Scarlet Heels is a horror mystery visual novel that follows Marion, a private investigator who uncovers the mystery behind the disappearance of several girls from the dance school. The story is written with mystery in mind and the art style uses noir and pictograms as representation of the visual part of the story.
Story and Art:
The visual novel is well written with has no issues and has sufficient enough content to tell the entire story while having a solid direction from the start. The depiction of the story with the noir stylized art is really effective and helps captivating the idea of a mystery genre. The use of pictograms to represent part of the story work really well in simplifying the visual needs of the story and gives the reader an immediate sense of who and what is happening at the moment. Good use of ADV and NVL dialogs since it creates a sense of transition between scenes and forwarding time in the story. The dialogs between the two main character Marion and Charles were smooth flowing and natural with a good sense of distinguishable identity and their relationship on the matter. The depiction of the victims through a painted artistic manner gives both the feel of horror as well as beauty, something that isn't easy to explain in words. The audio used pair well with the entire visual novel while the climatic segment had its own track that sends chills down ones's spine.
Theme:
(Spoiler Alert! Start)The theme that was picked is conservation of energy which is acceptable in this context since it was described how the victims are drained of bodily fluids (a resource for the magical plant) and becoming dried husks. Besides that the game does feature a magical girl, albeit for a short moment during the climax segment, where the missing girl, Hazel, was able to grow the life draining vines engulfing the entire house which can be identified as a magical girl powers(Spoiler Alert! End).
Overall:
Its a good short horror mystery that could be expanded on further since the story ends in a manner than writes off the mystery for lunch.