In Fragile Dreams, the player character, Seto, must traverse the ruins of Tokyo and the surrounding areas, fighting off ghosts that lurk within these ruins.[2][3] The game's heads-up display includes a mini-map and HP gauge for Seto's location and health, respectively. Seto will fall unconscious if his HP reaches zero, resulting in a game over. The player controls Seto from a third-person perspective with the Wii Remote and Nunchuk. Seto can use his flashlight (controlled by the Wii Remote pointer) to illuminate his surroundings or solve puzzles and interact with the environment. When searching for certain objectives or hidden enemies, pointing Seto's light in their direction picks up and plays their sounds through the Wii Remote's mini speaker. The Wii Nunchuk, meanwhile, directly controls Seto's movement: aside of basic movement, he can crouch to hide and crawl through small spaces. Seto will often come across damaged floors, which require slow movement (and for heavily-damaged floors, crouching) to cross without falling through.
As Seto, the player can use weapons found throughout the world to fight off ghosts, ranging from slingshots and golf clubs to crossbows and katanas. Each weapon can only take a certain amount of use: once a weapon reaches its limit, it will break after battle.[4] The player can also find other usable and collectable items in the field, marked with fireflies.[5] The player can only save their game by resting at small fire pits scattered throughout the world: used fire pits are marked with a bonfire. The player can also examine and identify Mystery Items, organize their inventory, as well as after encountering the Merchant, buy and sell items.[6]
As stated by the producer of the game, Kentarō Kawashima, Fragile Dreams is not strictly a survival horror: rather, its story focuses on human drama.[7] In Fragile Dreams, aside of the main story, the player can find and examine objects and graffiti throughout the world. Objects called memory items (ranging from origami and stones to cell phones and books) hold the memories of their former owners (only accessible at bonfires), while the graffiti contains messages only seen by pointing at them in first-person. By examining these messages, the player can piece together hints to the game's backstory.
