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About the Story"Police? I hope I'm not wasting your time, but I'm genuinely concerned. There's this weird, awful smell coming from my neighbour's apartment, and I haven't seen her around for days. It's starting to feel really unsettling... I think something might be seriously wrong." Game Details |
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Entrant, Main Festival - Spring Thing 2024
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Satisfying mystery with a few rough edges, April 4, 2024Having enjoyed the author’s *Last Vestiges* in last year’s IF Comp, I was happy to see another mystery game from them! This one is done in Twine rather than Inform, which allowed for some nice features, like a “case file” page documenting the evidence you’ve collected and pop-up notifications letting you know when analysis results are ready. The latter was a nice way of making it feel like time was passing in the game world and of ensuring that not too much information was dispensed at once.
Some aspects of the UI didn’t work as well for me; once I had all the analysis results, that section of the case file became overwhelming, so I would have liked to see it divided up somehow (whether with subsections or perhaps a sub-page). I also didn’t feel that the stock images representing the different locations and actions added much, as they were too generic to provide meaningful flavor.
Writing-wise, the tone was a bit odd, with the PC making some unjustified assumptions early on ((Spoiler - click to show)really, we never have any reason to suspect there was foul play), which didn’t fit with the otherwise realistic nature of the game. In contrast, the NPC dialogue was rather flat, and I wished there had been more depth to the interview segments (at least with the deceased’s son).
As far as gameplay, investigating the apartment felt somewhat lawnmower-y, and I would have liked if visited and unvisited links were distinguished with different colors. Seeking out evidence does get more complex later on, though, as new information opens new avenues of questioning and there are things you have to look up via keywords. The most fun part to me was once I had all the evidence and could start constructing a theory about what happened. Reviewing the various pieces of evidence and making connections between them made me feel like I really was solving a mystery. And when I saw how granular the game wanted me to be in describing my conclusions, I went over it all again before committing, because I was really invested in getting it right—and it was very satisfying when I did!
The Case of the Solitary Resident is a murder(ish) mystery game made in Twine where you get to play the detective, tasked to solve the mystery. Receiving the case, in you go to the location to investigate, and find... a dead body. Ensue a search for clues by interacting with different elements around the apartment, and interviewing different suspects. When you are good to go (and found enough clues that the game lets you do so - I found 15 out of 16), you can move to accusing the correct suspect and explain how it all happened (got the cause right away, it was the last detail that just didn't come right away).
I love a good murder mystery, especially the impossible kinds where it isn't clear who did it. I think I found what had happened pretty early one, though I couldn't have answered the final question without going through the game (and even then, it got technical).
The investigating is what makes the game shine here, with your little commentary and (sometimes false) observations of what is there. Snooping around people's stuff to learn more about who they are and how they got here is always very fun (aside from, you know... the dead body in the living room). Collecting samples around the place was neat, it even lets you cut a piece of cheese for testing!
All the clues you find during your run is neatly tucked inside a case file, which updates as you find those clues or get notifications of sample analysis being done (that first one made me giggle). And you can even review the interviews of the suspects or ask them more questions as you find more clues.
I struggled a bit with finding the last necessary clue: I thought I would be able to visit locations or go back to the precinct to do some research about them rather than (Spoiler - click to show)finding their number in the victim's phone. It didn't make much sense when the information is given through text or by one of the suspect, to then go through the victim's phone about it...
I also found the interview bits a bit lacking, especially compared to the investigating part. You get to pick topics to ask the suspects but not specific questions (it would have been fun to maybe be more antagonistic than just one-tone). You also can't really confront the suspects on their answers ((Spoiler - click to show)I know no one is at fault in this particular case, but sometimes people forget they've done or said things, or remember wrong). A bit more background on the other characters or more optional questions would have been nice to make the case feel a bit more... real? A bit more fluff, if you will.
One minor thing: the stock image to represent the Police department has a sign saying Polizei (German for Police), but it seems like the case is happening in Australia? The mention of dollars threw me off at first, then I connected the dots when talking to the son to where we were. Also, no Australian accents?
All and all, it was a pretty fun game.
Just the Facts, Ma'am, May 9, 2024Adapted from a SpringThing24 Review
Played: 4/3/24
Playtime: 1hr, 14/16 clues, right cause of death, wrong drug
If I part the opaque mists of time, push back untold eons to my reentry to this hobby, reaching, reaching nearly two entire trips around the sun to the barely discernible epoch of Fall 2022… this authorspace was virgin snow to me. Every game came as single line on a blank slate - no context of author idiosyncrasies, platform biases, tell-tale prose and fascinations. Just the raw work itself. Ah, such a simple, untarnished time and state for a reviewer full of unearned confidence and bluster.
