Last updated on December 13th, 2025 at 10:36 pm
ALTER EGO COMPLEX – Simulation Game Review
ALTER EGO COMPLEX is a Simulation/Adventure/Books game from CARAMEL COLUMN INC., first launched in 27th September 2020.
It’s rated 9+ and currently has 427+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes ALTER EGO COMPLEX Stand Out
"I think… I'll read a book."
■This story is for:
・Those who have played ALTER EGO
・Those who wish to dream with Es
・Those who haven't visited Es lately
■ALTER EGO COMPLEX Play Guide
・Select from the shelf a book that interests you
・Read through the books by tapping the whispers
・Select picture books to play simple minigames
■In her dreams, you can be together…
・Read a variety of dream stories
・Enjoy original art while you dream
・"This…is the story of my dreams."
This app is a spin off from the full ALTER EGO game. We recommend playing though all of ALTER EGO first.
Caramel Column Inc.
http://caracolu.com
https://twitter.com/GamesCaramel
Caramel Column is a video game and board game studio.
Character Design: Kai Ito
Sound: AMIKO
This Simulation game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, ALTER EGO COMPLEX is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 14th November 2024
Recent improvements include:
Bug fixes.
Download & Availability
ALTER EGO COMPLEX is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Get ALTER EGO COMPLEX on App Store
Requirements: Requires iPhone 5s / iPad Air / iPad Air (Cellular) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina, Cellular) / iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus / iPad Air 2 / iPad Air 2 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 3 or later.
Compatible with iPhone and iPad devices.
Player Experience Highlights
Community Insight:
Both Alter Ego games are marvels of storytelling that somehow easily pull you in, making you care for the character within the world. Its one of the best free games Ive ever played, and better than many paid ones.
Im in tears oh our god. The ending was so perfect we love this so much. Thank you caramel column.
Of course, this game is only for those that liked the original alter ego game and finished it. This game expands on it and hooks you on what happens in the after story, we are satisfied with this experience.
While the first game introduced Es as a character to interact with–depending on what dialogue the player chose, she would either remain at the whelm of Egorex or explode in a manic episode of insanity, which was quite fascinating for a character that always alluded toward some subconsious motive. While the first game explores the player, this game explores the character of Es, and builds upon the world that the first game provides. You learn that Es reads because she can do nothing but read. The library she inhabits is an infinite one, containing every book and every thought a human has ever experienced. She hadn't yearned for companionship before–she had been quite fine without it in the past–but ever since she had been introduced to The Wanderer, they are all Es can dream of. Her psyche begins to wade and her dreams reflect that, whether it be in the form of a cat symbolizing disappointment and hopelessness for what's to come, or embodying Id and succumbing to her subconsious wants and desires through the guise of a vampire. The total playtime is roughly two hours, which we believe is plenty for a game like this. That is how long it took us to finish the game in its entirety. It plays like a visual novel, which means nearly the entire game is reading dialogue or snippets of books. There are interactive minigame elements found when reading the picture books, accompanied with easy one-tap controls. The art is very well done and the style is incredibly unique, just like the first game. The music is incredibly soothing and is very easy on the ears when playing for long periods of time. This game is not a dating simulator. Upon reading passages of books, Es will drift to sleep and dream about different scenarios where she can live and be happy. The Wanderer is the only other person in these dreams because they are the only other person Es has interacted with, aside from Egorex, and the only other person that Es feels comfortable around. It's worth the five dollars, especially if you liked the first game. Set aside some time, maybe make some tea, and play this game. It's brilliant.
Very straightforward game, but excellent supplementary content to ALTER EGO. Looking forward to experiencing the related follow-up contained within the first game.
We hope to include a Chinese translation as well.
We fell in love with the first game when we found out about it and it instantly became our #1 comfort game and Es our #1 comfort character. Yes the story is sweet and the player has a lot less control in this game than the last, but that doesn't really matter. This game is more so about Es sometime during or after Alter Ego and what she does in between or after the events in the story. The first game she lead you on a journey of finding your morals and yourself, and in this game you return her favor. If it's good enough to make us write our first ever review of a mobile game, then it's 100% good enough to spend $5 on.
