Searching Woman's voice, so she thinks she's cursed, or that this is all a bad dream. She decides to go home and get some rest. At home, Hilda wants to sleep but she can't. She hears Leona shouting from outside and goes to look, but she's sure it's another hallucination. She ignores it and passes out in the bed, still hearing the voice of the Searching Woman. Tyler wakes up at home around noon, thinking he heard someone calling out to him. He sees a girl outside his window, looking up at him. She says "you were right, I have to apologize, I need to search." He thinks it's the Searching Woman, but she quickly disappears. He wants to help her somehow. Hilda wakes up at home. It's midnight, so she's already late for work. She's still hearing the voices in her head. She shouts at it to stop, and then her dad comes in telling her to be quiet. She yells at him to get out, then shoves him hard enough he falls all the way down the stairs. He's not moving or responding. She freaks out about killing another person. So Hilda decides this must be a dream and goes back to sleep, thinking over the events from last night. Around 5 am, Hilda is wandering around outside, blaming herself for killing Leona and her dad. She's thinking about turning herself in to the police. She opens the front door to her house and sees her dad standing there, asking what she's doing at this hour. She screams. Tyler is walking around outside, but he forgot where he is and what he's doing. He remembers treasure hunting with Hilda and Leona, and saying he'd go do one more treasure hunt. He feels a sense of deja vu when he arrives at the telephone pole. He finds the treasure box attached to the electrical box with a magnet, and feels very confused by how familiar this feels. When he finds the same dog keychain inside he's convinced this isn't just a coincidence or deja vu. He checks the logbook, but his name isn't written in there. Then he checks his phone and it's August 1st, which should be yesterday's date. He remembers what Mia told him, and thinks Hilda might be caught up in this, so he takes off running. Tyler finds Hilda on the street, wailing. She sobs into Tyler's chest while shouting she killed her dad, but he's alive again. Tyler bops her and tells her to calm down, then tells her to check the date on her phone. It's August 1st. They both remember treasure hunting together on the night of the 1st. Hilda explains everything that happened after she parted with Tyler. Tyler thinks the two of them timeslipped back a day. This is right around the time Leona got hurt, so they rush to the convenience store to check on her. At the convenience store, paramedics are loading Leona onto the ambulance. The paramedics say she still has a pulse, but can't say more without a proper exam. They both board the ambulance with her. At the hospital, the doctor says Leona is in a coma but otherwise nothing is wrong with her. Two other patients are in the same state. A nurse calls one of the visitors Kuranuma, and Tyler remembers that name was written on the house glasses guy came out of. He wonders if these are the victims from yesterday, but they don't have bandages on their heads so the events are different. Tyler tells Hilda she's not responsible for what happened to Leona, unless she headbutted these other 2 patients too. Hilda goes to call Leona's parents while Tyler heads to the nurse's station. He overhears that a patient went missing. He also spots glasses guy checking in on the other 2 patients. He might be responsible for Leona's situation or at least know something, so they decide to follow him. Tyler and Hilda are arguing about if they're following too close. Mia suddenly interrupts them saying they should be quieter when tailing someone. She looks sad when Tyler calls her by her name, and she says they've been swallowed by the vortex. She says she'll bring them to Simon, the glasses guy. They take a taxi to a large apartment building. Mia gives the driver a huge tip, and says money is infinite. Mia says she's been friends with Leona for 5 years, but Hilda says she's never mentioned Mia once. Mia lists a bunch of facts about Leona to prove it. They ask why Leona is in a coma and Mia says it was Hilda's headbutt, then says just kidding. She says Simon can explain more, so they take the elevator up. They arrive at a massive, expensive looking room. Simon welcomes them and apologizes about yesterday. He says there's nothing they can do for Leona at the moment, but she will wake up eventually. Simon explains the time vortex, that they're constantly repeating August 1st. Tyler asks for proof, and Simon says come back in a few days. That's all the proof you need. Then Tyler and Hilda leave. At home, Tyler is thinking things over. He decides to get some sleep instead of going treasure hunting like usual. Tyler suddenly finds himself outside, near where he found the dog keychain. His phone says it's August 1st, 5:01 am. Hilda should be at the convenience store, so he heads there. Hilda is