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THE CASE I had solved three or so murders before, but this one was a doozy. A dead janitor, killed in a small, one-room office off of a manufacturing floor. Gunshot wound, no casings, no bullet holes in the walls. "DEATH TO THE NEW GENERATION" was scrawled on the wall above the vic's corpse. The room was covered in prints, but they were either the victim's or his coworker, the security guard that works in the small office. I check him out -- other workers in the plant say they saw a muscular figure fleeing the scene around the time of the murder -- but it's no good. He has no obvious motive and when I search his apartment, I can't find a weapon or any ammunition that would indicate that he owns a gun. I go back to the crime scene, trying to be thorough. I must have missed something. I looked around the body and there it is: a small toy car. What was it doing here? Was this the killer's calling card? There's a fingerprint on it, one I don't recognize. That's my killer, but it's hard to find out an identity just from a fingerprint. I can search the entire government database if I sneak into city hall at night, but that would take actual hours. I was worried the case was going to get cold when the next day they kill again. A young woman shot and killed in her apartment. Same toy car left at the scene. Gunshot wound. "DEATH TO THE NEW GENERATION" on the wall. Witnesses can only describe the same muscular figure. I feel taunted. The single fingerprint isn't enough to go on. I try to find out anything linking the two victims together, cross reference their address books, see if they knew any of the same people. Nothing. Were they just random? The next victim died in a lucky way -- outside on the street, where witnesses could see. Still nothing more specific than "muscular figure" but this time witnesses give me a timeline of where they were. Based on how the killer was moving, I think they lived in the area. All three victims were around one corner of the city. I'm getting frantic now, I know I'm close. I'm going into apartments and grabbing prints off of mailboxes. Surely one of them will match. Nothing. I take a step back. There's something obvious, something I already know that I'm missing. What ties these victims together? I check over my case board. Then it hits me. Cause of death. Gunshot wounds. No casings left at the scene tells me that the killer used a revolver. I break into an arms dealer's shop at night, rifle through his sales records. There are eight people who bought guns or revolver ammunition before the first murder. It's an illegal arms dealer, so details are scarce, but I've got eight last names and that's enough to go on. I use the city hall's database and start checking the names. First up, A. Rossi. Anatobella Rossi. It's her. The prints match. She bought a gun a few days before the first killing and it seems that she was a fast learner. I get her workplace and her home address. I know she's dangerous so I grab a ballistic vest and get on over to her apartment. It's 11 am. She's at work, so I knock on the door. Her partner opens it. No time for games, I push my way into the apartment and handcuff him in the hallway, and start my search. The murder weapon isn't here -- Rossi is probably carrying it on her. I open every drawer and cupboard, break into her safe, nothing incriminating. But now I know where she is for sure. I go over to her office and ask for a tour. The receptionist is friendly, let's me in. I go down the line of cubicles. Rossi is at the end. She's sitting there, typing. A marketing manager, of course -- who else could be capable of such violence? I savor the moment, but it's time to finish this. I handcuff her and search her -- there's the revolver. That's all I need. I got her name, her address, her prints at the crime scene, the murder weapon, and the perp in cuffs on the floor. It's a cold walk back to city hall to hand in the case. I get paid, less than what I'd get if I done some dirty work for a corporation, but it's enough. I head outside, over to the bar. I'm getting thirsty. THE GAME That was a long story, so I'll keep this review short. SHADOWS OF DOUBT solves the perennial problem of mystery games: how do you allow the player to be entirely responsible for solving the mystery without running the risk of accidentally stopping progress because they can't solve the puzzle? The answer is that, through procedural generation of the cases, failure is not a wall. It's a door. If I had failed to solve that case, there would be no consequence beyond the continued killings and the knowledge that I just couldn't do it. You need to be a good detective, but the game gives you everything you need in order to become one. That case was especially difficult; no other killer gave me as much trouble as Rossi did (so far). With procedural games, there often reaches a point where a savvy player begins to understand the systems well enough such that they can engage at a purely technical level. Will I ever reach a point where I'd be able to say "Okay, this case is of *this* type, which means that if I go *here* I can find the likely killers"? Maybe. I'm not there yet. But if I ever reach that point, I will have absolutely gotten my money's worth in time and stories like the one above.Show moreShow less
26.2 hours at review985 people found this helpful
Written during Early Access