Too much crime
 

Is anyone else just the slightest bit annoyed by the whodunit/crime/investigative "adventure" games saturating the market lately? Ever since shows like CSI made it big on TV, its been almost nothing but games like it trying to profit off the success. One one hand, it's great that something out there is bringing adventure gaming into the spotlight.. but on the other hand, those of us who are veterans of the genre are seeing much of the same, time and time again.

I come around here every month or two to check the release dates section and just about every time I do, it's either crime or comedy (two of my least favorite AG styles).

I miss games like Syberia, TLJ/Dreamfall, Sanitarium, Bad Mojo, Broken Sword, etc. that stand on their own two feet and exist just to tell you a great story.

I don't know.. I guess I just needed to blow off some steam, but I'm sick of these cookie-cutter titles being released.

Anyhow.. based on the games I mentioned.. is there anything for me to look forward to? I glanced at the hype-o-meter and there's just a couple that look even remotely interesting to me. It's been pretty uneventful this year.

Unfortunatly, crime games are an all too easy fit into the adventure game structure.

The investigation type game gives players an excuse for walking around looking at things, interrogating people, solving puzzles etc.

Developers don't need to try as hard to fit the story round the puzzles with those games. It's more risky to try something new.

Plus they sell well.

Personally i'd like to see more innovation storywise in the genre.

Personally I wouldn't have any problem with that if those games were actually good.

Agreed! Discworld Noir did this kind of crime/investigation gameplay very well. But I feel there haven't been many interesting games with these elements after that one. Kinda sad actually, because Discworld Noir was a great game and very innovative.

Well personally I also liked still life and culpa innata... can't recall any other that was really good.

On the flip side, they are keeping the genre alive. If crime-based games sell, I say keep making them.

I think tie-in games pretty much always suck, they rely on the success of the franchise to boost sales and slack off on the development. Unfortunately for you, crime/whodunnit fit irresistibly into the Adventure game scenario - collecting clues and solving puzzles ARE the story; other types of narrative have to contrive a way to include those things without breaking up the flow of the story so much that you lose track. Even the best non-crime games run into issues of suspension of disbelief incorporating their puzzles... who messes around with rubber duckies and canal locks when they could pick up a magnet and a piece of string at the dollar store? Or risks a fatal road accident to score a lemon outside a bar? (Who ever heard of a bar without lemons?) Window dressing aside, I think pretty much all adventure games fit into two scenarios: investigative (gathering clues to solve a mystery) or quest overcoming obstacles to complete a task.) What sets them apart is not which of these they choose, or how they mix them, but the ingenuity of puzzle design and how they fit into the overall narrative of the game.

I'm not particularly a big fan of crimestories either. But there are certain "versions" of this theme that can still appeal to me, so I'm not complaining (as long as the game is good). :)

I like gritty crime/detective stories. I absolutely loved Post Mortem and Still Life, but I guess they have a bit of a twist to them; they're not just your typical CSI murder cases. I've never actually played an adventure game based on an existing property like a TV show, but I'd have to assume that most of them are mediocre.

I'll tell you two common adventure game traits that really grate on me:

1) Bouncing from one country to the next, with no sense of travel
2) Underground secret cults being the cause of everything

The question is when will someone finally make an adventuregame with the feel of a giallo? That can't be anything other then great. ;)

Most adventure games have some crime element to it. Someone is committing a crime and you have to stop them or someone has committed a crime and you have to solve it. It wouldn't be much fun playing a hero without going after a bad guy or 2.

I think the "Forensic" type games are a bit boring and feel more like work than play.

There are hundreds of similar crimenovels and they all sell well, so I'm afraid I'm not surprised crimegames sell well either, hehe.

I haven't played much new adventure games but I was planning to start, so I'm sad to hear this is the state of adventure gaming these days.

Crime mysteries are good enough but my favourite genre, by a long shot.

Same with comedy.

I agree with the original poster, but there are alternatives like Keepsake, Nibiru, Mysterious Island, The Lost Crown, Journey to the Center of the Earth, and others. We have to accept that we're a small niche, but right now I'm looking forward to a number of new titles, as well as playing some of the older ones I missed.

Oh yeah. Ol´ Dan Brown really left his mark on the adventure genre. I mean, these themes were used long before Dan Brown but right now.. you´ve got some cult related monks running around in Secret Files2, (seems like there are) even more of them in Memento Mori and since the german advertising of not only Memento Mori but Chronicles of Mystery: Scorpio Ritual' aswell, mentions the Dan Brown influence, i bet you´ve got´ em all over Chronicles of Mystery as well. So no matter what adventure games you might pick up in the near future, be prepared.. chances are high some mean monks are coming after you. :D

The popularity of subniches is fairly cyclical...back in the late 90s and early 00s, we were all saying "Isn't everyone tired of these historical exploration games? When will someone make a dramatic crime adventure again?" Games like Longest Journey and Sanitarium transcend genre and that's why they're uncommon--they're too risky and outside-the-box, no matter what's popular at the time.

Crime and investigation provide a sense of urgency which is why they lend themselves well--but I think your issue is more with the poor and stereotypical way that they're handled. Broken Sword was sort of a crime/investigative game, just a really well-paced one with high production value. I would keep an eye out for Gray Matter, and Three Cards to Midnight; although they will both likely have investigative elements, they are being handled by developers who are talented enough to rise above stereotypes.

I now that I am resuscitating a thread extremely old, but it was nonetheless the perfect place for a consideration of mine.

I just checked the list of adventure games released in 2008, and I realized that there were many games that can be categorized like crime/thriller, with gritty urban setting and plenty of FBI agents as lead characters. Whilst this isn't my favorite theme or sub-genre (usually I'm more for mysteries with a bit of occult or supernatural), since I'm not that much fascinated by serial killers and forensic investigation, I have nothing per se against this trend. On the contrary, I found that some of such games, like Casebook, were indeed very good. Some other, like Art of Murder, were maybe a bit dull and uninspired, but still enjoyable.

As Stinger noted some months ago, trends tend to be cyclical, it's true, but I guess that the CSI-mania first and the Post Mortem/Still Life dittico must have settled a very hard-to-die, durable trend, since - looking at the 2009 expected release - the majority of announced games are crime thrillers: Audere Sempre, Heavy Rain, Art of Murder 2, Still Life 2, Again, The Hardy Boys, Adam Syndrome, Culpa Innata 2 and so on.The crime/thriller trend seems to be well alive and kicking, at the expense of classic Agatha Cristie sleuth, which here in Italy we call "giallo" (no AC game this year), or at the expense of fantasy titles, which were extremely popular during the '90s.

There are, of course, as Stinger noticed, a few talented designers capable of surpass genre stereotypes, like Jane Jensen or Chris Jones/Aaron Conners. But they are the minority, sadly, so - even if I highly count on their new games - I'd like, here, to think in more general terms.

What I wanted to asked you is: is there a game, in the foreseeable future, capable - in your opinion - to turn the tide and settle another trend, thus replacing the empire of Crime/Thriller games?

haha Could that be a reference to Indigo Prophecy?! lol ;)