The Sexy Brutale

Puzzles are interesting. Story is decent until the twist.

As a point and click game with a focus on timing puzzles, this delivered a fun experience. The puzzles are on the light side, which I think works well--I was just as focused on skulking around and piecing together the story.

Certain elements of the game felt brilliant. In particular, the limited field of vision from spying creates some *really* well-framed scenes, in a way that brings narrative, gameplay, and art together nicely.

Not everything felt like it worked, especially tonally. The cartoony character designs and goofy humor rubbed up against the horror and pathos, especially later in the game.

Also . . . I did heave a big sigh at the "voodoo princess" stuff. If you're going to make up a religion for your game, there's no reason to stick the name of a real religion on it. Or if you do, go big! Call her the Queen of Protestants.

Great Puzzle game with surprising twists and story

A modern time capsule (2010') of a game, incorporating the old-school point and click mystery games with the 3D top down survival horror art style and story telling of the 2000.

The tone and story telling of the game is spot on. As you explore the eccentric party in the eerie art deco styled mansion, you'll feel the tension brought about by the powerlessness you feel on wanting to save everybody.

Game play wise, almost all the puzzle are well designed, but do take note that you should use the new powers given to you whenever it is possible and that you'll need to check the map time to time because it gives you the proper direction to solve some of the puzzle if you feel lost.

The frustrations about this game are that there are a couple of puzzles that has that old-school point and click logic, and some bugs involving some of the late game puzzles.

So if you like to play a puzzle game that rarely holds your hand with a fascination of old school art deco sounds and styles, Sexy Brutale is the game for you.

Simple puzzles. Interesting to see how the events you aren't currently focusing on keep occurring in the background. Very good ending. Very poetic.

Story is pointless, puzzles are bad, and time loop is underutilized. Watch the game on Youtube instead and you'll get everything it's worth (The art and music) out of it.
The Potential Game.
5/10

The puzzles were either immediately obvious or wildly obscure and the story was dull. The sprinkling of ah-ha moments (the feeling I play puzzle games for) was enough to make The Sexy Brutale not totally painful, but not enough to redeem it, either.

2/5

described as a time loop murder mystery game, i was expecting a little more freedom to explore the world & to utilize that info as the game progressed. instead, there is a sequence of railroaded puzzles, where you're locked into saving one guest at a time within a specific area of the world. i found it interesting at first, but ultimately refunded it. again, i would not recommend it if you are looking for more of an open-world experience during the time loops. if you're looking for a simpler puzzle experience with a story that unfolds step by step, this may still be the game for you.

Intresting story. Good gameplay. Good game.

The premise, art, and music is all great, but the puzzles boil down to walking through long hallways and slowly opening doors over and over while clicking on everything you see. It's like the worst parts of Resident Evil got their own game.

I think I just solved chapter two by accident without even knowing what was happening, or what I was doing..

Nice game, cool puzzles, the story has cool twists and the music is amazing!

I enjoyed this game alot. The gameplay is simple, but satisfying. I do feel some puzzles were "too easy" but that's just me being a nerd to be fair. The controls are a bit weird with M&K, but it's easy to get used to. I recommend this game to an easygoing puzzle enjoyer.
Storywise I enjoyed the story. I feel like it was a bit predicable, but it feels classic instead of overdone here. I wouldn't recommend this game for the story ALONE though so keep it in mind.

100% notes: This game was dreadful to imagine 100%ing due to needing to collect all 52 cards from around the place, It wasn't so bad though actually getting it done. The only part I didn't like in the 100% was getting a certain invitation as it felt kinda random, but it wasn't awful overall. I would recommend you 100% this as the scene you get for doing so is very worthwhile if you really enjoyed the game.

Bottom line: Plays like a very long tutorial.

