Shadows of Doubt

there is a bug that makes npcs not show up to their job and it makes selling stolen goods impossible in some runs. its been in the game for a long time now like more than a year. wish they'd fix it.

i absolutely love this game, but i highly suggest you do not play if you dont mind the game breaking amount of bugs... certain side cases not working because the document never spawned, civilians never showing up to meetups, etc.

i've recently had to start a new file after i encountered a bug where nothing spawned in the cctv rooms.. although there's so many issues with game and bugs i didn't event think could happen (currently dealing with a bug that makes normal shopkeepers act like black market dealers and give you the option to put in a password) but frankly, i just dont care. the game is engaging enough and the bugs dont make the game entirely unplayable, just frustrating to deal with at times.

games where you can be a morally dubious guy who just does things is my actual fucking jam. you wanna solve murder cases and be a hero? go nuts! you want to just rob people's homes and sell their expensive goods and buy yourself a penthouse? go absolutely crazyzyzyzyz!!!! want to be a professional stalker? DO IT. want to assault a guy in his own home, run out, return later for another case and have him act like nothing ever happened? this is the game for you.

i seriously think the devs need to start working on bug fixing than adding improvements to game (although i think this may already be happening as ive heard they've added everything they wanted to the game), and once the game is in a good state, i think they could find themselves with a less frustrated fanbase.

7/10, would kill for the developers - definitely putting them in my suicide note tho

I really want to like this game but its just so poorly optimized. I meet the exact recommended specs and get constant frame drops of about 15 or 20 frames. its basically unplayable

Really unoptimised, from what i can tell the devs have ditched this game and left it as a cashgrab, which is a shame knowing that there is so much potential for this kind of game.

Longpost about all negative reviews and "unreleased content":

1. This is not live service game, this is singleplayer, offline oldschool videogame, which is not required constant "updates" to be worth it or not, it must be valued by the game itself at current state.

2. 25$/Euro, it's a little higher than most indie on the market, but there: discounts and localized prices, which is cut up to 80% of price depending on region, even with some weak economic regions it's available and without need to make choice between comfort of living and purchasing of videogame. Price is fair in total.

3. The game is unique, which is add more value to the game, all closest relatives like LA Noire, Disco Elysium or Nobody Wants To Die is... Linear games in a manually created world, with extremely limited replayability. SoD is too when you mastered gameplay mechanics and generated situation templates become a more predictable, but still able to give you entertained gameplay in a much better way for long term games than any linear game. This is generated content gameplay after all, it has its own pros and cons, which is unique. Probably there is something like this on the market, but I doubt there will be a classic neon-noir Blade Runner style game, which is for most awesome extra credit.

4. The game is complete by itself. It's perfect? No. It could be better? Yes. But can you have fun in there at the current fair price and even with a discount? Hell yea. I bought the game not so long ago, kept an eye for the game for almost a year before a release, and the game is in a much better state than most indie for current price tag, thousands and thousands of games, which is the bottom of Steam, are way worse in many ways. And the game is still got some development in progress, which is good.

5. Make the game 1.0 release was a mistake? Yes. The terrible mistake, I may add, it's not only upset the active ingame community, but the devs missed the grand opportunity for a free boost in Steam's charts with release. Steam for every game that leaves Early Access, tries to give more main store page time for free, and because of mixed active playerbase reception, lots of bad reviews, many potential customers who saw that right after clicking on game from main page, prefer not buy the game and never will back to it, which is definitely will slow down and potential additional content...

But still, 1.0 is here, and the game got major bugs all over? Nope. The game got all the basic gameplay features to be fun and enjoyable? Yeap. The game is can be completed to the logic end without any outside fixes, severe bugs and end still be fun? Yes.

The game could have more content? Yes. Some of us wait for more? Definitely. But this is the reason not to buy the game, just because there are some "mirage of unreleased but promised stuff"? No. The game is done, and it's good for its price.

In total: worth it or not, it depends on from buyer perspective. For some 25 bucks is hellaoflot, for some it's dirt cheap, for some 92 yuans or 74 reals it's few days food, for some just Burger King's half a check. The game is finished, with "possible" additional content. The game can be fun and enjoyable with a fair price tag and localized prices without game breaking bugs. In the end, only that matters, and you choose, it's good for you to buy it or not.

For whose supported Early Access game - this is early access, even Steam with BIG LETTERS warn you about it. 1/2 games are never leave early access and 4/5 are not in promised by dev states, all popular stuff such as Don't Starve games, is from Green Light era, when it was needed more than 100$ to submit the game for Steam, and it's from 5% of successful indie games from Steam, rest - it's on the bottom, full of nothing. Be ready to be disappointed when you support Early Access stuff, because of that - I bought the game after 1.0 without the support pack, I found it fair deal at itself, if the game got more content, then I will buy a support pack upgrade, if not - Im happy with the deal that I already got.

