Murdered: Soul Suspect

Releasing a new property at the back-end of a console generation is always a risky endeavor, but Murdered: Soul Suspect feels confident in its narrative adventure. In true detective fashion, this ghostly tale between a living and dead world sets up a noir atmosphere with a grizzled protagonist. Banking on further supernatural events, this story manages to keep players going with fitting gameplay elements, only hindered by a botched appearance. That, in turn, makes the slender, yet appropriate, total look lesser than it is.

Well, I'm dead...

This game starts when the player dies; a rare sight indeed. Officer Ronan is taken down by a notorious criminal, the Bell killer. This isn't the end of the road, as the policeman must now find the killer's identity, while stuck in the spirit realm as a ghost. On the way, the surly cop will find new strengths and use old ones to deduce clues from crime scenes. Additionally, to matter in the real world, Ronan will need to find a way to communicate with the living. Luckily, some people exist to bridge that very gap.

With a captivating intro to tie Ronan's criminal past to an abundance of tattoos, Murdered is off to a good start. Visuals are kept on a somber note, but that's to be expected given the circumstances. Still, the ghost realm is mostly made up of shades of gray and the night of real world doesn't offset it one bit. It's one massive, dreary blob. Aside from the player's sleek presence, character models also suffer from a lack of detailed nuance in both appearance and movement. This makes a lot of key roles look like puppets in a giant act that prioritizes certain actors.

While the prior isn't problematic, due to the gripping story and on-point voice cast, an unreadable letter font atop of a blotched menu is much worse. A lot of this adventure is seen through text for clues and lore, but favoring style over substance makes it impossible to use most of it. Luckily, the basic outlines of the plot can steer players through story, but this is such a woeful blemish. It's unforgivable to opt for chicken scratch when it can't be deciphered.

This acting duo works well. It's clearly visible in the character model detail.

Fortunately, the detective is also able to use a keen eye to spot clues in crime scenes and other points of interest. This turns the sleuthing job to more of an exploration theme, having to pick up context from the environment. With clues in mind, the cop can then piece things together with the use of a simple logic puzzle. Scraps that are thrown around the screen represent the possible, relevant items that could lead to a break in the case. It's Ronan's task to find which items fit the puzzle to uncover yet another mystery. This does make proper use of the deduction theme, however, cutscenes that indicate the important events dampen the impact of looking for clues. It still works as a game mechanism, but it feels more like wading through the trash than cleverly assessing a situation.

There is more to ghost-life than just working though. Throughout environments, there are also a ton of collectibles to pick up, which give a lot more insight to the story. These are found in the weirdest places, often remote, but as our officer is a ghost, that's rarely a problem. Spirit walking allows Ronan to go through surfaces, giving access to areas where mortals can't go. Clipping through walls becomes an actual game mechanism, which looks a bit weird, but can be oddly liberating to navigate the environment. In particular, this is handy when Ronan has to assist a living person get around the surrounding area. When simple tricks don't work, it's also possible to manipulate small objects, such as unlocking latches or temporarily making appliances freak out. Being a poltergeist distracts guards, letting others flee while their backs are turned.

As a ghost detective, one can also peer into a suspect's mind, literally. With the power of possession, the spirit cop can take a look through a person's eyes, influence their thoughts or even fully take control of small animals. A lot of its implementation is fluff though, as only a select amount of characters offer any significant material. It does, however, widen options in theory. Being ethereal has a lot of advantages; even smoking forever without risk of death.

Damn, still dead. Bummer.

Though the spirit world almost seems untouchable, there are dangerous entities there as well, mainly demons. These creatures live to consume other spirits, making encounters with them tense. Only by stealthily approaching them is it possible to use their brief vulnerability to dispatch foes with a double quick time event. Both a button and a direction are required to succeed, making it trickier than it sounds. Should it fail, however, Ronan can quickly try to escape into vapors, which serve as obfuscating hiding spots, to survive. There's a decent balance between power and punishment in the demon play, which heightens the intensity of encounters. Most situations also allow sneaking, without dispatches or any detection at all, which should favor stealth fans. Demons are used sparingly, but just enough to retain their fear factor. More of them would make these shrieking beasts a routine.

Maybe this monkey stance will cheer up this demon.

Weirdly enough, there does seem to be room for a lot more demons in Murdered, as hiding spots are scattered everywhere, but no threats magically appear. In particular, the city that connects areas is a giant missed opportunity. It covers a lot of ground, but there's virtually nothing to do. Worse yet, all its characters are voiced by two people with two lines each. That's not even an exaggeration - it's that bad. What could be a liberating open world environment here is torn down to a pointless waste of time - it's poorly implemented and dumb.

While on the job though, the momentum does keep rolling, distracting from the many lesser parts. It takes a bit, but once the story gets chugging, it wastes no time. Like a real detective, Ronan hurries to capture the target in the third act without any fuss. It may appear like it glosses over a lot of content, which it does, but it does fit its detective theme and avoids any end slouching.

As a story adventure, Murdered: Soul Suspect delivers the most through acting and visual context, rather than a series of clever mechanism tidbits. It does, however, seems like the game ran out of production time and missed some iterations to bulk up on content. As its terrible presentation also starts eating at its narrative, there is little meat left on its bones that hasn't been soiled. That is a big loss for a game that showed the foundation for a lot more than an interesting ghost detective tale.

 

Daav Valentaten, NoobFeed (@Daavpuke)