For a game presented as multiple murder mystery puzzles happening simultaneously in a time loop, it really doesn’t utilize this concept at all. The game is extremely railroaded and simple. You go through a sequence of independent puzzles, each consisting of about seven rooms with one obvious mechanic to use. Areas are hard-locked, except for the completed and current puzzle, and what happens in one puzzle area has no overlap with the others. The selling point of “everything happens at once” is completely irrelevant since characters have zero impact outside their own puzzles. It’s just a gimmick or setting that doesn’t actually contribute to the puzzle or mystery experience.

I pushed through hoping for an engaging climax where the game would finally let me combine some pieces of knowledge from different puzzles—maybe saving everyone in the same time loop—but the game just ended. I don’t think I ever had to combine two mechanics at any point, and most abilities had a one-time-use feel. Honestly, almost every puzzle had the same vibe and complexity level as the tutorial. It’s a shame, because the concept had so much potential.

That said, the music and art direction are great! If you’re here to jam out to some jazz, relax, turn off your brain, and gather collectibles, you’ll probably have a good time.

Other than that, it completely underdelivers. Wouldn’t recommend.

Short, concise, fun game.

Solid 8/10.

A wonderful little experience.

A very casual puzzle game that is reminiscent of old point and click adventure games. You must prevent murders through a time loop, slowly unravelling a mystery and discovering new areas of a large mansion.

Although the game type is completely different, the game created a similar experience to what i felt playing Danganronpa and the 999 games.

Totally recommend this game, and if you get it on sale that's a super plus!

The gameplay is, you have to save the persons in the mansion (it is a mansion right hahaa) by rewinding time and changing their fate by doing certain actions at certain points in time, and you will also have new skills by acquiring masks as you progress in the game.

Pros
- Nice graphics, the environment is beautiful and there is lots of environment to explore as you go along
- Unique characters
- Unique gameplay
- Good and engaging story, with some mini stories of the items/ things in the mansion, which is an extra attention to details which i like. The fate of a few of the characters are a bit tragic and sad, but i still think the story is well done
- you can die but it's not really that hard to not die hahaa
- you can see what the other characters are doing while trying to save other characters while you're in the timeloop thing, which is also a nice attention to detail
- Dialogue is written very well with accordance to the characters personality

Cons (?)
- time-based gameplay, so if you don't like that sort of thing then maybe you won't like this
- there is a lot of death scenes (not good with some people i guess)
- no demo version

I wish there is another game involving the story / characters, but the game in itself is a gem, 10/10!

Que jogo bom. Puzzles muito divertidos

Sexy Brutale is an interesting puzzle/stealth game with an overarching mystery. The music and atmosphere are exceptional there are many great moments of tension, the overall story can get pretty weird especially in the latter half but I found it generally well done. My biggest complaints are one that the game is pretty short 20$ for about ~8 hours isn't the best although I did enjoy my time thoroughly, and two is that all the puzzles are actually pretty easy the game could definitively benefit with being a bit longer with longer more complex puzzles. Pretty much all of the puzzles have pretty simple solutions with the primary gimmick being that you need to repeat events to explore the area and eavesdrop on characters to figure out what actually happens in the lead up to a death, so you have to sneak around following characters to see what they do, once that's done however there's almost always a very obvious solution and it's just a matter of waiting for the correct moment. I would still absolutely recommend the game just don't go in expecting a particularly complicated puzzle game and maybe wait for a sale.

Really enjoyed the game and the way the mansion unfurls as you progress is incredible, but I feel this game is wasted potential. The gameplay revolves around the use of gathering masks from the house guests you save, and using their associated abilities to unlock new parts of the mansion. It has interesting abilities, but you are using most of them only for collectibles and no actual gameplay. The puzzles are also really cool but I feel are way to simplistic. The game is not a delicate balance and resource management to save multiple people in a satisfying rube goldberg machine, but a linear story where most the problems scream in your face. Slight spoiler for the story, but there is a section where you must save multiple people at once. I thought at first "Oh, each would go in separate directions and I would have to both help one and keep an eye on the other." You just press a button and the puzzle is solved. I will admit that I went into this game with a different mindset and high expectations, but I think there could have been a lot more attention with how to use the masks, how the characters interact in the story, puzzles, etc. If you enjoy simple puzzle games, I highly recommend this to you, but personally, this will be a glass half full game I do not recommend.