I love this game, it's awesome. But unfortunately it still feels half baked even after 1.0
There's really only 7 types of murder cases, and once you've played them once you're basically out of content
The devs have said there's not any plans for new content so the only hope is the steam workshop.
Please tell me why in this detective game where you play a detective I am completely unable to ask someone where they were at the time of the murder.
It's still great and if you're thinking about getting it you'll probably get enough time out of it to get your moneys worth but as someone who's been playing since early access it hurts a little

Look, I really REALLY loved the alpha/beta. It had a great idea, an interesting idea, took it an ran with it. But I can not recommend the full release. It really feels like just a beta with some minor bug fixes and a new mission type. If the devs really locked down, sourced some extra ideas, there truly is something brilliant here. But they didn't. They cashed out. I do not respect a dev that does that.

This game is just as buggy and lacking in depth as the original play-test was.

Don't let the low poly graphics fool you this game has grown to become a cool immersive sim style game with similar mechanics as the original Deus Ex. You can break windows, bribe people for info, rummage through personal documents, make phone calls and read email. The world itself is the main character.

The point of the game is to make you a freelance detective trying to scrape by and it nails the vibe well. It's all procedural so when the game gives you a seemingly impossible case or you catch the wrong suspect you have to try to learn from it and move on. In that way it feels more realistic than most because there is no such thing as a perfect way to do things and no easy way to google your way out of a problem.

Long story short. Idk where the devolopment process went for adding new things. Once youve done the first few cases youve done them all. Hopefully Dev starts focusing on players priorities

I've played this game for more hours than most reviewers I see on this game, so it's probably time for me to leave a review.

I got this game soon after the affairs update, and was immediately awestruck by the insane level of detail here that I had always craved in a video game. The worldbuilding and backstory feels very fleshed out, and the simple fact that every single citizen has a job, apartment (aside from the homeless), social life, etc. is awesome. However, as I began to play on, certain problems started to present themselves. Sometimes (albeit pretty rarely), citizens would glitch out and stop going out of the apartment. The spouses of murder victims seemed totally unaffected by the brain matter of the loves of their lives splattered across the wall as they walked over their corpses to go to work. Citizens would randomly come home from work in the middle of the day and go to sleep at 1 pm, and in general people weren't really following their work hours or routines, something you notice when you're trying to break into their apartments to find their passwords and birthdate. In general, the longer I played, the more I noticed breaks and gaps in the immersion. So, after eventually getting solving originally unique-feeling cases down to a basic and somewhat boring routine (check footage, if no footage, check workplace for prints, etc.) I ended up taking a break from the game.

A bit ago, I saw a post from the devs talking about plans for 2025, and decided to load up a new game and see what had changed.

On the surface, not very much. Then, I got a kidnapping case, something that was added during my hiatus, and was immediately thrown right back in. A whole new kind of crime made me need to think of a whole new way of going about things, and I was enthralled by this awesome game yet again. Not to mention, a LOT of the bugs that I was talking about earlier seem to have been fixed, or at least are less common/severe.

So, what's good about this game?
Right off the bat, you can see:
-In-depth worldbuilding
-A bunch of different 'main crimes' and side jobs
-Incredible detail in all individuals' lives
-Procedural crimes, meaning you won't get the exact same crime, or usually too similar ones, over and over again
-People keep their routines now (for the most part at least)
-General freedom of action
-A bunch of stuff to buy
Over time, you begin to appreciate more:
-Differences in different citizens' modi operandi
-Survival/effects system (there are a bunch of effects that you can gain, good and bad, from being focused from a coffee and bleeding after getting shot to getting anywhere from slightly buzzed after one cider to absolutely hammered after 5 bottles of whiskey)
-Procedurally generated cities
-more I cant think of right now tbh (I'll edit this when I think of more)
-The devs seem to really care about improving this game, have done great things so far, and have some good-but-realistic goals for the future

However, as with all games, especially really ambitious ones like this, there are always problems. Some things that could be fixed/improved are:
-As it stands, citizens don't really have much of a life outside of work, home, and the occasional affair (no times set to hang out with friends, etc.) or interact socially
-Not a whole lot of unique items that citizens have in their apartments, making them feel a little too similar
-General unrealistic things (people not affected by a murder of their spouse/coworker, people not eating what's in their fridges [that's just an example ofc], people don't care when you enter a restricted area if they didn't directly see you do it but should be able to infer [you were there one second, they turned, heard a door close, you're not there anymore], etc.)
-There's a decent amount of flavor right now, but the game could definitely benefit from more, as it would really give more of a feeling of uniqueness to different citizens
-Bugs (there are still a noticeable amount to deal with, but it is definitely a lot better)

Overall, I think this game has awesome potential, and is a good game right now as well. I'm really excited to see where this game goes in 2025 and beyond.