crying over Leona, already in a coma. She apparently timeslipped right back here. They call an ambulance and go to the hospital, but the doctor says the same thing as last time. They decide to go talk to Simon. As soon as they enter Simon's room, a huge crowd is waiting to welcome them. Mia calls them their 9th and 10th companions. Ritapon, Holly, and Joe are there and greet them too. Hilda is confused and just wants to know how to help Leona. Simon goes into an explanation about the time vortex. He says this sort of thing has happened many times in the past, all over the world. The last one happened in 1994, in Maryland, America. It happened to a bunch of students camping in a forest. They managed to escape and wrote about their experience, but nobody believed them. Simon found their writings and contacted them, which is how they learned as much as they have. The survivors continued researching after escaping. The vortex is a natural phenomenon, like a typhoon or an earthquake, and they don't know the cause. The only way out is to wait, which took them 20-30 years last time. Or maybe more, they don't remember. Simon has been looping 15 years. Looping takes more and more of a mental toll over time, so the only way loopers can die is mentally. Which seems to be what happened to Leona. But she should still awaken if they escape the vortex. Hilda asks why only Leona got sick. She's been looping for 5 years, and what broke her was being unable to talk to her best friend about it. Leona had really strict parents but did poorly in school, so she once attempted suicide. And since then she always stuck close to Hilda. Tyler says even from his short time with Leona he could tell how much she trusted Hilda, and Leona would probably be more worried about how this is hurting Hilda. Tyler asks what happened to the other 2 people in comas. Mia says they were loopers too. In addition to going into a coma like Leona, they can go mad and start committing horrible arcs, thinking everything will just reset the next day anyway. You can force that person to sleep by killing them over and over. Simon is always awake at the 5 am reset point, so he can do it before they wake up. They finally do introductions. Simon is the oldest and the leader. Holly is famous for starring in the Holy Knight channel online. Hilda has heard of her, she has over a million subscribers. Ritapon is a writer that goes by the pen name "Miracle Energy ☆ Ritapon D". Joe is an athletic guy. Mia just says to call her Mia. Tyler asks what now. Simon says all they can do is wait for the vortex to stop. Mia says even if you die you'll come back the next day. Holly says you can spend all your money and it'll reset the next day. Hilda and Tyler excitedly high five. Tyler wants to go get super fancy food. Joe, Holly, and Ritapon decide not to come with, but Simon and Mia decide to come along. Simon goes to get changed, so they chat with Mia. She's in middle school. All the loopers wear a badge with the letter L written on it. At a fancy restaurant, Tyler and Hilda are ordering tons of food. Simon has never seen anyone this excited on their first day as a looper. They tell them to slow down, but Tyler and Hilda won't stop. They even try to make Mia eat more. When they're finally done, they look at the bill and panic when they see it's 300,000 yen. Their cash resets each day, but that doesn't mean they have more money than what's in their wallets. Simon says their options in this situation are to dine and dash and accept being caught by the police, or to ask him for help in advance. But he reminds them they'll have to go back to normal life one day. On to more serious topics, Simon wonders if the people swallowed by the vortex are random or not. So far it's only happened to kids. Tyler jokes it's the Searching Woman's curse. Hilda says visions of the Searching Woman and Leona did harass her around the time she was swallowed by the vortex. Simon calls those illusions of time. Other loopers experienced something similar. Since the past and future are mixing together, people can see things from both. Hilda worries the Searching Woman might actually appear in the future. Simon says this sort of phenomenon may happen again when the vortex stops. If they see more illusions, it could be a sign of the vortex stopping. According to the survivors, when it does stop a gate will appear at the center. They also say it's good that Tyler and Hilda joined them, because Joe, Holly, and Ritapon may be near the breaking point and end up like Leona. The gate is only open for a short time, so they'll have to carry the comatose people through it. Hilda asks what happens if they don't go through the gate. Simon says there was an incident in Russia in 1959 where a group of people went comatose, probably because they failed to escape. Simon says he really wants everyone to escape. Tyler says leave it to him, even if he's the only one left he'll carry everyone through the gate. Simon and Mia both think Tyler is an idiot, but his