Night Call

Night Call is a text-only visual novel with strong noir vibes and very shallow gameplay. You're a cab driver with A Past(tm), working the night shift in Paris. Following a sequence of rather unrealistic events, you're strong-armed into investigating a series of heinous crimes by collecting information from the random clients who enter your cab. There are three stories to explore, all based around the premise of a serial killer stalking the streets of Paris, but they all follow the exact same beats making it feel like you're playing the same story thrice. The game gathers and arranges all the clues for you and the only thing left to do is click through waves of character drama and pick the appropriate response every now and then. Some of the stories are compelling, some surreal, some cringy, and some overly preachy but overall the writing is pretty good for the most part. Managing your resources (money, gas) seems utterly meaningless and gathering clues feels entirely random. It's an ok game, with cool monochrome visuals and chill music. Good to kill 5-6 hours with but gets repetitive quickly after that.

For the right day in the right mood of the right gamer, this one is a special treat. You'll spend the majority of your game time reading - no voice overs - the stories of one of dozens of possible taxi passengers, some of them repeat customers who open up more on their second or third trips with you. It's narrow in theme - you're a Parisian taxi driver presumably of Arabic-French descent, and this game swims in it. Your interactive opportunities are limited to suit this constraint. For example, dialogue choices for you as a driver are usually scant or silence, but ripple in satisfying ways across multiple nights. Yes there is a whodunnit underneath all of this which ties in eloquently to the overall narrative, but I would hesitate to recommend this to those seeking robust mechanics of deduction (such as in Return of the Obra Dinn). In some cases the randomness of the clues you'll get will greatly hamper your ability to solve the case for that run. There is a tentative spirit of replayability here, more richly geared towards exploring the life stories of the people in the back of the cab than in solving the cases. Whether the journey will be more important than the destination for you comes down to whether you enjoy well authored dark and contemplative prose about the struggles of transient weirdos from the backseat of a cab. Pour moi, I would be quite sad if such a game n'exist pas.

Premise might be misleading because it's not detective game. It's hardly game in fact. There are 3 scenarios about catching serial killer, or to be more precise 1 scenario in 3 variants, each with different killer and suspects. But general scheme is always the same: you're the only survivor of killer's attack, police blackmails you into helping them, gives list of suspects and you have 6 nights to gather evidence and point the culprit. Then you realize the crime aspect is barely there. You can visit places related to case or drive suspects themselves to maybe find some clues. Between nights these are added to your "board" and automatically assigned to suspects. Before final night you'll have to pick one based on gathered evidence and there likely won't be enough to tell for sure. But if you choose wrong it doesn't really matter because you can just reload and pick again. Majority of each night is doing normal cabbie job: driving random people around and talking (or not) with them. That's the best or worst part, depending what you expect. At first I had mixed feelings but later got completely immersed. There's about 90 unique characters, some with multiple possible conversations or requiring few rides to know their whole story. People and events can be mundane or bizarre, sad or funny, serious or silly, mostly believable but sometimes surreal. Writing is good and range of topics and characters immense, making me really curious who next customer will be and what turn will encounter take. Of course there is no actual driving, all is done by clicking mouse. Investigation part feels half-baked same as cash and fuel mechanics. And there are some unskippable parts in each scenario that will feel old fast. But fortunately there's also free roam mode where you just drive without serial killer plot. If you can see yourself sitting comfy during gloomy night and reading snippets of nonexistent people lives, there's a chance you will enjoy this atmospheric oddity like I did.

Gorgeous art style and great game play. I love the story telling and pace of the game. Only issue is the heavy left wing politics in the game, which is kinda off putting and distracting from the story.

"Night Call" was a wonderful gaming experience that seemed new, part thrilling, part relaxing to me. You're a taxi driver who was attacked by a serial killer. Working together with the police, you collect clues by listening carefully to your guests, while trying to think into their minds, choosing the correct answers by being emphatic and careful, so that they are more willing to give information. Being combined with a wall on which you arrange your hints and evidence, and a sim element in which you have to earn enough money, this was a fascinating task. The game is highly immersive, and this is because of the excellent writing of the dialogues and the love the makers had for every single of their many different characters. The game IS mainly text-based, but being written that good, it was better than so many more graphics-oriented games. Speaking of which, the graphics are mainly black and white, fitting perfectly to the noir ambiance, but being a modern-time game with modern topics. Thanks for the experience!