A Certain Magical Index is a light novel series written by Kazuma Kamachi and illustrated by Kiyotaka Haimura. The story follows Toma Kamijo, a high school student from Academy City, and his meeting with Index, a young nun from the Church of England whose mind has been implanted with 103,000 grimoires of the Index Librorum Prohibitorum. The series and its spin-off, A Certain Scientific Railgun, have been adapted into several video games.

A Certain Magical Index (PSP)

A Certain Magical Index is a fighting game developed by Shade for the PlayStation Portable and published by ASCII Media Works, with Kadokawa Games in charge of sales, on January 27, 2011. ASCII Media Works later developed a revised edition of the game titled A Certain Magical Index PSP the Best, which was released by Kadokawa Games on March 22, 2012.

Gameplay The game is divided into three modes: battle, story, and communication battle. The "battle mode", also called "vs CPU", allows the player to fight against an AI-controlled character. The "story mode" allows the player to watch the story development of a selected character, with game scenarios written by Kazuma Kamachi. The "communication battle mode", also called "vs HUMAN", allows the player to invite up to two people to play a co-op through the unit's built-in WLAN.

The player's selected character, known as "attacker", can choose from 16 characters to be their combat assistant, known as "partner". The compatibility between the two, which is based on their relationship in the light novel, will determine their ability level.

Music The opening theme music for A Certain Magical Index PSP game is "Answer" by Maon Kurosaki.

Marketing In September 2010, two exhibits for the game's trial were set up at the Tokyo Game Show 2010 in Chiba and the Dengeki Bunko Autumn Festival 2010 in Tokyo. ASCII Media Works also set up an exhibit at the 9th Games Japan Festa 2010 in Osaka, which was held in October 2010. In January 2011, buses wrapped with the game's poster began to operate for a week around Akihabara, Ikebukuro, Osaka, Shinjuku, Tokushima, and Tokyo. The game's limited edition purchase was bundled with a Mikoto Misaka figma. Two days after the release of the game, a collaboration event with the Oreimo PSP game was held at Akihabara to distribute shopping bags designed with their posters.

Reception

Sales A survey conducted by Media Create reported a sale of 56,017 copies of the game upon its release, ranking #5 in the game software weekly sales on the last week of January 2011.

A Certain Scientific Railgun (PSP)

A Certain Scientific Railgun is an action-adventure game developed by Shade for the PlayStation Portable and published by ASCII Media Works, with Kadokawa Games in charge of sales, on December 8, 2011. The story follows Mikoto Misaka, Kuroko Shirai, Kazari Uiharu, and Ruiko Saten in their investigation of urban legends that take place in Academy City. Kadokawa Games later released a PSP the Best edition of the game on March 28, 2013.

Gameplay The game is a combination of 2D and 3D drawings of characters for the conversation and action parts respectively. During the "conversation" part, the player collects information based on the discussion with the characters to solve the urban legend. It is followed by the "Girls Talk" mode that involves the four main characters of the series, where the player enters the collected topics at the right time to change the flow of the story. Afterward, the player will construct the reasoning to solve the mystery during the "Judgment" mode. If the player reaches a good judgment, the Judgment gauge will increase. Otherwise, the story might reach a bad ending route.

In the "action" part, the player needs to defeat the culprit behind the urban legend during quick time events. Original anime scenes, produced by J.C.Staff, will play in the climax of the game.

Plot

The introductory story of the game follows Mikoto Misaka, Kuroko Shirai, Kazari Uiharu, and Ruiko Saten dining in a family restaurant when they heard the grade school students' discussion of an urban legend called "Hair Cutting Bug". Ruiko then explains that a woman with scissors cut the hair of people who fell asleep in a vacant lot. Mikoto becomes interested in the urban legend and starts to investigate it with her friends.

Development J.C.Staff produced about 80 CG events for A Certain Scientific Railgun PSP game, with Kamachi writing the scenarios. fripSide performed the game's theme music titled "Way to Answer". Composer Satoshi Yaginuma composed and arranged the song in three days after he read the game's plot for five weeks. He came up with the title based on the game's element to solve the mystery of urban legends by Mikoto Misaka and her friends.

Marketing and release ASCII Media Works released a promotional video for A Certain Scientific Railgun PSP game on November 17, 2011. The game was intended to be released on November 23, 2011, but was delayed to its current release date. A Kuroko Shirai figma and a special cleaning cloth designed by J.C.Staff were bundled with the limited edition release of the game.

A Certain Magical Index: Struggle Battle

was a mobile-based social card game developed by Heroz for Mobage, which was published by ASCII Media Works on December 25, 2012. It was later distributed for the Mixi platform on July 16, 2013.

Gameplay Players collected and built decks of cards to battle with other players, which were divided into two types that were located on the upper left corner: magic (symbolized by the Star of David) and science (symbolized by the atom). The cards were categorized into several levels of rarity: N (normal), N+, R (rare), R+, HR, SR (super rare), and SR+. Aside from battles, visual novel-styled scenarios written by Kamachi were also in the game. Players could participate in limited-time events that were held thrice in a month to receive exclusive cards and luxury rewards.

