New Sherlock Holmes Game Learns From Walking Dead

Zombies really do get everywhere, even Edwardian London. OK, maybe it’s disingenuous to suggest that the undead will make a physical appearance in Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments, but their presence can nonetheless be felt lurking in the background. It’s all thanks to Telltale’s The Walking Dead, which thrust adventure games back into the limelight in a very big way. While Frogwares has been capably creating adventure games based on Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes for over 10 years, it appears that the independent developer has also paid close attention to the recent efforts of its peers.

The Walking Dead highlighted the potency of a narrative that responds in a meaningful way to the actions and decisions of the player.  Frogwares is taking this lesson onboard to create its most dynamic Holmes adventure to date. Throughout the eight cases that make up the story of Crimes and Punishments, the decisions of the player will affect both the conclusions that the famous detective arrives at and the events that his deductions set in motion.

Frogwares looks to have done away with the notion of an absolute truth, preferring instead to let the player deduce what they can from the clues to decide who is guilty and dictate what should be done about it. The first case of Crimes and Punishments clearly illustrates this concept with three possible conclusions and two moral choices for each outcome. A physically abusive husband is killed, but is it self-defence, premeditated murder or a botched robbery?

The clues and testimonies Holmes gathers can be made to fit all three possibilities and, once enough evidence has been collected, you’ll have the required information to hit the Deduction Board and piece together the whos, whys and wherefores. For example, one person’s testimony telling you that three people were drinking wine might be contradicted by an examination of the glasses themselves and the discovery that only two of them contain traces of the liquid: is that person lying to you or are they simply mistaken?

Once you’ve drawn your conclusions, the game rumbles on and your decisions influence the remainder of the story. Crucially, it doesn’t appear that you are told whether you are right or wrong, indeed it appears that there is no right or wrong, just logical conclusions based on your intuition and reading of the facts. Much like The Walking Dead was Lee and Clementine’s story influenced and moulded by you, Crimes and Punishments looks to function in the same way but with the added bonus of multiple endings to fit the decisions you’ve made throughout the game.

It’s possible that this could rob the game of the thrill of using deductive reasoning to nail the one, true perpetrator but this lack of a correct or incorrect path certainly didn’t do The Walking Dead any harm. Indeed, a story that adapts its path based on the clues you collect and how you interpret them could elevate Holmes’ adventure above its contemporaries and provide ample reason to play through the game more than once.

While there perhaps won’t be the same tension inherent in potentially ruining Holmes’ illustrious career by blundering a case, there’s also no danger of him seeming like a dullard. Here, the facts are presented and you choose the version of events that you believe they represent. For fans of the Holmes seen in the BBC TV series this will seem like a logical culmination of the near-omniscience that lends the famous detective an arrogant edge. Now, what Holmes says happened is what happened, but what you choose to do with that power and how it affects the outcome will remain the game’s greatest mystery.

The Walking Dead has brought a whole new audience to the adventure game genre, so while Crimes and Punishments represents Holmes’ seventh major Frogwares outing, it could be many people’s first experience of the series. It’s just as well, then, that Holmes and the world around him have made an effort to get dressed-up in their best Unreal Engine 3-rendered finery, making this version of Holmes the most attractive in Frogwares’ history.

There have been myriad versions of Sherlock Holmes over 126 years since his first appearance. The great detective continues to be explored in new ways, which reveal new facets of his personality and give rise to new ways to tell his story. Frogwares itself has told many stories of Sherlock Holmes, exploring everyday murder, supernatural shenanigans and the psyche of the detective himself.

Now it seems the indie developer is turning the sculpting of the story over to the player. You’re making the decisions and you’re responsible for the consequences, and where once the world of Sherlock was rendered in distinct black and white, now it is several shades of grey. Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments could offer the most intriguing story of Holmes yet told in a video game – without a zombie in sight.

Stace Harman is a freelance contributor to IGN and is convinced that zombies will one day inherent the Earth. You can follow him on Twitter and IGN.

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