His fellow human beings? Stinking shoggoths oozing pus and blood. His perceptions got all scrambled, and now the world appears to him as a mass of pulsing, rotten gore. Song Of Saya tells the story of Fuminori, a young medical student who, after a terrible car accident and an experimental brain surgery, finds himself trapped in a living nightmare. Because a decade ago, it got an American comic adaptation. Its presence on a mainstream storefront feels viscerally wrong, like something dark and rotten that should not have been brought to light.Īnd yet, this is not the first time Song Of Saya got introduced to a bigger audience. It can be completed in a single sitting, but will haunt you for years. A horror love story festooned in blood and gore, and with a list of content warnings longer than my games backlog. It’s a terrific visual novel, this one, but one always recommended in whispers.

Seeing Song Of Saya (Saya no Uta) featured on Steam is like finding a dead body on the shore.

This month, Giada examines the differences between cult horror visual novel Song Of Saya and its American comic adaptation. A Panel Shaped Screen is a monthly column where Giada Zavarise explores how comics and videogames inspire each other.

Saya no uta visual novel screen caps