For rest of review and links: https://www.backloggd.com/u/gamemast15r/review/2457680/

The general gameplay is not unlike other immersive sim gameplay like Deus Ex or Thief: explore the areas around you, multiple pathways designed to get to the finish line, (usually) numerous lethal and non-lethal options around, a semi-open world to roam around, numerous quests and branching pathways to the end of the story and much more. However, while I’ll classify this game as an immersive sim, there’s a lot of things that this game does differently for better or for worse than the other games. Starting with the exploration and numerous open ended options to solving crimes? Yes, there are tons and tons of options on how to make things work. Trying to break into the crime scene and can’t? Try looking for air vents, turning off the power, lockpick through a door, cause a distraction perhaps by activating a fire alarm a floor or two down. The crime scene itself? Scanning for fingerprints is a must on both the victim, their potential partner as well as any and all and a rare suspect fingerprint. Need more clues? Hack into the victim’s computer, search their contact book, dial 541-0000 to see the last phone number that called or break into the building’s phone records, analyze the body for a time of death and the finishing blow. Trying to find the suspect? Search the government database at City Hall and look up some names, bribe people to ask for information or a way in to search the place, look at security footage to see who could’ve possibly entered and exited the crime scene. There are a lot of different solutions to solve every crime, and when it works it delivers this huge spike of dopamine to my brain that makes me want to press onward feeling like a genius. HOWEVER the randomized generation, while it can make every crime scene feel unique and interesting like its own story, it leads to its own set of problems. I’ve had to hack into the government database numerous times to brute force the case to a possible end due to confusing circumstances. Sometimes certain options are closed because you can’t find fingerprints, making the case extra difficult due to circumstances out of your league. Sometimes certain cases (such as a killer leaving an anagram of their name) are WAY TOO EASY to brute force with a government database and as such, sometimes for the sake of getting that dopamine rush it’s way better to not use the government database.

I’ve had numerous times where I had to throw in the towel on certain cases too due to it either maybe potentially glitching or it hurting my head as to why I can’t figure it out. For context, outside of the main murder cases you can take on, you can take on side cases that involve taking photos of lovers potentially cheating or beating someone up, perhaps stealing some documents they have and tossing them into the ocean. All of these cases? Solid idea! I love that idea! However, I have some issues with them. When you get a photo of a location to find a briefcase and you decide to pin it to a caseboard? I’ve had problems where the photo just goes blank, mandating me not pin it and instead keep it on my case screen attached to nothing until I find it, which can be difficult if you’re not familiar with the map. One time they just got the street name wrong, as in it’s not on the map at all and I randomly found it by looking at potential walls on the map that could be mistaken for alley ways. Speaking of maps, if you wanna look at yours you need to go to the case screen and look to the upper left corner of the screen to find it. There’s no dedicated map screen, which sucks because it would’ve been nice to have it be separated though I guess for the sake of certain tools you don’t. Still though randomized difficulty (which is funny because my very last case was so easy I solved it immediately) aside and some glitches, the game is phenomenal otherwise. All of these emergent systems, finding out every little piece of information about every person in your mini-city block like their blood type or who their landlord is, the ability to buy apartments and tools like lockpicks and handcuffs (among others like stun grenades) are amazing and allow so much depth I can’t describe it all into words. One goofy and frustrating moment had me barging into a crime scene after I heard noise to find the suspect and a police officer duking it out right? This ended in me getting shot and killed by both of them together, which is frustrating but made for a great emergent story. Another cool moment? Arrest someone on a staircase and six dudes come out with guns to shoot me….only to get wiped out by a turret. It’s little stuff like this that gets me excited. You think with all of this talk about guns however that you might be able to use them? No. There is no lethal option for you personally, I guess which makes sense cause you’re a private detective, but it would’ve been cool to have the ability to defend yourself after buying a gun permit or clean up crime scenes after a killer perhaps hires you instead.

While I’m not sure I did the gameplay description a lot of justice due to my criticisms, the game is a lot of fun. It feels awesome solving a case and building up my social credit (to get perks like the ability to fast travel to your apartment or for cops to willingly let you into a crime scene), breaking into someone’s safe to steal their upgrade chips to give you passive bonus options, making a quick escape by jumping down an elevator shaft after installing a “no fall damage” chip to avoid getting shot, escaping from the hospital when I do get shot to escape paying, hacking into the government databases to get fingerprint details, all of it. Could it used more time in the oven? I don’t know. Sure the dialogue trees are samey and not really interactive but with the random generation, the only real way you could get a narrative is to either piece together your own or maybe if there’s a mod to add in dialogue A.I. to randomized a storyline together (which I’m already iffy on because I don’t like replacing real writers) but it feels like an amazing stepping stone to what could be the ULTIMATE immersive sim game. It’s a weird back and forth between emergent and restrictive in ways that while I don’t understand totally how to fix, know that ColePowered Games is onto what could be one of THE classic games of the genre. If there is one thing I will say though, it’s that the endgame of retiring to “The Fields” feels lackluster. There’s no reveal or true ending, and I have to give all of my stuff to a random civilian before I leave right? I don’t feel there’s enough emergent gameplay to truly build character connections, so I ended up giving all of my stuff to a cop named Mario Montoya because I felt bad for clubbing him and arresting him on my second-to-last case to break into a crime scene. Overall, phenomenal though and I could see myself replaying this over and over in the future.

