Night Call

In this game you play as a taxi driver who works for the police and must hunt down a killer, looking for clues and listening to client conversations under the premise that people are less defensive and more likely to reveal stuff about themselves in the presence of a cab driver. As you listen to people's stories you can talk to them and sometimes influence their decisions. It's a very good premise, but the execution is preposterous. For one, there's no rhyme or reason. The game gives you random clients and you have to luck into running into one that's related to the case in some capacity (by being a suspect or holding a clue). If you happen to run into one of those, you have to luck into them bringing up the subject. You can very well have a suspect as a client and they'll never say anything relevant. Then there's the "investigation" aspect. There really isn't one. You automatically gather clues by going to an established place that can hold one or just by chance. Then they're automatically sorted and related to each suspect. Then, after a few days of this you get a call and you say who you think is the suspect based on whichever clues look more damning. Keep in mind that you have no way to know if most clues are even true (some will contradict others), so you're just guessing. Then, if you happen to win, or just restart, the mission will be more or less the same, but with a different culprit, as they're chosen at random. That means that whomever was guilty in your first playthrough is likely to be innocent here, so kiss your immersion goodbye, assuming it wasn't already broken when you randomly had to drive a ghost or Santa. The one good aspect about the game are the conversations between you and your clients. They are, for the most part, realistic, and you'll meet interesting characters (they will repeat upon a new game, though, so there's that). If this was all the game was about, it'd be better, but the whole murder mystery thing throws it off the rails.

This game was such a let-down. When I first saw the trailer I thought it would be amazing; A noire detective game with a papers please-esque money clambering and a killer that is acively hunting you? How can this not be great? Well, the game is nothing like it. The only thing you do in this game is driving around and listening to other peoples stories and sometimes stubeling over "clues" that are automatically assigned to the correnct person with no investigation at all. Money is never a problem, you start out with a sizable chunk of cash, and while you often break even during your shifts, there is nothing you really can do to earn more money (as you'll be driving around clients anway). The characters are decent for the most part, but some of them just takes me out of it and spoils the mood, like the *minor spoilers* ghost and hologram from the future. They aren't however good enough to hold up the title on its own, and without the investigation and the hunt there is not really much to it.

To get into Night Call, you need to be prepared to enter a Noir story composed of a lot of characters. You are a taxi driver and must find a serial killer before it finds you. The only way to do that and ask questions, discuss with your passengers. Each one have a personnality and a story that each run reveals. Put some headphones on, to be totally immerged in that beautiful written story among black and white graphisms.

This game is not for everyone. For me, personally, it's a 5 star game. The atmosphere is dark and moody. It's always night time and it's always raining. Catch glimpses of Paris as you drive your customers around, talk to them and unlock their life stories. Try to determine who the killer is without getting yourself killed in the process. This is a point and click, narrative driven game. Don't buy this if you thing it's a shooter, or a action puzzler, or anything like that. It's click on how you respond to your customers. You are given a pretty good range of replies, and you can always "Remain silent." Lots of replay value as you have many possible customers, and most have multiple story arcs to discover through conversation... You won't unlock them all in one run. I don't wanna ruin the main plot, suffice to say that you are a taxi driver who becomes a witness to a murder, though you didn't get a clear look at the killer. Since you were the closest to the scene, you're forcibly recruited by a detective... And by "recruited" I mean threatened. You are given leads to follow, evidence to gather, and possible suspects. One of them is the killer. You move clues around on an evidence board every morning to help you narrow things down. The atmosphere is fantastic, the story is great, and there's multiple stories to enjoy that all have differing main plots, but the killer is different every time! If you enjoy stories AT ALL, then I think you would enjoy this game. If you hate reading, engaging stories, point and click adventures, rain, taxi's, or Paris, then this game might not be for you. I highly recommend this game! And the soundtrack is amazing as well. It captures the atmosphere just right.