This world is wonderful. Cinematics, lighting, scenery, open world are outright amazing for a team that was 80 people at their peak. The overall story design great (case design less so), dialog is stellar. Its the world design and the characters, that draw you back in. Its gameplay also feels congruent, but with a few very odd choices, that point into the direction of some of the game assets/systems maybe having been developed using outside help, having been tied together by a casemanager. One youve got the game, to its credit, it never feels clunky - but to get there proves quite a challenge for some people. No GPS pathing, no map markers for progression. And then on two instances you get map markers. A fighting system thats very fun once you master it (flows really well), but makes it harder for people if they miss QTEs the first time around, and sometimes feels forced in its implementation into the plot. Great character model design - that doesnt seem to please all fans (give it a chance ;) ) and a tutorial that actually allows for the player not not understand what they are doing and continue, which comes back to haunt them, once they realize there is no GPS, and no mission markers, and your friend sidekick doest give gameplay tips anymore after the tutorial phase (only in journal entries). Icons are only explained in a help menu. :) That said, once you get it, you'll have no problem picking up the throughline from clue texts and dialogue, works woderfully. (Just dont think, that the crowd system means NPCs on the other side of the (gameplay wise a bit empty) open world will give you case clues - because, there are 7000 of them and not enough voice actors in the world.). Its polished, and yet has such a hard time getting the player to where they are proficient playing it - no GPS and no glowies on the map seem to be a hurdle too high to overcome for many players these days. Still, it remains wonderful in tone and execution, even with case design being ambiguous.
So I did what people usually tell you - rightly so - and played Crimes and Punishments, the previous title in the series first. I enjoyed it immensely. I found it to be a clever, atmospherically dense, superbly written, highly engaging game - that innovated on classic adventure tropes and succeeded in making them better and the genre more approachable. Then I continued on to "The Devil's daughter' and its a gut punch. During the intro sequence, they spooled off the following tropes: Token black women (first game must have had too few for the new publishers taste (game set in victorian London)), knocking on Holmes' door, becoming a flirt/love interest to Watson, Holmes acting fashionably cool, then dissing a child - to show he's edgy. Then diagnosing 'no, the child is not sick he has cried' without any context given, as one of the first player actions (with Watson idle in the background), then switching into acting overly sweet towards the child, because that would be the PC thing to do - someone told the dialog writer, with the child then turning out to be a blueprint of Tiny TIm, with a lame arm, who's lost his parents. A few minutes later Holmes encounters his daughter, who is back home from boarding school - and greets her with a non sequitur about "how not to tell her about a case, because its so not age appropriate". Then a few minutes later you have one of Holmes' street urchins cleaning a chimney - (governa'), in a mini-game, in the middle of a chase sequence. And after a few more scenes, you get Holmes shouting at Watson who had just plot advanced, that Holmes' daughter isnt his real daughter - while on the doorstep of a new, unrelated location, that his daughter' shall never be told that she is not his daughter. Ever. Because he would loose here. And thats the end of it. Looking dapper, and bachelor. The previous game had an intelligent, cynical, sharp, crude main protagonist and on the point, intelligent story delivery and a great supporting cast.