Links:
Links:
https://colepowered.com/games/concrete-jungle/
https://store.steampowered.com/app/400160/Concrete_Jungle/
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3229880/Shadows_of_Doubt__Digital_Artbook/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadows_of_Doubt
https://www.indiedb.com/games/shadows-of-doubt/news/shadows-of-doubt-a-detective-management-game
https://www.indiedb.com/games/shadows-of-doubt/news/shadows-of-doubt-devblog-6-first-person-adventures
https://shadows-of-doubt.fandom.com/wiki/Anglo-French_Empire
https://shadows-of-doubt.fandom.com/wiki/The_Fields
https://shadows-of-doubt.fandom.com/wiki/United_Atlantic_States
https://shadows-of-doubt.fandom.com/wiki/Apple_Krueger
https://shadows-of-doubt.fandom.com/wiki/Starch_Kola
https://x.com/detectivesim?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdDqrSvLOGc
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2497620/Shadows_of_Doubt_Soundtrack/
https://archive.org/details/so-d-artbook-final

As cool as this game was at first, I cannot recommend it in its current state. The first 20 hours I was just in awe, the procedural generation, the atmosphere, solving damn murders in a sandbox game where I had to just figure it out on my own?? It was amazing.

Unfortunately though this novelty wore off pretty quick. After about 10 hours you start to realise some things just don’t add up. A lot of the emails talking about someone stalking them etc don’t actually lead anywhere. What you essentially have is a fingerprint hunting simulator which 90% of the time boils down to checking the victims phone book and workplace for a matching print. There’s some exceptions like the sniper cases but that’s the only new content we’ve seen in over a year with no signs of major updates in future. The game is essentially abandoned.

Overall a game with a lot of potential that won’t ever be capitalised on. With more content this game could’ve been something amazing. As it stands if you can grab it on sale it’ll definitely entertain for a few hours but don’t expect anything more.

Bugged. It was better in earlier states, now often you literally cannot resolve a case as you get soft locked out of things left and right. The kidnappings are very frustrating because the timing is way too fast to actually solve anything, and they cannot be turned off. The city hall database room now triggers trespassing, so you cannot actually use the computer in there anymore. You talk to someone living in the same house as someone who was kidnapped and they refuse to say a word to you (I mean really, you hired me). You go to talk to someone who has had something stolen but they are never home. The game has been abandoned since "release" and I use quotes because they clearly got tired of it and just said this was version 1.0 because they didn't want to keep bothering with it.

Hopefully, a more reputable company will take this idea and run with it, because a true procedurally generated detective game is sorely needed on Steam.

This game has a lot of potential to be an engaging detective simulator. The mechanics of the game are mindblowing, the game makes you feel smart when you connect the dots and solve a case. The first game hours are very enjoyable, however, as of February 2025 the game feels like it is in a beta state. There are small bugs and optimization problems that should be solved before charging 25€.

I am recommending the game because it is an indie project and you can notice that it has a soul. Buy it if it is on sale or whenever its issues are fixed.

Really cool concept for a game, whats here so far is creative and well executed. Is it however, definitely not finished

The world you generate is actually very immersive as these things go. Walking the streets in a storm, breaking into a building in the dead of night, sneaking into a crime scene and lifting a fingerprint - all pull you into the setting. Tracking down a suspect generally feels organic and logical. Checking through databases and pulling information from neighbours & colleagues can lead to those "aha!" moments detective game lovers are after

The issues are your typical early access stuff. Bugs can make cases unsolvable, clues can leave you with no feasible way to actually find a suspect and there is only so much content right now that you can experience most of it within a dozen or so hours

Some issues I personally have are around struggling performance and the repetitive nature of cases and stuff around the world. Every person seems to have the same set of spam email, lovers notes, and until you've played a while these can seem like important clues when in reality it's padding. Once you know how the mechanics work and what you can get away with, it can lead to solving most cases by cross referencing the police database with an apartments database. Similarly, if you play in the same generated world for a while you'll end up building a log book of basically every person in the city

I've enjoyed my time in this game and i'm always excited for the next content release, I think what the devs are doing here is fantastic and this game has the potential to really carve itself out a niche that hasn't yet been filled

Sadly still feels unfinished and unpolished after releasing from early access, despite having tons of potential. Unless there's plans for some big changes post-release I can't really recommend it.

