D.W. Dagger: Chapter One
A noir first-person murder mystery set in a gloomy 1947 Pacific Northwest city. Play as the renowned Detective D.W. Dagger to help solve his latest case. A violent murder, a possible suicide, and a handful of suspects.
Can you deduce what happened?
––
As the first case in the upcoming series, test your deductive reasoning skills to piece together the truth of a new violent crime.
Taking inspiration from video games like “Gone Home” and “What Remains of Edith Finch,” as well as the board game classic “Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective,” you follow the narrative told through evidence found within the crime scene. As the lead detective, you must find suspects, determine which evidence helps your case and which hurts it, and ultimately, determine who committed the gruesome act.
This is a small, first case to give players an idea of what the larger series entails. It takes around 30-45 minutes to finish, depending on your detective skills! There is no randomized evidence or alternate paths, so once you complete it, that’s it.
Original Soundtrack by Corey Teply
Read More: Best Noir Adventure Games.
DETECTIVE TYCOON
Travel 70 years back in time to the days of noir detectives and lead your own 1-bit detective agency! Solve the most difficult cases. Hire new detectives. Expand your office.
Travel to the noir era!
-
Start from scratch
Your story begins in a small backroom with one detective and one table. Expand your business and hire new agents to solve the most difficult cases. Choose simple and safe cases or take risks for a bigger reward.
-
Decide for yourself what your agency will be
While your detectives are gaining experience on missions, you can improve your agency. Build a break room to give your detectives a place to relax. Build the wiretap room to receive irrefutable evidence or the laboratory to analyze collected clues.
-
Participate in the investigation
Solve cases by guessing and collecting clues! The prosperity of your agency depends on your choice. But the success of the case will depend not only on your deductive abilities but also on the amount of evidence that your detectives collect!
-
Take care of your detectives
Keep track of the needs of your agents. After all, it is impossible to solve a case without a cup of strong black coffee! Make sure all of your detectives get enough of it. Don’t forget about the personal skills of your detectives - may be one of them should inspect the crime scene, and the other should interview the witnesses? Or vice versa? Also, remember to send detectives on vacation and improve their skills. And don’t forget about their salary too!
Read More: Best Noir Simulation Games.
Ms.Director
Ms. Director is a game I can’t give justice to in just words. Either by my terrible writing skills or by repeating what others have said. Yet I can say that Ms. Director is one of the best RPGmaker-style games I have played in a very long time. It succeeds with the good ol’ cliche 2D horror game formula, but feels like a refreshing new experience in the RPGmaker-style genre. Either by well-written characters, fantastic links to LGBTQ+ Hollywood history, or fantastic music.
My final words about this game being a wonderful and beautiful small indie game that has been clearly made with passion and creativity. True love, research and time went into making this and it shines with it. It’s got the typical growing pains and teething problems of being a first major RPGmaker project, but those will eventually go away when the developer learns more and grows from mistakes. Ms. Director is a game I can’t recommend enough. Just writing this review isn’t even doing it justice.
– Real player with 11.8 hrs in game
Read More: Best Noir Horror Games.
I found this game through a friend on twitter, and saw that it was an indie horror title. I went and played it, not knowing what to expect, and fell in love with the characters, art style, puns, and presentation. It’s a really solid title, with a lot of thought put into it. It is a bit short, and there are a few text errors, but it’s pretty easy to miss when you are focused on all the weird stuff happening in the mansion. I’m looking forward to seeing what sketchy nonsense puts out next.
– Real player with 8.3 hrs in game
Chinatown Detective Agency: Day One
‘‘There simply must be a corpse in a detective novel, and the deader the corpse the better.’’ - S.S. Van Dine
Chinatown, Singapore in the year 2032 - Amira Darma is the female protagonist operating her first day as a Private Investigator in a dystopian cybernoir world where she feels her detective skills can flourish outside of the financially crippled Criminal Investigation Department that she once worked for under the command of Superintendent Justin Koh.
The 3 Cases, characters and the puzzles
– Real player with 4.0 hrs in game
“Chinatown Detective Agency - Day One” is a prologue for the main game due sometime in 2021, and gives a first impression of what to expect.
In short: I found the game to be interesting and it’s definitely got potential - hence my thumbs up. But it still needs some a lot of work.
The low-down
CDA is a retro-styled cyberpunk/noir-themed whodunit which plays much like a classic point-and-click-adventure with some light elements of life-sim and puzzle-games. From what I hear it is strongly inspired by the Carmen Sandiego-franchise with its chasing after clues and travelling to places all over the world.
– Real player with 3.2 hrs in game
Mystery Hotel - Hidden Object Detective Game
This one is mostly on par with the other games made by Crisp App Studio. It’s a bit on the short side, you definitely want to get all accomplishments completed on every level to get you monies worth. Best to wait for a sale.
It’s a shame you can’t scroll through the high scores and it’d be nice to see more than 3 scores at once.
The English is improving.
