Murdered: Soul Suspect is a game developed by Airtight Games who some people may know for making the game Dark Void on the Xbox 360. In so many words, Murdered is a Ghost version of LA Noire in my opinion, going around solving crimes and mysteries through the use and combination of evidence and getting the right information out of people. Is this game worth it, or is it safe to just bury it away in the cheap bucket.
Story
The game centres on felon-turned cop Ronan O’Connor, a man who carries the weight of his wife’s death with the only thing holding him together is his badge. Following the death of his partner he continues his job as a Detective, solving crimes here and there in a rather dangerous loner manner. His luck runs out when he answers a call that leads him to who he believes to be the Bell Killer, who proceeds to throw Ronan out of a window and put 6 bullets in his chest.
…Game Over…
Ronan gets back up however and tries to run after the killer, only to find out he is now an ethereal ghost with no real tangible control of the real world. Learning from a ghost child from nearby Ronan learns how to control his new abilities as a ghost, as skills in the real world turn into ghostly powers in death. Moving ghostly objects and passing through earthly matter, Ronan gets back to his body which is now surrounded by his fellow cops. From here Ronan begins his journey to find his killer and put a stop to his murderous rampage, and to hopefully allow Ronan to move on and be with his deceased Wife.
Solving cases, figuring out mysterious and following leads, Ronan is taken over the surrounding city and areas, meeting up with other Ghosts who need help moving on or simply stuck in the real world who can have a helpful word here and there. The mystery deepens as the Killer is not as earthly as he seems and the woman he is after.
The story is around 10 hours long and offers little to no replay value, besides the hunt for collectables and side quests the game can’t be lengthened too much over its main story.
Gameplay
Murdered: Soul Suspect combines the investigative and puzzle solving of a Detective with the sneaking and assignation from a stealth game. During the safer parts of the game you will be exploring the world, passing through walls and thin objects and collecting items and finding clues that help in your investigations, as well as talking to other ghosts and helping them move on. On entering new areas you will meet Demons who hunt you down and bubbling pits that bring you down to hell. Demons can be killed with a sneak attack from behind but the pits must be manoeuvred around.
The investigative part of Murdered feels very similar to LA Noire, in the fact you hunt around crime scenes, people’s belongings and suspect areas, piece the evidence together and draw conclusions and eventually solve the mystery. Besides the evidence you find you can also possess the living and listen in on their conversation, thoughts and see things through their eyes which will bring you deeper in the story and their background. Combining these two mechanics you can “interrogate” the living by showing them images of evidence or imprinting the memory of someone in their head to make them reveal something about the dead or the event they wouldn’t think of otherwise.
Besides the main part of the game there are hundreds of collectables to find, like ghostly objects that reveal other deaths and histories of the locations, newspaper clippings that tell of the Bell Killer and the areas of the world and even more. On top of the side quests that are rather intriguing there is definitely a lot to be had besides the story.
Overall Thoughts and Feelings
Graphically, Murdered is nothing to write home about, it looks fine and can be run on most PC’s but it doesn’t push the envelope in the graphics department. The majority of the world has a washed over look, with most of the environments taking on grey and dark hues of colour that make the world look rather dead and depressing, which may fit in with the death theme of Ronan but leave the game unappealing to the eye.
The music in the game is also rather lacklustre, with most of the soundtrack being subdued and uninteresting beside the sneaking and hunting sections around the Hunters or flash backs of events that happened prior.
Overall I would give Murdered: Soul Suspect a 3/5, it is a good Detective game with some unique ghost mechanics that give the genre a new life, heh heh. Besides the solid gameplay there isn’t much to say about this release, there are better made and more fun Detective games out there and Murdered simply can’t compete in the looks or quality departments. Fans of Detective or adventure games would enjoy Murdered, but besides that you will find it hard to have fun in this game.
Disclaimer:All scores given within our reviews are based on the artist’s personal opinion; this should in no way impede your decision to purchase the game.
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