Sadly, a pretty strong case against early access. I don't really have anything to add to the conversation other than to amplify what everyone else is saying. The game launched into early access with a really cool premise and a lot of unrealized potential. The game never really made any significant improvements, it got a 1.0 release, and the devs have abandoned it.

Do yourself a favor and play a detective game where all the cases were handcrafted so that they are satisfying, logical, and most importantly. literally solvable and functional. If you want a stealth immersive sim, there are a lot of options out there. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to quite be a game that blends the two, but don't waste your time or money playing this. I don't think any gamer should want to encourage the kind of behavior these devs have engaged in.

If the game worked it would probably be fun, unfortunately it is super buggy, you straight up cant solve many cases. The kidnapping cases in particular are completely broken, if you find the kidnapped victim and free them they attack you and call the cops on you. If the victim sees you try and fight the kidnapper, they attack you and call the cops. The kidnapped victim wont even tell you their name, and if you ask how they are they say they are good, or tell you to piss off, despite being tied up in a basement, with someone coming to kill them soon. These issues have been around for at least a year, and were never fixed even when the game fully released. Save the $25 and get a game that actually works

I LOVE this game, but it literally hit 1.0 and was immediately abandoned. If that's not a reason to recommend against buying, idk what is.

Unfortunately I cannot recommend this game in it's current state. Dev doesn't listen to the player base and refuses to add simple features much less fix bigger issues such as performance, bugs and the glaring lack of variety in the gameplay. Sad state.

As much as I like this game a lot, I can't recommend it in its current state and based on the pacing of the development so far. I have owned this game for at least half a year now and have seen nothing of substance really added.

The main issue with this game is, there is a lot of window dressing and not a lot of substance here. The dev seems more interested in expanding things like... in world TV drama series... VS adding things like... expanding forensics, expanding clues, expanding missions in an actual clever way, adding more buildings to the world, dialogue, fixing the awful UI and so on.

Let me paint the picture of the SoD experience. You first load up the game and you are awe-struck. You have this amazing atmosphere, you are bombarded with information, potential leads, clues... you get your first murder case! So exciting. You go in and look around. Notice the vic submitted a police report about being stalked... go to see if you can look at the report - doesn't exist. You read through the emails, an email suggests that he was upset with a co-worker... you check out the lead - irrelevant filler mail. You check the camera system during the time of death... no one is on camera during this time. Your vic has a spouse, surely they talked to their spouse about being stalked - didn't see or hear anything unusual.

- You begin to realize that 95% of the game is just clutter and filler, and your instinctual investigative skills will almost always lead you on a wild goose chase either following what you think are leads but are actually very misleading filler emails, or looking for something that doesn't exist in the game. You start to realize that the core of the game is to take this fingerprint and match it to every person that the vic knew and here are some clues to narrow down that search. This is pretty much true with the side missions as well, just with a slight twist on what you actually have to do.

I do have to say that the fingerprint system is absolutely fabulous, but that seems to be the only thing that is actually fleshed out.

What this game needs is a major expansion to the forensics side of the game... give me blood splatter. A reason for blood type. Let me find shoes that have had blood. Let me find blood that has been cleaned up. Let me find hair. Let me look for signs of a break and enter. Trophies for serial killers. Evidence and paper trail of a purchased murder weapon. Signs or evidence of the killer suggesting murder to a bartender, a spouse, or a colleague. Spousal murder case. Criminal records that are relevant to the case. Police reports that actually exist. Emails that actually make sense to the case. I want more ways to solve murders and compensate with harder cases. I don't need everything all in 1 case, but I want more variety here. Also, remove the government database... this is literally a cheat code. If you want something like that, have it be like, you can bribe a specific officer that can give you a lineup of possible fingerprint matches, with vague information after like a certain level. It is dumb you can just free access all information about everyone. The other thing that needs majorly implemented is a proper dialogue system. It is so annoying not being able to actually question people about anything. Like I want to be able to test for alibis, I want to ask people if they saw anything weird and to actually have people see stuff weird, I want to be able to question the spouse, collegue or witness. Get rid of misleading emails like "Let's secretly meet here" "Why are you dealing on my turf?" "my boss is upset with me", the number of times I thought these were clues indicating the vic was dealing drugs which led to his death, or was upset with the boss, or was having an affair, only to realize these have absolutely nothing to do with the case is annoying. Finally, if you are up to it. More building variety.

One final gripe... the UI is such a pain to use. Why is there a button I have to click in the UI to drop something. Why do I need to see every colour when I edit a clue. Why is the map such a pain to use. The UI really needs to be streamlined, simplified and cleaned up. Especially the inventory part.

