A fairly clumsy, dry entry into the Idol-like genre that forgets the lessons of its forebears.


This is a really perfunctory Idol-like. It's a bunch of hollow feeling scenes than the players click their way through. There doesn't seem to have been as much attention paid to the scenarios as there was in the Golden idol series, as nothing feels particular interesting, chin-stroking, or revealing. It's just a bunch of stuff you look at and then fill out the paperwork for. I guess it's very realistic and true to a real detective in that sense? :)

I think the biggest issue with the game design, however, is that it's an Idol-like that forgot to clone the important parts of the Idol-like genre! Specifically:

1. It forgets any kind of delayed reveal mechanic on the persona sub-screen, meaning you can just brute force all of the faces without caring who anyone is. Sure, most players won't do that, but designers need to protect players from ruining their own experiences and optimising the fun out of a game.
2. It doesn't have enough sub-mysteries to help the player step their way through each scenario. I guess this is because each scenario is really obvious, once you've gone around looking at everything. Some of the leaps of logic in the scene aren't entirely logical either, and sub-mysteries might have helped round that out.
3. The interstitial / sub-mysteries that do exist don't actually help, as the way the UI is structured they're all hidden away, rather than being separate windows like in Idol games, so you can't view them all at once, resulting in too much tedious tab switching.
3. The eye icon ticks hotspots off that you've visited, but doesn't track if you collected all the clue words or visited the sub-hotspots. Meaning if you get interrupted you might not realise you missed something. Also, reloading into a scenario refreshes all of the eyeballs, but you still have all of the clues, which is confusing.
4. Clues are often clearly visible in in-game text, but not "collectable". You always have to find the exact scene to find someone's name, despite it being visible everywhere else. I imagine this is to encourage you to explore, but that seems a lazy solution and isn't one taken by the other pillars of the genre. (Also, you have to renter people's names each scenario, despite having seen them in the past 5)
5. You rarely have to input motive, which means it's not clarified / understood by the player. You're mostly just inputting the chronology of the crime scene.
6. It explains itself a bit too much. There's no real air of mystery, just some crimes that happened.


You don't need to copy everything in the tentpole games, but as the idiom in the jazz community goes, first you need to learn the rules so that you can break them. There's a reason why these features are in the other games! Pope didn't invent the triple-reveal for his fun, it was for the players :)

Concluding, I'd like to say that it's a pleasant enough experience, even if it does fall short of the mark. Hopefully the developers make more games in the genre and improve on what they've got already. Fans of the Dinn-like family of genres should find enough here to chew on whilst they await their next morsel, but it might not be the best introduction for those new to the genre, look to the Golden Idol series or The Roottrees Are Dead.



Miscellany:

1. I like the font.
2. Early on the English and writing was a bit dodgy, but it seemed to get better over time. Or perhaps I just grew more used to it?
3. It has quite poor soundwork, especially the sound mixing, with some hotspots being tediously loud
4. There's no keyboard shortcuts, so you have to use the mouse to interact with the journal every time. It's just a bit too much friction and makes you wonder how the developers play these kinds of games.
5. I liked the more "progressive" elements, i.e. turning on a light first, or finding a safe code, the interviews, the case filing cabinet etc. They added a touch of novelty to the genre. It's a shame they didn't focus on the fundamentals first!
6. Something baffling happens in terms of arrests. It's "explained" later in the story, but the fact it happens at all yet isn't told to the player is weird. I thought we were jumping around the timeline at first.
7. I like the graphics and even the scenario settings. It definitely felt like I imagine the LA billionaire social scene to be.
8. The game INNOVATED with drop downs, but they were too full and therefore unwieldy. I would like them to trim after other words get locked in. The Idol-like word tableau is there, but it's tedious hidden.
9. This game is unique amongst the Idol-likes in that you're an actual person, rather than a godlike being of deduction. And unlike Obra Dinn, almost everyone here is still alive. But you can't interview the suspects in the scene, you just go around frisking them and trying to discern their identities from scraps of paper.

I absolutely loved this game. I wish there were more like this. I like that one has to read and pay attention, something we are sorely missing in the modern environment. The story was interesting throughout, the characters well developed for such a short period of getting to know them. Very nicely done.

I enjoyed this game. The influence from the Golden Idol games is obvious, and that's a positive because I love those games. I like the art style and the characters were interesting enough. However, I don't think it was worth the price. I finished the game in just over 4 hours and it was very easy to solve the cases. If you like these types of games, then maybe wait until it's on sale.