– Real player with 4.8 hrs in game
Your arrival at the Hotel associated with a mysterious murder and only you can get to the bottom of the truth.
This game is about solving the “Hotel Noir” riddles, so I recommend it to all who loves to collect puzzles, match clues and search differences.
Pretty interesting and detailed locations, animations, music - all of this makes playing experience even more breathtaking!
– Real player with 4.4 hrs in game
PCI Public Crime Investigation
Excellent game with such a great style… been waiting for a game that plays as legit as this one! Everything in it is full of realism.
Full support!
– Real player with 19.1 hrs in game
Really interesting concept and very well executed. PCI casts you as an armchair detective. The French police are asking for assistance with some of their cases. You must create an actual account in order to play online as a team or by yourself and accrue points after finishing up cases. There are 6 cases total ranging from around 30 minutes to 4 hours. The content is VERY dark in some cases and deals with some heavy realistic topics (I’ll list some TW’s at the end of this). While I felt uncomfortable during playing I was so hooked. The cases are riveting and the quizzes at the end really engage you actively with the material. The actors/actresses do a fantastic job of bringing the characters to life (even the worst ones) and not even making you realize they’re acting.
– Real player with 8.4 hrs in game
Unmemory
Unusual game - reminiscent of the old text-based games we used to play. A little frustrating at times, trying to work out how to move forward. Worthwhile if you like adventure games and fancy something with a different interface.
– Real player with 10.2 hrs in game
Fun puzzle game with a nice multisensory story telling emphasis. I have to say though that the process of garnering the “materials” for the puzzle can be somewhat frustrating; for example the KLF puzzle requires something that is fairly obscure to find just to get started. The puzzles themselves, once you have all the materials needed, are alright at straightforward difficulty (hints are really optional), although I am particularly impressed by the last puzzle, the Dancers Numbers, the solution of which (the only I looked up online) really blew my mind for the cleverness. (as aside, I was too taken up with the thought that the dancers might be instructing a sequence about how the button ought to be pressed; which is quite tempting, but this is not nearly as clever as the official solution). Overall it is a great game
– Real player with 9.4 hrs in game
Night Call
Perfect job to hear all the drama.
After dropping off the latest passenger, you decide that it was high time to take a smoke break. However, before you can step towards a wall to lean against, a lurking figure makes themselves known. Before you can see more than a hint of a dead body, everything goes dark. Next thing you know, you’re staring up at a hospital’s ceiling. It turns out that you were in an induced coma due to being attacked by Paris’ new serial killer. Luckily for you, the serial killer wasn’t aiming to make you one of their newest victims as you’re the only one to survive an attack. A month goes by before you’re back to work, despite your wound yet to heal and that night still fresh on your mind.
– Real player with 26.1 hrs in game
The meat of the game is talking to your passengers and enjoying their interactive stories. The three different mysteries you can choose to play provide a narrative structure to the game, but mystery-solving is not the core of the game by a long shot. A lot of the specifics/details of the murder mysteries will be left out of your understanding completely. If you go in expecting a taut thriller with deep, mind-bending mystery, you will be disappointed. But if you like a noir aesthetic and non-linear narratives (as advertised) this is definitely a game for you.
– Real player with 15.7 hrs in game
Ring of Fire
Ring of Fire is a detective noir puzzler set in the solarpunk utopia of New London.
You play as Detective Grosvenor, a jaded, middle-aged woman hunting through the still-dark corners of the city in pursuit of a radicalised serial killer.
Using your powers of deduction you must solve the brutally gruesome murders of the Ring of Fire killer. Examine clues, interrogate key suspects, and cross-reference your findings in the police database to uncover the mystery.
SEARCH
Solve the case using text entry, meaning you can’t brute force the puzzle.
INTERVIEW
Push your suspects to the brink through branching cinematic conversations with meaningful consequences.
INVESTIGATE
Explore the 3D crime scene to examine evidence both visually and textually.
The Flower Collectors
|
Review by Gaming Masterpieces - The greatest games of all time on Steam.
|
Is this game a masterpiece? Nope, it is a little detective story about a political (?) murder in Spain after Franco’s death.
A grumpy ex-policeman, bound to a wheelchair after an accident, spends his time rolling around in his little flat (2 rooms, balcony), smoking, watching the neighbours with his binoculars, drawing little pictures, taking pills against his pain… but mostly sleeping and being bored. This flat is his world, and this is where the game takes place. Suddenly a gunshot in the night, and a dead corpse in the middle of the plaza under his flat. A young, terrified girl knocks on the door, breaking into his little world. And so the story begins…
– Real player with 16.8 hrs in game
[url] Please see my curator page for more games that are worth your time [/url]
Approximate amount of time to 100%: 4h+
Estimated achievement difficulty: 3/10
Minimum number of playthroughs needed: 1, but you might end up with at least one more
Has it been in a bundle: No
Is there a good guide available: Not yet. I tried to write one, but it isn’t easy for this game. I hope somebody else will be able to make a good guide.
– Real player with 10.0 hrs in game