This game has so much potential if the devs could just focus on adding actual substance to the core gameplay loop of the game. They nailed the atmosphere, the npc gen is amazing, and there are more than enough world items... but like I said so much of it is just window dressing and every case has the exact same formula to solve - give or take a few steps. I will say the kidnapping case was a fresh new addition, but it seems they didn't think it through much, cause the most reliable way to solve this is literally to buy a briefcase and arrest the kidnapper at the drop location. Get the location of the person kidnapped. And done.

It has been half a year since I bought this game, and almost nothing has actually changed about it. I really hope the devs focus and prioritize and aim to expand the area that matters instead of getting sidetracked on superfluous things that don't add gameplay to the game.

The game is fantastic for the first few hours at least. After that NPC's slowly stop following schedules and just get stuck in their homes or work, making it impossible to do certain things from accessing an apartment when they're gone, to not being able to buy and sell things at shops because the shopkeeper never shows up. I really love this game but the developer refuses to acknowledge that this is a problem.

Unfortunately this game is not up to it's real potential. The main thing ruining this game is the AI of the people. I'll leave aside the optimization of the game which is kinda bad in itself.
Just for context as to what was my last drop, I had to work on a kidnapping case. Easy, just go to that address and find out more, and rescue the dude before the time runs out. Fuck yeah let's go and save people! Fuck me for thinking it was gonna be helpful interacting with any AI in this town.
I arrive at the address where the ransom was left, and a lady opens the door. I ask about the ransom note and she's all scared and "nee-nee-nee help me I'm scared and the police won't do shit". So I look at the ransom note and the timer starts.
Little did I know, when I ask if I can go look around in their apartment or ask any kind of helpful information, I get the "Why in the hell would I let you in" or "Mind your own business" kind of dialogue.
The "scared" AI just vanishes and goes back to blank and boring off the street AI, like the case is not even ON.
Not the only time this happened but basically this was the last chance I'll give this game for a long while, or until the AI just gets a makeover.
I love the concept, I love the aesthetics and the process of doing stuff in this game. But the AI and optimization are just awful.

Almost a year has passed and the game has not received any significant updates in that time.
The concept is great, but considering how slowly it has been developing, it is not worth buying at all.

p.s
A year since leaving early access, please note. The game is already two years old, and there have been absolutely no significant updates to it

A very strong case of abandon-ware. I don't trust devs and neither should you.

I really would like to play this game more. I started out enjoying it, but when the 1.0 update happened my opinion changed. The kidnapping cases should be something I can opt out of. Right now I do not see a way to make them go away. I tried learning how to manage them, but I really do not find them enjoyable at all and would love to be able to get rid of them . If this change ever happens I'll update this review or if anyone has any suggestions on how to disable them please let me know.

Great game, but there is no auto-save & a ton of bugs.
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Spoiler: im so sad we had no glimpse of "the fields" after we retire. We see all these notes and conversations about this eerie place called "the fields", but when it came time to retire, we got nothing. Not even a cutscene or text-log, just right back to the home screen. super disappointing after so many hours invested.

It's an untitled Batman game. I had an unwinding side job contract during which I had to find a person based on their fingerprints and hair color and humiliate them in revenge. Not much huh? So I've broken into the government's archives office by breaking a window with a computer chair. Then I hacked a terminal and started printing a huge base of townsfolk. Bingo, a black haired man with corresponding fingerprints. But some guard heard a noise of paper printing and went to check it along with his colleague. I tried to run through them peacefully, but they started shooting and closed the emergency door isolating us in the same room. There was an only option, an armed grenade in my hand, sending both the guards to paint the walls with their blocky bodies. I've hacked an alarm and went to my target while trying to stop the bleeding leaving a thick blood trail behind. I was full of it. Knocked the door of the criminal twice and once the footsteps sounded behind the door I violently kicked the door sending the long haired woman flying to the kitchen floor. It was his innocent wife. Suddenly a man runs out of the bathroom with a shining blade pointing at me, but gets a 10kg dumbell hit to their face, cracks their spine over a corridor stand and spreads out all over the floor. I put handcuffs on his cooling hands and go to my pocket to fulfil the contract task.. I extract a glazed donut and gently throw it to his face satisfying a mysterious contract keeper. Now the case is done.

This game is an art of immersive sims

Basically abandoned by developer, shallow, lots of issues. Wouldn't buy.
Rushed "1.0" release, where developer said no new features.

The premise is great, but unpolished and incomplete. The devs have all but abandoned the project, not releasing any new content and mainly working on bug fixes, which seem to be few and far between and often ineffective. It seems to me the dev grew tired of this project and rushed the 1.0 release so he is able to move on to new projects. Damn shame because this could have been so great.

