The Apothecary Diaries: The False Imperial Brother Announced

The immensely popular novel, light novel, manga, TV drama, and anime, The Apothecary Diaries, is making it’s debut in the gaming space soon! It focuses on a fictional country inspired by the years 618-907, or Tang Dynasty of China, and features Maomao, an apothecary’s daughter and unofficial forensic pathologist in the Imperial Palace who finds herself consistently dragged into palace intrigue, and Jinshi, a young man with a considerable amount of intrigue about him, as the main characters. I’m largely unfamiliar with the series, personally, but hopefully I’ll have time to fix that situation in the months ahead.

The game itself looks to fit a very specific set of niche genres in one; the Atelier-series like and an mystery solving title together, which- yeah, yeah, I’m immediately sold on the game and series based on that alone, personally. For those unfamiliar with the Atelier series is made by Koei Tecmo and Gust in specific, who’s also developing this title- which immediately makes this make more sense, and it’s a series largely based around developing items while spending time with and getting to know likable characters, with RPG battles and storylines with… varying degrees of seriousness.

More recent Atelier titles tend to lean towards the more serious side, with earlier titles leaning towards more of simpler slice of life sort of stories, but always having a heart underneath. The mystery-solving part probably doesn’t need explanation, but The False Imperial Brother here seems to involve having Maomao’s experience with making medicine and her intelligence feed into the gameplay, crafting medicine as requested by witnesses, collecting evidence and asking questions, while maintaining trust with all parties involved to get to the truth of the matter. Political intrigue, considerably more fascinating in a fictional setting, but always fascinating in that situation when done well.

There is no official date for it’s release yet, just an Early 2027. It is currently set to release on PS5, the Switch 2, Switch, and Steam.

Jason Ditton

My memory's spotty, to say the least, but gaming's been a major part of my personal life from my younger years, where it was directly responsible for my fingers becoming functional. I've owned every notable Sony console, but started with the Sega Genesis, and I'm still slightly annoyed by the Dreamcast's lifecycle going the way that it did.