Greyhat - A Digital Detective Adventure
This game ties if not usurps The Return of the Obra Dinn as my favorite game of all time. I’ve played hundreds of games on Steam and PS4, nearly all of them critical darlings, of all genres and scopes. Alphabetically in my library, it sits between Gorogoa and Guacamelee, and after this, Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 is next in my queue.
While not trying to spoil anything, I recommend this game to pretty much anybody without reservation, worth every penny of its asking price - but most especially those that actively seek out games of this genre like Obra Dinn and to a lesser extent like Unheard that tickle the brain a little they way a detective or point-and-click adventure game might. Hell even if you like the Ace Attorney series of games, there’s something in here for you too. Far from perfect and I have my critiques, but to be honest my library is full of these faux hacker puzzle/detective games but none are as creative, polished, or fleshed-out or quite frankly as affecting as Greyhat. The “a-ha” moments here are the most rewarding and feel most earned here and for example chatting and “tunneling” elements are two examples of how the devs going out of their way to nail the feeling of being a clandestine keyboard warrior furiously typing messages or lines of code. Were I to say more I’d worry about revealing spoilers.
– Real player with 25.5 hrs in game
Read More: Best Hacking Detective Games.
My playtime: 19.2h (based on steam, 100% achievement)
Grindy Achievement(s): No.
Optional Achievement(s): Yes (5 achievements).
Difficult Achievement(s): No.
Intro
Greyhat - A Digital Detective Adventure is a game where you have to find clues and solve minigames. The game has ~19 levels in total.
Pros:
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~19 levels
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Minigames
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Hints
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Some levels have different solutions when you replay it
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Collectibles
Cons:
- You need to manually type some clues to your notes
– Real player with 19.2 hrs in game
Cogmind
Cogmind is a roguelike game, where you constantly build and rebuild your character. Your capabilities are defined by the items you acquire. There is no experience (no grinding!), you gain ‘levels’ by climbing to the next floor. This system makes various builds equally viable: combat, speed, stealth, all sorts of hybrids and so on.
Items are not just stats +X. You will balance energy output, heat generation and support with your combat capabilities, speed and information gathering capabilities. There are over a thousand different items: weapons, power sources, cooling, propulsion, sensors, armors, shields, hackware, build and repair utilities and many, many more. Each item has a cost to use it, with more powerful items typically having bigger costs. There are various synergies and you can get some sick combos! But don’t get too attached to the components you currently own, because sooner or later they WILL get destroyed. That’s why you constantly need to acquire new parts (they are everywhere!) to rebuild yourself, sometimes completely respecializing to a different build type (You were a heavy tank, machine of destruction, but after a particularly tough fight not much is left of you? Time to become an ultra light jet that zips past enemies before they get a chance to act!).
– Real player with 1628.0 hrs in game
Read More: Best Hacking Atmospheric Games.
This game is good. Really good.
I’ve put 200+ hours into it, and I still want to play more.
In depth reasons below, but a quick tl;dr:
This game solves a lot of problems that I’ve found with the entire roguelike genre, in major ways. Even without looking at roguelikes at all, this is a very good game in it’s own right, and once you learn all the systems in play (which the game helps you learn, instead of having to look in an out of game wiki for arcane details) it’s a joy to play. It’s also fun to discover these things out as you go, and I really liked the magical feeling upon finding new areas off the beaten path. Running into Z(partially redacted) was a really cool moment in my first few hours of play, and those are scattered throughout the game. In addition, the early game is a lot better then other games of this type, instead of being a slog.
– Real player with 532.5 hrs in game