Broke into a guys house, beat him over the head with a club, found out it's the wrong guy, leave

Good game

First, I really like this game. It is my kind of thing.

Not recommending based pretty much just on the price and because its not for everyone. If you read all the negative reviews and still think it sounds cool (or if its on sale for like, less than 10) then by all means go for it. I really hope the devs go on to do more!
I love this game for what it does with procedural generation, making a real living world more or less where things happen. If more "bigger" games incorporated stuff like this we could get some really interesting stuff (having characters with generated jobs and schedules but also where they vary it up, leaving behind evidence and clues so that you can theoretically track down and trace the steps of any of hundreds of NPCs, not just specific criminal suspects etc.)
When you need to figure stuff out by kind of thinking outside the box, even with little things like remembering to put a motion sensor outside someone's door so you know when they're home (or to alert you when the owner is coming back while you're mid-break-in) then it feels really immersive. I love the extra effort into the world and the design overall.

The main problem is the limitations that the framework and procedural generation put on. Everything is a put too formulaic where it feels like minor tweaks, just more random or branching options. As it is, most cases will either be solved, like, immediately (a person is killed, you decide to investigate their coworkers, you immediately determine it was one of their 4 coworkers.) or you will have essentially nothing useful to go on (one witness reports seeing a person with "brown hair hair" but even though you go through the trouble of hacking into street cameras which cover the crime scene, they only take pictures every 15 minutes and never seem to show the people you want.) The art style is cool for scenery and buildings but awful for characters, it is impossible to identify people from their pictures, so you mind spend a lot of time looking for one person on the street or in an office just to be told by others "they are right here!" or "i just saw them on [this street]" but never figure out which one is them.
The different types of cases follow strict formula which you can figure out immediately, and once you know how they play out you this makes it much easier to solve the cases (i mean you still gotta go do the work and find suspects, but you'll have a better idea of where to start), the side missions can be neat but they're absolutely random and sometimes just impossible ("throw food into the face of an specific person but the only information I will give you about them is their shoe size and that their partner's name starts with a J"), and just as with the main murder cases a lot of it relies on you just having over time gathered information about a large proportion of the city.
The cases rarely have real stories, or at least they're never explained, beyond the basic "template" of the case (e.g. it might be a "jealous lover" but you might not find anything to suggest the killer and victim had a relationship, for most cases you won't find anything to suggest they knew each other at all. Even if you catch the murderer and ask them why they did it, you just get the same generic responses like "my work speaks for itself!" - that is, the procedural generation is good at having people move around and be at places and leave behind evidence (footprints, fingerprints, security camera footage, trash and even printed receipts they might drop or put in the trash, witness statemnets from others who saw them etc.) but bad at all of the social aspects, especially when it really needs to be.
Your interactions with people are basically limited to getting basic information about them or asking if they know others, but you can't ask about relationships which just makes interrogation not really useful - every NPC knows every other NPC basically (with the main difference being like "that is my neighbor/coworker" or just "i saw them in [the building they live in]", occassionally you might get lucky and a suspect might have been spotted on the move and you can sort of retrace their steps, but since you can't ask about past activity it doesn't really work the way it feels like it should - and of course, asking about a murder victim will universally get you the answer of "yes I just saw them at [location of murder]" even days after they were killed no matter who you ask or where. Just little tweaks - like confronting people with evidence, or asking "when did you last see this person" and getting multiple answers when appropriate could make this so much more.

I won't spoil anything cause the fun in the game is figuring out how to use different .. systems and methods of investigation. Once you know the ways to do it you really end up where I go to, where you can immediately tell if a case is just two steps or if you have really no options beyond waiting for more murders.

The fun is in feeling clever for thinking of ways to solve the case or just managiing multiple things at once (for example, putting a tracker on a person who you think might have information or is even a possible suspect (because they are tall with brown hair, possibly) and keeping an eye on their whereabouts while also breaking into another apartment just to check someone else's emails to see if they might be connected. But once you figure out the tricks its too easy to just rush through most of this and essentialyl brute force it (minor spoiler or just too useful tip but unless you're looking for a cheating spouse or something complicated there are many simple ways to get someone's fingerprints which can always then link them to the crime scene, even if its not definitive on its own, so all the trouble of tracking someone or gathering informaiton about them is made useful by the fact that there is always a quicker solution)

So in terms of like.. progress IN GAME.. its not quite the same. You level up in social ranking which give you some benefits but they all just make the game easier or have no real impact. You get money for cases but at least for buying equipment and tech you'll get all the money you need just from robbing every apartment you ever visit, you can purchase and furnish apartments but there's not really a need beyond having a place to sleep (or just buying an implant so you never get tired) - I was kind of taken of the "role play" elements of being a noir detective by the fact that whenever I went back to my apartment to sleep I would get woken up 3 hours later when another murder happened, and the one cool case I had where I couldn't find a good suspect but had lots of evidence to rule people out and narrow things down (footprints where I went back to ruled out all the cops and neighbors who had possibly containminated the scene, etc.) - and then the case was ruined because so many murders happened so quickly and by the fourth or fifth murder the killer literally had just left a note with their name written on it. So i solved the case and got the money without doing any detective work beyond sneaking onto several crime scenes and stealing evidence until the killer got bored and just told me who they were. Not my best case in the end!

