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Review
Adapted from an IFCOMP24 Review
I think I respond to a murder mystery like I do pizza or sex. Even when it’s not that great, it’s still pretty great. The intersection of human drama and intellectual puzzle is just a time tested winner. Arguably, while it took a few years, those same impulses power large swaths of IF as a whole. I will say, this one challenged itself with some first impressions that gave up a lot of ground it would have to recover.
It opens with a view of a murder. So specific a view, it seemed to pretty definitively narrow the suspect pool (and motive space!) with out-of-character knowledge. As a ‘you-solve-it’ this was a wild choice I still don’t understand and am not sure the work loses anything by dropping. The second early misstep was in the setup: an FBI rookie, fresh out of the academy, flying solo on her first case. Don’t they pretty famously partner those folks up? For LOTS of reasons? Strike two.
The third strike was leaning into a ‘die roll v attribute’ tabletop paradigm. I have a quibble with this mechanism, including on the table. When testing things an rpg merely simulates, say swordsmanship, sure, roll away. Probability is a big numbers game, have at it. Mysteries only KIND of do that. They are more cerebral, more explicitly testing player ability to connect dots and form theories. Making a die roll in that kind of thing both reduces player initiative and introduces an unwelcome guest to the thinking party - random chance. Do you notice the clue? <die roll> Nope. How about the next one? <die roll> Bad luck, no again. Yes you have RPG-like stats to deploy to swing the odds but no guarantees. This mechanism raises the prospect that through no fault of your own, the fates will not provide enough data. That flies in the face of the cold, logical underpinnings of murder mysteries! And BOY does that impression loom large over every failed die roll. Yeah, I understand probability and big numbers but I NEED THAT FOOTPRINT!!!
Fortunately for KiW at three strikes in, the rules of baseball allow for, I wanna say, five strikes? Five strikes. After digging a hole for itself, the actual investigation started. Here, we just smoothly shifted to a new gear and never looked back. There is a very useful map highlighting the geography and clue locations that updates with the investigation. You interview lots of folks, suffer lots of die rolls and generally start assembling the picture. It’s not a full strike, maybe a foul ball, but I do wish location text varied after the first visit. Continually seeing the same introductory text for two straight days chipped at immersion and would be easily fixed by {if (first visit) else (default) } type coding. Even so, the choices started logically, then bloomed over time into a large web of possible connections (and red herrings) to untangle. NPCs were simple yet believably distinct, events transpired with clear motivations and consequences, it was just solidly constructed. It’s not perfect. Some failed die rolls block clue paths that you CLEARLY could just call someone else to help with, but at this point progress was assured enough that the misses grated less. More importantly, as the implacable hand of big numbers asserted itself I did get disconnected clues to wrestle with. Before I knew it, my decrying of die rolls had cycled from irritation with the mechanism to full on engagement in the mystery.
It rewarded my engagement. The mystery was a satisfying procedural romp that seemed to have multiple paths to solve, and to be at least first-order resistant to bad die rolls. I do wonder had I chosen a more physical protagonist, given the die rolls laid out for me, would their path have been as resilient? Maybe the challenges presented are tuned to the investigator in some way to ensure fairness? As a one-solution mystery I’ll probably never know. Certainly the physical rolls I uncovered were statistically small enough to make that a concern.
By the end, I had developed a solid enough theory but had acted more deliberately than urgently (Spoiler - click to show)and people paid the cost. This was a cool and legitimate outcome of my approach! I did manage to solve it (puffs chest) despite my die roll misgivings. I had climbed, however tentatively out of the first impressions hole it had dug into a really good time, capstoned with earned accomplishment. I just wish I hadn’t labored so long under the shadow of those first impressions to really enjoy the ride start to finish. As it was, I will have to split the difference between Sparks and Engaging.
Since I opened with a sex metaphor, then segued into a baseball one, I have a question. What is the sexual equivalent of fifth base? There’s five of those too, right?
Played: 9/3/24
Playtime: 45m, 5/5 solved as Negotiator
Artistic/Technical ratings: Sparks of Joy->Engaged/Mostly Seamless
Would Play Again?: No, experience is complete
Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless
