Number of Reviews: 7
Write a review4 of
4 people found the following review helpful:
A hilarious gumshoe detective game in a hybrid parser interface, May 16, 2017I beta tested this game.
Detectiveland is a great game in a unique interface created by Robin Johnson.
The interface is a refinement of the one used in Draculaland. You have a parser-like interface, but instead of typing in commands, you have a menu of visible things and people and an inventory; you click on an object or person, and a menu of verbs comes up. One object at a time can be 'held', and this affects the menus of other nouns.
This is one of the biggest IFComp winners ever, with a minimal walkthrough taking 250 or more moves. It is split into 4 cases, 3 of which can be solved simultaneously.
You play a detective resolving problems in a square grid town. The game has graphics of speakers, and has really good humorous writing.
The game is written Scott Adams style, so many of the locations have very spare writing. This, according to the other, allowed him to spend more time on conversations and scripted events.
**Edit**
I actually hadn't played any Scott Adams games before this one; now I have played three, and this game is a straight send-up of those games, down to the split window and empty room descriptions. It's a perfect homage.