enthusiasm will be invaluable in preventing the others from losing heart. Outside the restaurant, Hilda is planning to go home and rest. Simon gives Tyler a fancy looking credit card with a balance of 20 million yen, and he says he'll put it in his mailbox every morning so Tyler can use it anytime. Simon asks them to regularly send him time and location data from their phones, because the vortex can periodically fluctuate. The loop today started at 5:01 and 23 seconds, but yesterday it was one second later. He needs data to analyze this. Tyler and Hilda both agree to help and give him their phone numbers. Then Simon and Hilda head home. Tyler asks what Mia plans to do. She says Simon asked her to stay with Tyler until he get the hang of things here. They go shopping and Tyler is buying stuff he doesn't want, saying it's an act of rebellion against consumerism. Shopkeepers are begging for his business. He's buying all kinds of stuff, and then asks to buy an outfit for Mia. She's wearing a fancy Victorian dress, complaining she's not a dress-up doll. After shopping, Tyler pulls out his phone and sends the data Simon requested. He finally goes home to rest after a long exciting day. The next day, Tyler and Mia are hanging out together again. Tyler decides to use his new immortality to climb a high-rise building. Mia gripes that Joe did something similar. Then he climbs a radio tower, then a crane, then a billboard. Tyler falls.:(A day later, Tyler decides to stop climbing for a while. They take a plane to an island, flying first class. Tyler asks where Mia resets to each day. She says her bed. And she says Leona's reset point was right when Hilda headbutts her. They're at the beach. Mia says they could've just gone to the beach nearby, but Tyler insists it's different here. He got juice for both of them. He asks if there's anything Mia wants to do, since they're always doing what he wants to do. She used to collect lip balm, but looping makes that impossible now. Tyler is always energetic about doing fun things because he knows he won't have time for it once he becomes an adult. He wants to go paragliding or scuba diving with Mia, but she says she's done all that and would rather just watch. Days later, Tyler thanks Mia for always hanging out with him. She says she doesn't dislike it. Even though life has gotten boring for her, watching him is amusing. He suggests doing something she's never done before: treasure hunting. They take a taxi to a park. Tyler set up this treasure hunt himself. It has a time limit to finish by 8:30 pm, and it's currently 7:30. Mia is searching all over the park, following the map. She thinks it's buried under a park bench and complains she has no tools, but Tyler insists it's not buried and tells her to look again. She finds it stuck to the bottom of the table. Mia is bouncing around, ecstatic she did it, but she finds a letter inside, labeled 1/5, telling her another location in the park to search. Mia swears she'll find them all. Tyler offers to give her hints a couple times, but she always refuses. The second is in the playground, the third is near the tennis court, and the fourth is by the springy animals. The fifth isn't in the park at all, so Mia is worried she'll have to learn a whole new place. They leave the park and go to the top of a hill overlooking the river, with a view breathtaking enough Mia is at a loss for words. She asks if this view is the treasure, but Tyler says it's still ahead. The map says it's another half a kilometer south, so Mia takes off running to make it in the time limit. Mia can't remember the last time she ran this hard. Out of breath, Mia finally stops. She notices this spot has a clear view of the vividly illuminated Ferris wheel. Tyler says the joy of finding something is something money can't buy. Mia is embarrassed because even though she thought she'd done everything, she'd never experienced this beautiful scenery. She finds a box on the location indicated by the map, and inside is a note: "Congratulations. Look at the Ferris wheel at 8:30. That's your reward." At 8:30 on the dot, fireworks begin filling the sky all around the Ferris wheel. They do this every day and Tyler thought it was a shame more people couldn't see this, so he set up this treasure hunt to let others learn about it. He asks if she had fun, and she says it was great. They both cheer. All the stagnation in Mia's heart released, and for a moment she was full of emotion. After so long in the loop, she had forgotten she could have this much fun. She says she loves treasure hunting, and wants to do it again. He shows her the map on his geohunting app and zooms out, showing it's full of treasures everywhere. Mia wants to do them all together. She leans her head against Tyler's chest, but quickly moves away. She asks why Tyler enjoys treasure hunting, and he says it's about trust. Because he can believe the treasure is there to be found. They keep gazing at the Ferris wheel together long after the fireworks stop.