An interminable 18 months later finds the withered, corrupted husk before you: penetrating brilliance and revelatory insights dimmed and drowned beneath a cacophony of prior art and superficial connections. You require evidence of my tragic artistic collapse? Not even past the cover page of this game, the eureka that pushed all other thoughts from my head was “Oooh! Oooh! I know this!” For a mad minute, I thought it could even be a Twine reimplementation of that former parser effort.
As final, damning evidence of my intellectual bankruptcy let me now proceed to review this work, liberally comparing it to its predecessor.
IT IS BETTER IN EVERY WAY.
The Twine platform is used to great effect in this work - its game-pane setup, liberal use of mood-setting graphics, case file/interview subscreens, and even text organization all combine to immediately cast the player in role of no-nonsense, just-the-facts-ma’am detective. The Twine command paradigm of selecting highlighted links on the page provide a superior framework where links only allow actions that support the investigation, as opposed to a parser’s need to accommodate any number of mimesis-breaking player fumblings.
The mystery is very capably put together - enough red herrings and dead ends to make searching out truths fun and challenging, not too many to drown the player. Many different items and leads that branch and intersect in interesting ways. Even the flourishes like timed text are used to advantage that could easily be intrusive.
The author uses all these tools to push the player into the role of Forensic Detective, then opens the door on clinical test results, chemical names and lateral thinking. My biggest beef with the previous game was that it didn’t sufficiently show its stripes, and let the player muck about with parser puzzle toys instead. It wanted Quincy, but let you be Clouseau. This time, the player is aligned from the jump - get that Keystone Cops nonsense outta here, pros are at work! The work is better focused, and better showcases its strengths, for it.
I really had fun with this one. In the end, I drew satisfaction from legitimate deduction and clue connection to determine cause of death. I failed however to identify the chemical source of the problem. I did miss two clues somewhere, perhaps those held the final piece I needed. OR PERHAPS NOT. Because the first thing I did after informed of my failure was Google search some chemicals, and ON THE FIRST RESULTS PAGE, THE MYSTERY WAS SOLVED.
I COULDA USED GOOGLE TO HELP SOLVE THE MYSTERY ALL ALONG! God, I love that so much. This thing made me a detective and with just one more bit of extra-game lateral thinking I might have closed the case. LIKE A REAL DETECTIVE. I can’t remember a failure so satisfying, and the credit goes to the real-world, clinical vibe the game created through graphic layout, mystery construction and tight UI control.
I kinda can’t wait for the next one in the series. You better BELIEVE I will be testing if it measures up to this one. [spoiler aside to author - that said, there is a discernible pattern in these two works that casts a shadow… beware!]
Mystery, Inc: Velma
Vibe: Forensic Detective
Polish: Smooth
Gimme the Wheel! : If it were my project, only one tweak: the body’s apparent sex is left unrevealed when examined, leading to a strange few minutes of disconnect when finding female name references around the apartment. Yes, it can be deduced but doesn’t feel like that detail should need to be.
A police procedural from the creator of Last Vestiges in IFComp 2023, The Case of the Solitary Resident is a Twine mystery that explores police investigations in an edutainment kind of way.
The player can navigate through the victim's apartment using hyperlinks and ask forensics to look at samples. Results come in as you get more clues and time passes. There's a lot of clicking compared to other Twine titles I've played because objects and rooms have their own hyperlinks within them -- it reminds me of other Twine games that try to mimic the look and feel of parser games.
The writing can be somewhat charming when given a chance to shine. I particularly like the description of examining camembert cheese and the narrator goes "It looks innocuous enough, but you cannot help but wonder... is there death in the cheese?" It's a delightfully cheesy line that I kind of wish was more prominent in the game because I found the title too serious.
Indeed, the narrator doesn't have the hardboiled cop vibe for me. Although the narration suggests that they've got experience and a desire to avoid wrongful convictions, I don't think they have much personality. I realize that the character is simply an avatar for the player, but it makes for a rather plain reading experience. The text wasn't engaging for me, and I found myself skimming lines to see what links to click on next.
The mystery itself isn't that interesting either. Having played Last Vestiges, I thought the solution would be similar and it's disappointing that there are no twists and turns in this game either. The interviews have very little interactivity since you only ask the suspects about the few clues that exist. And when the player is ready to make an accusation, they are presented with several options that look similar to each other and the jargon doesn't help much. Unlike Last Vestiges, there is an attempt to help the player learn the jargon through books, but I find them very unhelpful and wonder if this is even accurate (kudos to the developer for adding a disclaimer that this may not be accurate for the two books you read). I didn't get any satisfaction from solving the case as I found the general outline of events predictable; I just didn't know the specific jargon needed to close the case.
