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The Case Of The Golden Idol <—- 5 star deduction game
Case Of The Golden Idol is one of the best games in years. The logical deduction system has echoes of Obra Dinn in all the best ways, while still being totally original. The story, art, difficulty level, puzzling satisfaction is all A+. Can’t say enough good things about it!
I don’t know why there aren’t hundreds more games that actually challenge the player to basic deduction like this. If you can name any others, please share.
I could name a lot of other ones, but unfortunately many of them are in Japanese. Since mystery/detective adventure games became one of the main types for them, there’s tons of games that focus on deduction style puzzles.
For games without a language barrier, Tangle Tower and Detective Grimoire had a cool deduction mechanic of selecting clues to form a sentence. I wished it was a bit more challenging, but still pretty cool and the games overall are great.
Of course there’s the Ace Attorney games and its various spinoffs which are based around making deductions by finding contradictions in witness testimony. There’s also Contradiction: Spot the Liar, Aviary Attorney, Spirit Hunter, etc which have borrowed from that mechanic.
Your Turn to Die - Death Game by Majority has a unique mechanic where you debate other participants trapped in the death game. You have to extract new testimony out of certain statements, match statements against each other, and use items to make logical deductions. The game is also free and available here
The newer Frogwares Sherlock games also focus on numerous types of deduction based puzzling. I played Chapter One this year and it’s got clue combining, tracking evidence using detective sense in 3D space, eavesdropping for clues, disguising, recreating crime scenes, and of course the standard presenting evidence to make new leads. Unfortunately the game also has some awful combat, but it’s optional.
There’s some other ones I can think of that aren’t too standout mechanically, like the clue combining in the Blackwell series, a similar mechanic in Blacksad: Under The Skin, and the Batman TTG games. There’s some older stuff like Murder on the Mississippi, but I haven’t played it myself.
I could name a lot of other ones, but unfortunately many of them are in Japanese.
That’s not so unfortunate.
Sensei, tell us about those games, お願いします.
I think there was also an old adventure about Jack the Ripper with a similar concept. Either way, Golden Idle looks like a very curious game that just hit the spot judging by the very positive feedback, really looking forward to playing it soon.
PC means personal computer
I could name a lot of other ones, but unfortunately many of them are in Japanese.
That’s not so unfortunate.
Sensei, tell us about those games, お願いします.
Yes, I’d like to hear more, too. I know, I don’t understand Japanese, but I love the concept of such games.
Edit:
Maybe you could open a thread dedicated to detective games.
That’s not so unfortunate.
Sensei, tell us about those games, お願いします.
Yes, I’d like to hear more, too. I know, I don’t understand Japanese, but I love the concept of such games.
Sure, I can list some of them. Doing an exhaustive, or even an extensive list, would take forever because there’s games going all the way back to The Portopia Serial Murder Case in 1983. But, here are some I think are cool or have interesting mechanics.
Mikagura Shoujo Tanteidan by Human Entertainment (also known in adventure games for Clock Tower and the Twilight Syndrome series) - As you travel around, certain lines of testimony or descriptions for objects will appear in blue text along with an option to “pull the trigger.” If you successfully identified a clue, contradiction, or suspicious piece of testimony you’ll gain points. If not, you’ll waste a trigger, which causes a game over if you run out. it’s a simple but well executed system, especially since there’s only chapter saves, giving genuine stakes.
Amagoushi no Yakata by FOG - In this game the protagonist finds himself stranded in a mansion with a group of actors when a series of murders begins. The player has to successfully uncover each incident before their “action gauge” depletes. Each action such as moving between locations, inspecting evidence, questioning witnesses, editing your alibi table, etc has a cost. If you manage to identify the culprit you can move on to the next chapter, depending on how well you deduce the case you can prevent the murder from happening, if not some characters can die. There are also additional systems like character affinity where certain testimony won’t be available unless a character likes you enough.
Missing Parts: The Tantei Stories by FOG - The gameplay is somewhat similar to Amagoushi no Yakata. Commands have a time cost, albeit one not represented by a gauge, and the scenario changes depending on the inference choices you make. So you have to think carefully about where to go, who to question, etc. How well you solved the mystery effects your “detective rank” for each chapter and epilogue sections with major revelations are gated behind getting an A rank. This game became a cult classic in Japan and is considered one of the best in the genre.
Trick X Logic by Chunsoft - This game uses a system where you read through stories with occasionally highlighted phrases. You select up to 5 which are used to form a hypothesis about the case’s culprit and method. By forming the right hypothesis’ and organizing them to describe the events of the case you can solve the mystery. A similar, but simplified, version of this system was used in the recent game Centennial Case: A Shijima Story, which shared some devs with Trick X Logic.
The Kanshikikan by Tomcat Systems - A game where you play as a forensic investigator, naturally you use various tools at the scene. after gathering evidence you have it analyzed by one of the 8 departments (Forensics, Chemistry, Intel, Communication, Fingerprint, Physics, Biology, or Psychology) at the institute where the protagonist works. Then the new information is used to make deductions about the case. You receive a rank based on how many mistakes you made, and getting the top rank in every case unlocks a bonus scenario.
