Toby's Nose

In this game, you play as Sherlock Holmes' dog as you investigate a murder. The game features an innovative movement system based on Pacian's Castle of the Red Prince.

You explore a huge variety of locales with what seems like a hundred or more objects, but due to the system, it can be done quickly.

The one aspect of the game that initially turned me off is that it requires exhaustive search of all such objects. You have a single command to search them, but you have to repeat it over, and over, and over. It becomes like Where's Waldo.

However, as the story unfolded (using hints occasionally because I hurried through it in an hour), I became enthralled. This is a good mystery. As the author states, it is intended to be solved in your head, and not through gameplay mechanics (contrast this with the wonderful Infocom mystery Ballyhoo, where the focus is on solving puzzles to obtain more evidence, but a psychological element is still present).

I found the solution to be very logical and satisfying. I had two false accusations I was convinced of in the middle of the game before I realized I had missed crucial evidence.

Strongly recommended.

P.S. I was stuck at the very beginning because I did not understand the mechanic. You need to (Spoiler - click to show)smell nouns that appear in the descriptions of people, even if they are not present. So if someone smells like they went to a party, type SMELL PARTY, etc..