Marketing A pre-registration for the game began on November 22, 2012, with registered players to receive a specially-drawn Mikoto Misaka limited card. A Christmas game event was held from December 25 to 28, 2012, where players received SR cards of Index and Mikoto in their Santa Claus outfit. On December 29, 2012, at Comiket 83, limited edition SR cards of Index in her John Pen's mode were distributed in the Dengeki Bunko booth.

Reception A Certain Magical Index: Struggle Battle was ranked in Mobage's top 20 apps and was popular among its users, with over 400,000 registered players.

Sequel The game entered its second season on February 3, 2015, after ASCII Media Works released a major update, rebranding it as A Certain Magical Index: Struggle Battle II and expanding it to the GREE platform. The update came with three new characters, a new card rarity called "SSR", and a new feature called "Partner Effect" to allow the character's "partner", whom they dated within the game, to participate in battles with additional effects. The official website of Mobage announced that the game ended its service on March 30, 2018.

A Certain Magical and Scientific Ensemble

is a visual novel game developed by Guyzware for the PlayStation Portable and PlayStation Vita and published by Namco Bandai Games on February 21, 2013. The game is a crossover between A Certain Magical Index and A Certain Scientific Railgun franchises.

Synopsis Settings The game scenarios that were written by Kamachi are divided into four interconnected stories: "Magic (Surface)", "Magic (Hidden)", "Science (Surface)", and "Science (Hidden)". They are set before the events of the Daihasei Festival story arc of the series and the story will lead to A Certain Magical Index: The Movie – The Miracle of Endymion.

Plot

Magic (Surface): Toma Kamijo and Index plan for their shopping using the coupon from his Academy City SNS Rondo Net when he encountered Mikoto Misaka also using the same social networking site. They share their excitement with Venus Probe Contest while Academy City launches a rocket into space.

Magic (Hidden): Motoharu Tsuchimikado is summoned by Academy City Board Chairman Aleister Crowley for a "certain command" as the chaos around the city ensues, such as mysterious bombings and traffic control system errors. He then enlists the help of Kaori Kanzaki.

Science (Surface): Kuroko Shirai is busy with her Judgment work in preparation for the Daihaseisai. She chats with Mikoto when they heard the roar of the rocket soaring to space. She mentions the connection of the rocket to the Venus Probe Contest that would be held in Academy City SNS Rondo Net.

Science (Hidden): Ruiko Saten enthusiastically introduces Kazari Uiharu to the Academy City SNS Rondo Net. Kazari becomes excited to learn that she could use the coupon from the site to purchase sweets.

Development Namco Bandai Games had shown interest in making a game with Kamachi as early as January 2011. The company intended to produce a new game for A Certain Magical Index series but they decided to combine it with A Certain Scientific Railgun franchise. Guyzware and Namco Bandai Games announced on June 8, 2012, a collaboration project for a game adaptation of the series, which later revealed to be a crossover visual novel game for PSP. During the planning stage, Kamachi was asked to write the game's plot that would match the film. He wrote the Magic (Surface) route and supervised the other three routes that were handled by Namco Bandai Games. The characters were designed using the Live2D system to depict "slimy" movements and expressive gestures.

Marketing On August 30, 2012, the game's release date was announced to be February 21, 2013. The game's official website released its first promotional video on October 8, 2012. Four chibi toys from Banpresto for Index, Mikoto Misaka, Ureapaddy Exica, and Kukimoto Hibiki were included in the first production limited release, which was delivered on October 21, 2012. Namco Bandai Games released a promotional video for the games' Magic (Hidden) route on February 14, 2013.

Reception Sales Famitsu reported a sale of 19,004 copies of the game three days after its release, ranking #5 in the top 30 game software sales ranking dated February 18–24, 2013.

A Certain Scientific Railgun S Puzzle was a puzzle game developed by ASCII Media Works for iOS, which was released on July 26, 2013. It was based on A Certain Scientific Railgun S anime series. The game was no longer available in the App Store, with the app's last update being on October 31, 2014.

Gameplay The player arranged 3 or more panels horizontally or vertically to match patterns and erase them. The bonus button designed with the selected character from the start of the game was located on the bottom screen and could be used five times. 16 wallpapers were available once the player cleared the stages, which could be used for the app's title screen.

A Certain Magical and Scientific Puzzdex was an action puzzle game developed by Heroz, and published by ASCII Media Works on March 16, 2014, for Android and in April for iOS. The game ended its service on June 30, 2016.

Gameplay Players needed to form five character cards, called "deck", to play quests. Character cards had five different colored "attributes" (passion, cool, gentle, pride, and innocent) and categorized into two "sides" (magic and science) that were located on the upper left corner. Quests had three types (normal, tutorial, and event) that required "stamina" to play them, except for tutorial mode. "Limited Time Quest" was only available in a certain period of time, where players could obtain limited character cards.

During a quest, the screen was vertically divided into two: the upper part contained five chibi characters of the player's deck, and the lower part contained six-columned five-rowed hexagonal-shaped colored tiles that the player slid horizontally or vertically to combine colors based on their character card attribute and launch an attack.