Buddy Mission BOND by Koei Tecmo - This game is split into two sections, investigation and infiltration. During the investigation parts you travel around a board game-like map with a limited number of actions, you have to select the right spots to investigate, make the right choices, as well as selecting the appropriate “buddy” character for your investigation. Afterwards you reason a plan to infiltrate a given area. During the infiltration part you control a character in full 3D, and execute the plan solving various puzzles along the way.
Diamond and the Sound of a Gunshot by Zerner Works - A game where you play as a hostage negotiator. You must make valid arguments while also managing the culprit’s stress. The yellow line represents the level of tension and if the emotion gauge fills it’s much harder to advance. The timing of your selections also matters.
Trick DS-ban ~Kakushigami no Sumu Yakata~ by Konami - Based on a popular TV series also called “Trick,” in this game you uncover would-be paranormal phenomena by revealing the various tricks behind them. Gameplay wise, the information, locations, and evidence you gather become cards which you combine to deduce the magic tricks and other details of the case.
Cross Tantei Monogatari by WorkJam - Mechanically, a fairly conventional Japanese mystery adventure. As such, you’re doing the typical thing of gathering evidence, presenting evidence, questioning suspects, etc. But to avoid the brute forcing of solutions that became common of this genre, there are various parts where you must deduce a culprit’s identity, motivation, or a killing trick via text input. Initially there will be a greater number of characters than the actual answer requires. But upon subsequent tries the amount of possible characters reduces, hinting at the solution.
Thank you. Awesome list, though the time or action limits scare me a little.
They all seem to be visual novel console games with no PC version or fan translation available, so it’s really niche stuff from the adventure gaming point of view indeed.
Interesting looking games though.
They all seem to be visual novel console games with no PC version or fan translation available, so it’s really niche stuff from the adventure gaming point of view indeed.
Interesting looking games though.
Trick X Logic, and Diamond are the only novel games on the list. All the rest are command select or P&C ADV games.
Trick X Logic, and Diamond are the only novel games on the list. All the rest are command select or P&C ADV games.
They are listed as visual novels on different Internet sites, such as the Visual Novel DataBase.
Mikagura Shoujo Tanteidan
Amagoushi no Yakata
Missing Parts: The Tantei Stories
Trick x Logic
The Kanshikikan
Buddy Mission BOND
Diamond and the Sound of a Gunshot
Trick DS-ban ~Kakushigami no Sumu Yakata~
Cross Tantei Monogatari
Is the database wrong here, or is there some kind of ambiguity in the genre definition, or what source of information is correct here?
Of course sometimes the Japanese definition of adventure is a bit different, and sometimes any Japanese game that isn’t from Nintendo is listed as a visual novel on some Western sites, but someone thinks these are all VNs.
Is the database wrong here, or is there some kind of ambiguity in the genre definition, or what source of information is correct here?
Of course sometimes the Japanese definition of adventure is a bit different, and sometimes any Japanese game that isn’t from Nintendo is listed as a visual novel on some Western sites, but someone thinks these are all VNs.
Yes, the database is wrong. You shouldn’t be using VNDB as an authority on anything genre related. Their criteria is notoriously nebulous and has caused several blow outs, mods have admitted there are games they don’t consider VNs which they don’t remove from fear of backlash (like the Ace Attorney series):
Now, you are right about Phoenix Wright. It is probably not a visual novel, but we kept hands off from it. If a relatively unknown game like 13 Sentinels can garner such an outraged reaction, we fear what would happen if we eliminate all the PW games…
Which is why their guidelines list it as a “borderline game” that you’re not supposed to cite for inclusion of other games to the DB. Despite this, they have an entire tag for adventure games with alias tag titles of “western style adventure game” and “point and click adventure.” Put simply, their stance on the inclusion of these games is incoherent.
It’s just a community driven site where the popular western misconception that all Japanese adventure games are VNs carries over, and the staff itself have a poor understanding of these genres too. If you want accurate information just read the websites for the games themselves, or at least a Japanese source covering them.
Or conversely, at least in the case of Cross Tantei Monogatari, you can read the glorious Engrish title cards from the intro:
That’s a beautiful list on Japanese adventure games.
Reminds me of playing Famicon Detective Club 2 for the SNES.
Those of you who loved The Golden Idol may be interested to know that more DLC was released two days ago: The Lemurian Vampire. Three cases on Monkey Paw Island (where the game started with Oberon and Albert).
The devs said there will be no more DLC. But I sure hope they will continue creating this kind of game. 
Butter my buns and call me a biscuit! - Agent A
I’ve just watched a video about the history of visual novels. According to that youtuber, VNs are a subgenre of adventure games, but Japanese adventure games are often branded as VNs, because a)they have similar graphic styles, and b) people here often don’t know better. So according to this Video, games like Ace Attorney are considered adventure games in Japan, not Visual Novels.
The Video, if you’re interested:
The saga continues but now in the 70s!
The visuals are on point. Pretty excited for this one.
Oh wow! That’s great news. On my wish list.
Butter my buns and call me a biscuit! - Agent A
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