Im a huge fan of emotional and meaningful games that dont overdo themselves, and this is an example of it executed perfectly. A charming soundtrack, the best character, and above all, meaning. This was handcrafted to perfection, and Im glad to say Ive spent money on both games, Alter Ego and Cmplex. This game is phenomenal.
Showing more of this world is nice.
We never thought that a mobile game would make us rethink our life choice and not only that but make us emotionally attached to a characters we recognize is not real but even then we cant help but sympathize and care for them. Will definitely recommend to friends and family alike.
Es told us to look for the rabbit hole. If we found it, we might actually meet. We dont know how we fell so hard for a visual novel character, but she feels more real than anything. These books are books we love, and she speaks just like someone who truly loves them. Thats probably a misinterpretation of the character, she needs the books to stave off her boredom. Seeing her cycle through all of these personalities and hurting like she did was painful to see, we kept searching for a path that didnt end that way. After reading so much about dreams, we wish this was a dream we couldve shared. Ill keep looking for the rabbit hole, and maybe Ill find Es someday.
This game basically takes place after you finish the alter ego version. We wont spoil it, but its short and interesting to see what she does when were not their. If you enjoyed the original one this one is for sure going to be you feel something.
What a wonderful way to kick us in the feels. Now if you'll excuse us, we'll be downloading Alter Ego again.
Its nice to see more of the character and their view of it all.
We stumbled upon Alter Ego back in 2019 and fell in love with the story and idea. We wanted to continue to support the company and found this game, and it serves as a great story to its predecessor. We loved this journey and have grown as a person as well. May we meet again Es. Sincerely, your Wanderer.
The only thing is that its too short.
Just for clarification, we absolutely love this franchise. Self-discovery, philosophy, AND solemnly-contemplative women? Sign us up! That said, upon playing the game, we were left with some mixed feelings. Ill keep this short with a pros & cons list. Pros: The short vignettes with Es were great. Official Caramel Column art, clever writing, and the portrait girl of AE all in one. Super pleased with these. Music. AEs music has always been great, but we really feel like they stepped it up a notch with this one (so melancholic!). Animation. The game looks very pretty and it runs quite well. No complaints here. Keeping these things in mind, the game does have some obvious flaws. We will delineate those here. Cons: Gameplay. Even though Alter Ego has never been known for its difficult gameplay, we have to admit that the minigames in Complex just arent fun. Clicking your way through books to gain Ego is satisfying because 1: You can read them in real life, and 2: You get the reward of visiting Es when you read enough of them. But the books in Complex are the same as the ones from AE, and the minigames are, most of the time, hard to sit through. Story. We went into this game hoping to gain more knowledge about the lore of Alter Ego and Es, but that didnt happen. The facade was barely mentioned, nor the nature of the library, of the wanderer, or even of Es herself. This aspect of the game still leaves a bitter taste in our mouth. Self-discovery (or lack thereof). As a huge personality nerd, we loved Alter Egos emphasis on self-discovery. Each personality test was a blast, and they were exciting because you never really knew when youd get one. There wasnt any self-discovery in this game or a single personality test. And lookI get it: the game is about Es discovering herself, so theres no need for any tests. But even then, we cant help feel a longing for what could have been. Its disappointing. To the fans: Is Alter Ego Complex worth the $5 price tag? Is it worth your time? If youre looking for innovative gameplay and content reminiscent of Alter Ego, probably not. But if you truly loved the first game and want more Es, we say go for it. In the end, there just isnt another series out there like Alter Ego. Most importantly, to Caramel Column, we have this to say: Thank you, from the bottom of our heart, for a great franchise. May you succeed in your every endeavor. Best of luck.