An intricately crafted time-loop murder mystery

In The Sexy Brutale, you are a guest to a masked ball in a huge, ostentatious mansion - and like everyone else in that mansion, you are stuck in a time loop that resets ever 12 hours. Within these 12 hours, the staff off the mansion is killing the guests one by one. Your task is to prevent the murders, find out what is going on, and eventually break the loop.

Your presence is somewhat ghost-like. You cannot talk to or otherwise interact with other people (actually you have to hide from them), but you can investigate and manipulate objects as long as no one else is in the room. To prevent a murder, you first have to observe the actions of the characters, by peeking through keyholes into neighboring rooms, listening in on conversations, or hiding in cupboards. Once you understand the sequence of events, you need to find a way to break it, e.g. by manipulating a murder weapon before the killer picks it up. This creates puzzles which aren't overly complex, but imaginative and varied.

There are 6 of such murder cases to solve, with some of them having more than one murder to prevent. Saving a victim will give you access to another area of the mansion, where the next murder is taking place. You will also gain additional powers from each saved victim, which can be used to gain more information and reveal secrets throughout the mansion, giving you a reason to revisit areas you've already been to.

I found the puzzles and the mechanics of this game very engaging. Observation-based games can easily become a bit boring due to the passivity of the main gameplay mechanic, and games with a time-loop mechanic can easily get repetitive - but The Sexy Brutale never felt that way. I always found new interesting details. I felt that I was unraveling an intricately designed mystery, step by step, and the repetition of events affirmed me that my understanding of that mystery kept growing. (Also, once you prevented a murder, you don't have to repeat that ever again.)

I enjoyed the story and characters quite a lot. The characters are very distinct, you learn many little details about them, and the ending was appropriate and very touching.

The game's presentation is gorgeous. The graphics look splendid, and there is a lot of variation between the areas and rooms. The same goes for the music, especially the jazzy tones for the bar and casino evoke the atmosphere of such an upper-class establishment at some time in the last century perfectly. The sound design also integrates exceptionally well with the gameplay: sometimes you get audio cues from neighboring rooms, and certain events can be heard in the entire mansion. There is no voice acting, but I did not miss it.

For me, The Sexy Brutale was an amazing adventure, and I am really struggling to find something to criticize - apart from the godawful and completely misleading name. My biggest concern are probably the controls - keys cannot be rebound, and the control scheme assumes that the keys Z, X, 1, and 3 are close together since you have to press them frequently, often in time-critical moments. That's a problem for French, German, and Dvorak keyboards, and it's very disappointing that such an integral feature was overlooked in a game that is otherwise so finely polished.

Some players also complained about the game's length, but I think 20€ list price for a well-designed, highly polished game that took me 8 hours to solve and 10 hours to fully complete, are appropriate. Given that I have much less time now than I had 20 years ago, I actually appreciate games that pack high-quality content into an experience that can be fully had in a day or two. The Sexy Brutale fits that bill perfectly.

I recommend this game wholeheartedly to everyone who likes adventure games and murder mysteries, especially if you have an eye for details and like the setting.

I had a good time. It's style (music, vibes, visuals, etc) is immaculate, but everything else is just ok to me. Still, I had fun, so I'd recommend it.

one of the best games of all time. make sure you have a good computer that can run it.

The Sexy Brutale is a short and sweet puzzle game. The time loop mechanic works well and is narratively grounded in a satisfying way. None of the puzzles are too difficult or long, but they encourage the player to think critically and pay attention to the environment and characters, which is genius as it also keeps you hooked into the story (which becomes surprisingly melancholic and earnest in the final act). The controls can be a little janky, and the pseudo-stealth mechanics are also a bit stiff, but they don't detract much from the overall enjoyment. In fact, though mechanically malnourished, they stealth does well to serve the overall pace of the game and puzzles as it encourages the player to slow down and be more observant.
The soundtrack is amazing and fits the atmosphere of the mansion well, which is also a pleasure to explore. The collectibles are also well placed, with most being on your core route and others encouraging you to step off the beaten path and see everything the game has to offer.