Following Key's previous success with the production of two prior visual novels termed "kinetic novels"—Planetarian: The Reverie of a Little Planet (2004) and Harmonia (2016)—since their gameplay offers no choices or alternate endings, Loopers was one of three kinetic novels announced in October 2020 alongside Lunaria: Virtualized Moonchild (2021) and Stella of The End (2022). Planning for the project began with video game director Kazuma Takada and producer Tōya Okano, the latter of whom has been credited on the staff of Key's visual novels since providing scenario assistance with Air (2000). The game's motif was built around the concept of treasure hunting, specifically geocaching. During a production meeting, Okano suggested the idea of a geochache containing a human finger, adding an element of horror to the story. In keeping with Key's main theme of making the end user cry, the concept for Loopers was solidified around "treasure hunting, horror and crying", to which Takada suggested Ryukishi07 of 07th Expansion be brought in to write the scenario. Ryukishi07 had previously worked with Key on the scenario for Rewrite (2011) and its fan disc Rewrite Harvest festa! (2012) because of his reputation as a horror writer. Ryukishi07 used his experience as a horror writer, along with his recognition as an author who uses time loops in his stories, to repeat the same day in the story at given intervals as the plot progresses. As he had plenty of time for the development of the game's plot, he was able to carefully write it while continuing to discuss it with the production staff over the course of its development. In contrast to his work on Rewrite, which he views as having been written with a certain youthful vigor, he sees Loopers as a culmination of everything he has cultivated as a writer, making it his most carefully written story to date by his own admission. In keeping with Key's brand image, Ryukishi07 restrained from making the story too horrific, opting to give it a mysterious feel with a story that is 70% tear-inducing and 30% horrific, as well as making it suitable for all ages. However, some of his suggestions for horrific elements were rejected by the production staff as not being compatible with Key's image. Ryukishi07 had not initially been familiar with geocaching when brought onto the project, and he even tried it himself with a geocaching app to get a feel for the treasure hunting process. In researching geocaching, he did not want to sully what is what he refers to as a "fun treasure hunting game," leaving out anything too extreme as a result. Ryukishi07's aim was to write a plot that was a balance between what fans of Key have come to expect from the brand and what he as a writer chosen specifically for the project could bring to add unorthodox elements not normally seen in works produced by Key. He was also attempting to write a story that worked best as a kinetic novel as opposed to a visual novel adventure game. It took him a long time to remain faithful to the story of Loopers while also adjusting its orthodox and unorthodox elements. Kei Mochizuki is the art director and character designer for Loopers. In production meetings about what art the game would have, there were discussions about how the typical art style Key has used in their games up to now would not be the best fit for a scenario written by Ryukishi07. As a result, Takada suggested to go with Mochizuki because of her distinct art style described as not only stylish, but that which also incorporates moe elements into it to make her character designs both cool and cute according to Ryukishi07. At the time, Takada had been looking forward to what he termed a "large chemical reaction" that would occur from bringing together two creators who have very distinctive styles. Key released a free game demo on April 26, 2021, on the game's official website. Loopers was released on May 28, 2021, for Windows in Japan. Three editions were released: a download edition just for the game itself, a limited edition, and a more expensive special edition that comes bundled with more content. Both physical editions came bundled with the game's original soundtrack and a full color art book. The special edition was also bundled with an illustrated acrylic plate, a metal key-shaped charm, a Loopers badge, an illustration signed by Kei Mochizuki, and a special card featuring the main characters. Loopers was also ported to iOS and Android devices in Japan on July 20, 2021. Prototype released a Nintendo Switch port worldwide on June 2, 2022, with text support for Japanese, English and Chinese. Prototype also released a PlayStation 4 port worldwide on February 16, 2023, with text support for Japanese, English and Chinese. This version was released on Steam on June 27, 2023.

The game's soundtrack was composed by Shinji Orito, Sōshi Hosoi, Donmaru, Hisashi Tenkyū, Shōyu and Sumi. Loopers has three theme songs: the opening theme "Senya Ichiya Vortex", the ending theme "Fukaki Yumemishi", and "Kimi to no Takarasagashi" as an insert song. Each song is sung by Sana of the rock band Sajou no Hana. The Loopers Original Soundtrack was bundled with the limited and special edition releases of the game on May 28, 2021. It was released on Key Sounds Label bearing the catalog number KSLA-0184.