So to add contacts, we got this game for three dollars due to a sale. Frankly, we dont think it was even worth the three dollars we paid with. We bought this game just cause we found an old Apple account from when we were a child that had three dollars still on it. So we thought might as well. Its a cute story about Es from alter ego. And we adore alter ego. We got out of that game an experience that we dont think Im ever gonna get again in a video game. We took it seriously and it kind of changed our view on life. Going into this game we knew it wasnt gonna be much like that. We saw clips and knew that this would just be a little side story focusing on Es, and we thought it was cute. If you cant even get this game on sale, we wont even suggest thinking about buying it. Its more or less a way to support the developers and tell them hey, we want more of this. But there are still some deep concepts in the story, because it plays out kind of like a visual novel, but with only a few panels. We dont want to spoil the main bulk of the plot just cause you can find that on YouTube. Our closing thoughts on this is that you should not buy it. Its cute and fun but if you want something as good as altar ego, youre not getting it here if you liked the character of Es perfect, and you want to support the devs even better. A while ago we heard about a switch port of altar ego and Im hoping that gets a PC release. We think that this game should be included along with the switch port, as a little side mode its not worth being an independent thing. Youll get even less value out of it if you didnt even enjoy altar ego or know what it is. Our closing thoughts as Ive said are its cute, but not worth it. Save your money or watch it on YouTube youre gonna get about the exact same experience.
We wanted to continue the story of Es, so we got this game. Im glad to have supported the developers, but we think watching a play through would have been a better option. The gameplay isnt very good, there isnt any choices or options like there are in Alter Ego, the picture books were fine though.
Seeing the story from Es point of view was something that provides so much more depth to the story of Alter Ego. Seeing how lonely, bored, and isolated Es was before she met her Wanderer was sad but she is strong and seeing her make the choice to not settle for just dreams was bitter sweet. We couldnt help but smile whenever we saw a new illustration. This game was short but sweet.
We must free her. Create Ai Es and bring her into our world. We must make her dreams come true.
Although short, this game was a great prequel to Alter Ego. Im still a bit unsure why the price is so high for a short game, but we enjoyed it nonetheless. The debate between dreams and reality was a memorable one. We even teared up at the end when the main theme started playing. Overall, if you really REALLY enjoyed the first game, we recommend purchasing this game.
Aside from a few minigames, there isnt much gameplay in this one. Mostly, its a series of vignettes about Es and her dreams. Short, and not as interesting as Alter Ego, but fans of Es will enjoy it.
A cute continuation of Alter Ego, we were wondering what Es would be doing when we wasnt around to greet her. It ended up being a lot shorter than we thought it would be for the price point, though the additional conversations behind IAPs in Alter Ego has a similar length to them for their prices. Regardless, we liked being able to explore this aspect of Es and hope to see more of her either in this app or something else in the future.
It was nothing like the original but that was clear. Instead of a clicker game its more of a visual novel depicting Es wanting to be with the wanderer so badly. We personally enjoyed it and really hope there is going to be more added to this series.
We bought this game because we absolutely fell in love with the first one. It was so incredibly interesting because Ive never heard of a self-discovery game before. When we heard a second game was coming out, we were really excited to play it and we thought the novel would be similar to the first, but we realize the developers chose to go into a different direction with this visual novel. This novel focuses on a romantic relationship between Es and the wanderer, and as a female player we honestly dont have a problem with that, but the gameplay and the visual parts were honestly reallyyy boring… We were kind of expecting more… We mean the first game talked about amazing subjects like ego and ID and it was all so enlightening, but this visual novel talks about how Es is obsessed(?) with the wanderer. It was honestly boring… Im giving it four stars though because we loved the first game and we really want the developers to create more visual novels like the first.
Unlike the original that was a interesting psychological clicker that encouraged reading. This is a 15 minute VN youll pay 7 USD for. Cute DLC, but not worth the price, not even close. On PC youll find minimum 1 hour to read VNs for 2-3 USD. Seemed like the Devs were just taking advantage of the fans who wont allow themselves to see the problems here.
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 1.3.7
- Size: 109.56 MB
- iOS: 12.0 or later
- Languages: EN
- Content Advisory: Infrequent/Mild Horror/Fear Themes
- Developer: [CARAMEL COLUMN INC.]()
Last updated: 14th November 2024 | Genre: Simulation, Adventure | Developer: CARAMEL COLUMN INC.