In terms of art, theme, tone, gameplay, narrative, and soundtrack, The Sexy Brutale checks all the boxes. The only things that would hold it back for me are the overall jankiness of the controls, which make it feel really dated (and not in a cute retro way like the artstyle).

7.5/10 - the puzzles aren't out of this world, the mechanics are rickety, but this small game is packed with charm and a fascinating story and atmosphere.

This game so good I wish real life also had a banger soundtrack that played in time with the noise around me...

Seriously though, don't let the title mislead you. This is a beautiful game with a very important message. It deeply resonated with me and I couldn't reccomend it more. It's packed with extremely fun mechanics and full of personality and charm, as well as secrets to uncover. You can really tell the people who made this cared about their game, it's in the details. I really love The Sexy Brutale :))

This game is excellent. The writing, the atmosphere, the music, and the gameplay are all perfectly on-point. The only issue is the one that plagues all puzzle games: no reason to replay unless you've got a bad memory.

Everyone should give this one a try.

Time travelling murder mystery. It is a lot of fun.

Can't voice review without heavy spoilers so ROT13:

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This game is an interesting combination of puzzle and detective mechanics. It uses a time loop-ish mechanic to allow the player to gradually uncover the plot and events of the game.

I think it would be more enjoyable and impressive if the world design was open, and allowed the player to progress non-linearly in whatever direction their curiosity takes them. Instead, the progression of area/ability unlocks is linear and guided.

The Sexy Brutale has a distinct maximalist aesthetic style, which I didn’t love, but it is consistent. Seemed overly maximalist in some animations/effects. The biggest downside of this game was clunky, unresponsive character animations. Sometimes I would press a button to interact with something, but I had to wait through a long animation if I wanted to cancel it out, or do something else instead. Some of the interactions even had long animations *after* completing the action.

Overall though, it's interesting enough in a short enough amount of time to be worth while playing.

W puzzles W story W art. play this game

A casual and atmospheric puzzle game where you have to make use of a Groundhog Day time loop to solve and prevent various murders in a fantastical opulent mansion full of masquerade guests. This game has a phenomenal art style and a lovely soundtrack. If I had any complaints, it would just be that it is a very easy game. There are no particularly fiendish puzzles; pretty much all of them are straightforward once you've collected all the information. By the end, I was yearning for one really complicated and elaborate day where everything came together into a huge final puzzle, but unfortunately, this is not the case, and the game remains easy all the way to the end. Mild spoiler: The final loop where you save everyone at once simply plays out in a non-interactive cutscene.

That said, if you're looking for a visually delightful casual puzzle experience with low stakes that you can take your time meandering through, enjoying the scenery, and fully complete in one or two afternoons, you won't go wrong with this one.

short and sweet
one of those rare fun time loop games

This isn't a bad game, really. The concept is relatively simple, and the game is very forgiving of mistakes, making it extremely easy. The music is pretty good and the controls are good, but I just couldn't really get into the story or care about its outcome.

LITERALLY THE BEST TIME LOOP GAME EVER 🫦🫦🎉🎉🐬🐬🫧🫧🩷🩷👊👊💪💪💯💯

Serious themes are mixed with jolly characters and catchy music for a plot full of mystery and murder. Gameplay is an entertaining and fresh take on the Time Loop genre.

Phenomenal presentation. Not a particularly taxing reverse-Hitman in terms of puzzles but I had so much fun exploring the mansion and revealing the story it's a fun game to take your time with.

I wasn't a huge fan. The pacing felt really off, mostly bound by movement speed and room transitions. The puzzles were good, easy but decent. But with the way the game was paced, I'd have preferred more puzzles and less walking.