Still, I find the game a pleasure to play because I like the mystery genre and exploring the apartment as an investigator is always fun. While it does feel like a chore at times, obsessively clicking through the hyperlinks and making sure you've asked the lab to check for fingerprints and hair is quite refreshing. The procedural work is fun to click through, so I wonder if the game would be more interesting if we were just looking for clues. The game falls apart for me once I'm in the solving stage; the investigative parts have more depth (and are perhaps more attuned to the expertise of the developer).
To put it another way, I think the ideal mystery for me may not be about inventive solutions or ingenious logical puzzles. Rather, what I enjoy most is roleplaying as an investigator looking for clues -- the process, not the solution. Mysteries, even the great ones out there, tend to be sloppy in this regard and I can see games like The Case of the Solitary Resident correcting this trend.
I hope the developer continues making this game and polishing their craft.
Ferns and forensics, May 14, 2024So this is a slightly strained parallel, maybe, but you know Evil Dead 2? The title makes it sound like a sequel, but actually it’s more of a remake, taking the same basic ingredients from the first movie (cabin in the woods, Necronomicon, first-person POV zombies, Bruce Campbell) and redeploying them with significantly higher production values. It’s the same story with The Case of the Solitary Resident, which is recognizably of a piece with Last Vestiges, the author’s IF Comp entry from last year, sharing a locked-door-murder premise and a focus on forensic deduction while moving to Twine, incorporating visuals, and better communicating its expectations to the player. While even in its more accessible form this gameplay paradigm is still a bit dry, the end result is a satisfying intellectual puzzle.
I sometimes struggled with Last Vestiges because it looked like a more conventional mystery than it wound up being – in particular, there were a series of standard adventure-game logic puzzles that gated progression, which made it seem like solving those would likewise solve the mystery. However, that just provided the raw clues; actually understanding what happened also required bringing medical knowledge to bear, and while a police-inspector NPC was on hand to provide some of that information, their expertise wasn’t clearly telegraphed, and accessing that information was made challenging by the open-ended parser interface. Solitary Resident improves in both areas, eliminating the out-of-context game-y elements to focus on its core competencies, while using the affordances of its choice-based interface to make clear what kind of data you need to gather and how you can get it analyzed.
The real strength here is the high level of detail; you can search for blood, hair, and fingerprints in each room of the victim’s apartment, as it becomes clear that poison may have had something to do with her demise, you’ve got lots of tools to come to grips with what’s happened, including sending samples off to the crime lab and two different keyword-driven reference manuals. Beyond that, you can also get formal statements from half a dozen or so suspects, and then question them to push on key elements of their stories (this is the one place where the otherwise-smooth interface falters – I was stymied for a bit after launching my first interview since I didn’t realize that I could go back for Q+A after reading the initial statement). Chasing down every single lead requires paying close attention to everything you’ve learned, and a few use text-box input to make sure you can’t just lawnmower your way to victory – I felt very satisfied when the game told me I’d found all 16 clues after finishing the game and aced the multiple-choice test where you lay out your theory of the case, since I’d had to use my noodle to get there.
My only real critique is that the forensic side of things feels like it far overwhelms the personal elements of investigation. The suspect interviews are much more straightforward than the evidence-gathering gameplay, and none of the characters – the victim very much included – never threaten to feel like real people. That perhaps fits the author’s design goals (the game is tagged as “educational”, and a few references within it suggest that it’s at least partially intended as a more-engaging experiential-learning alternative to textbooks), but does feel like something of a missed opportunity – a few more colorful characters to liven things up wouldn’t undermine the pedagogical possibilities, I don’t think. This head-down approach to detective-work also winds up making the solution to the locked-door mystery easier to guess: (Spoiler - click to show)when the thinly-sketched suspects are a son who needs money but clearly could have just asked for it rather than tried to hurry his inheritance, an old business associate who had a moderately-intense falling-out with the victim a decade ago, a neighbor who has no conceivable motive whatsoever, another neighbor who had a strained relationship with the victim since she was annoyed by his smoking habit, and a near-comatose ex-husband, it doesn’t take too many little gray cells to realize this was an accident and not murder.
If there’s a third game in the sequence, I think I’d enjoy it more if it paid more attention to the personalities involved and created as much suspense around the question of who did the killing, as around how it was accomplished. A full-comedy installment a la the third Evil Dead movie, Army of Darkness, is probably not needed here, though – the authors have cracked their formula and there’s plenty of room to keep playing with it.
This is version 8 of this page, edited by thesleuthacademy on 14 May 2024 at 1:12am. - View Update History - Edit This Page - Add a News Item - Delete This Page