A seemingly straight-forward police procedural that follows genre conventions to a tee: opening with a murder-scene, then jumping to the PC examining the evidence in his office. A rudimentary attempt at introducing interactivity to the pre-credits murder does not succeed: "which way does the victim run?" is a pretty meaningless choice that does little to provide any empathy between the player and the victim, either this sequence should be expanded to actually give some hope of survival (with the rug pulled away at the last moment), or it should be straight text.
Once the investigation kicks off though, we are into the real meat of the interaction. What kind of cunning detective tools and tricks will we be using? How will the tense and intricate world of clues and deduction be simulated? By, erm, making a cup of coffee. From a murder in the woods to the PC's Great Coffee Making Adventure in the space of one turn. That's quite a tension-killer right there. For this kind of game to succeed, every action needs to be meaningful, every action needs to relate to the task in hand. You can't afford to dissipate any atmosphere like this, always keep things moving moving moving...
No comments:
Post a Comment