Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments

In priciple, the developers' approach to translating Holmes's method into an interactive game is going in the right direction, but the execution seriously lacking. - Out of the six cases in the game, one is not worthy of Holmes' attention, one is completely nonsensical, one is more of an Indiana Jones than a Sherlock Holmes story, and one is copied 1:1 from Doyle. Only the last two are half decent. - Even having found every single clue as counted by the game, there are multiple interpretations possible. The game arbitrarily declares one of them "correct". Holmes would never accept accusing someone without sufficient data. - After having cleared a case, we get a moral choice, e.g. whether we want to catch the criminal or let them go. The game rarely offers plausible motivations for them. For example, in the first case, we can choose to let the murderer go free, because we decide that he acted in self-defense. Except that there is no previous indication whatsoever that this might actually have been the case; we are simply left guessing. - Regularly, investigations get stuck because some event or conclusion just doesn't get triggered. This is because the game insists that some unimportant tiny action must be performed first, even if it brings no relevant new information. - Holmes' eccentric character is rarely on display here; this version of him is rather boring. Watson is always comically stupid. NPCs are often bland and prototypical, dialogues with them full of clichés. - For dramatic effect, Holmes sets up "traps" at the end of each case to catch the criminals. And every time he sets them up so stupidly that things nearly get out of control, saved in the end only by the player aceing some QTE. Speaking of which, there are lots of aweful minigames and QTEs. And the game is often quite bad at communicating what it wants you to do during those QTEs, which means that you will fail many of them at first. - Locations are few and often tiny, yet full of loadzones.

It seems like a cool game, but it has some issues for non-dextrous people. Some puzzles require quick button mashing, which is pretty disappointing in a game where you're supposed to be using your intellect. They also use vibration feedback as a clue, making them much easier with a controller than with a mouse. Other puzzles assume your mouse has a middle button, but this can be worked around with AutoHotKeys.

This game gave me a pleasurable detective experience. It is based on the stories from Arthur Conan Doyle and I was lucky that I didn't read this ones. However, game system is built on deducing also other versions of what happened, playing with possibilities and getting to the most plausible answer so I can imagine that it would be fun also for someone who read the books. Gameplay was well balanced, I was never bored. You will be gathering clues (duh), doing research and experiments, solving puzzles, picking locks and so on, until you'll have enough evidence to solve the crime. You can always be wrong (and game will continue) and you'll have to make a moral choice about the criminal. Graphics are very nice and I had no issues with running it, though I am playing it on far stronger machine than developers could think of when working on their HW requirements. Controls was rather standard and without anything that would be uncomfortable. To sum it up, if you like adventure games and detective stories, just go and play this one. :)

TLDR: This game is fantastic. Buy immediately. I have been playing the Frogwares Sherlock games since the Silver Earring, plus many other adventure games, and I can say that this is one of the best ever. It leans more towards being a puzzle game, and some may find it too easy, but I thought it was loads of fun. I thought the characters were spot on for for Conan Doyle's characterisation, and thought it had a nice balance with investigation, action and humour. There were also nice touches like how you can talk to Toby the dog (and Toby's bed has 'Toby' written on it! Cuuuute!) Pro: - Good writing, with some nice fun moments that balance the humour and drama nicely - Voice acting is top notch - Wonderfully detailed environments and high-res textures make it fun to explore locations - Deduction space is well designed and makes the investigation streamlined - Can easily replay case endings to see how different endings play out I liked, but others may not: - Interaction icons turn green when you have exhausted investigation options, making it easy to see if you have checked out everything in a location. I thought it was a good way to avoid having to revisit locations just to see if you need to click on every item again - Notebook makes it clear what you have to do next. Some may find this makes it a bit too easy, but I found it meant the game never slowed down, and I didn't have to check walkthroughs to see if I'd missed a trigger somwhere - Lots of mini-games/QTEs. I found them a bit reminiscent of early 90s games like Defender of the Crown and personally I liked how the game had more than just one mechanic Con: - Texture pop. Lots of textures pop, especially on transparent textures. - I thought the ending was a bit anticlimactic - Only get to wear the deerstalker cap in once case Frogwares could just remake this game with different cases and I would keep buying them.