I really really loved this game the first time I played it because of its potential. Unfortunately, it went into full release without seeming to have much added to it - there's no real progression, the "ending" is nothing, its pure sandbox. Some systems just dont work or feel like placeholders (someone else mentioned the thing I hate the most: you might just accidentally throw trash by misclicking or thinking who cares its trash and then suddenly find yourself being attacked by the entire city.)
I love sandbox, and I probably will dust this game off every once in a while, but it still feels like an excellent proof of concept rather than a serious game on its own.

Still, give it a shot if you can get it for cheap!

Steal-the-document quests have been broken forever. This game needs bug fixes that it really isn't getting. It says it's released, but it's as bad as early access.

Fun exploration/detective game. I think the current gameplay loop is fine, but they are still actively patching.

Its worth noting the rain is very intensive when turned up high, and occasionally some items will pop in late. Sometimes a business will close with the open sign still on and NPC's will get real aggressive when you enter. Be sure to save before going in some of these places. Nothing game breaking so far as long as you save relatively often.

Some tips to keep in mind:
You can only question someone on a name if that name is on your investigation board, so be sure to add it there. You don't need the full name or a picture of them to do this.

Also there are some health mods for your character you can find or buy from the doctor to increase your inventory size. Its painfully small to begin with.

Happy Hunting

Dead game, unfinished, only releasing patches to resolve small issues rather than addressing larger problems.

I love the gameplay, ideas, design from an artistic perspective yada yada, but the fact you need to have a highend NVIDIA GPU is fucking ridiculous, I have an AMD 7800XT, Ryzen 7 5700X, and can't get about 30 fps, 15 if it's raining, why would you do this.

I have logged a lot of hours on this game for the state that it's currently in.
I have a lot to say, because its an awesome project that is worth your money ON SALE.
Aside from price this game is NOT finished.

If i'm being honest, the small bugs are fine and ignorable for how crazy cool and fun this game is.
But at the same time, there are many times (about 3 out of 10 cases) when I simply cannot play this game because of how aggrivating it can be.

One of my only complaints is how hard the Sniper murder cases are. They are STUPID hard.
I tend to be very good at this game, and find it very enjoyable, but if I had an option to simply skip a case and get the game to select a new type of serial killer, i absolutely would in these cases.
The primary problem with Sniper serial killers is that they leave behind virtually NO evidence at the scene. On top of that, there's NO surveillance. There usually isn't even any fingerprints or footprints (or phone calls) to go off of. The only way that I have been able to solve these cases is when the first case goes cold, the killer calls me like a dumb ass, and then I track them down directly through the call log boxes in the buildings. I want to make it absolutely clear that this is the ONLY way I have EVER been able to solve these cases. I am currently writing this review while I am playing the game, and I just ran into a case where the building that the call was made from DIDN'T HAVE A CALL LOG BOX >:(. I now have to deal with a serial killer on the loose that I can't catch because these cases are TOO GODDAMN HARD.

Edit: I eventually solved this case by triangulating the shooter's position in the opposite building from a murder that happened under the same circumstances in the same building. Good game :)

Other than that angry review, I do in fact recommend the game if you get it on sale. Its a good buy and will keep you entertained for hours.

This game had so much potential with such a unique, original concept. I mean who hasn't wanted to be a gritty, noir detective in a random, procedural world? Well, this game turned out to be a shallow depiction of everything that I hoped it to be.

Everything seems so staged, after the first occurrences that lifts your spirits and hope for such an original premise, it all comes crashing down soon after when almost every instance unfolds the same way. So little variations on crimes, so few ways to investigate, about the only thing they nailed it on was the story boards you can mark up on the cork-board.

Biggest disappointments being: no guns (yup, that's right folks cause everyone wants to be a detective without a firearm and possible shootouts) and no vehicles (yup, no visceral, noir-style car chases either).

There is some brief fun to be had like I had over the course of a few days when I was on holidays but it diminishes quickly once the veil is lifted and you see the procedural repetitiveness cycle once or twice.

With a rushed 1.0 release and virtually all updates ceasing since. This game was a substantial let down from the potential that could have been in the hands of a more dedicated and proficient developer.

I can't recommend the game in good faith in the current state.

The dev has stated that the game is officially in version 1.0 and that development is concluded.

This would be great if the leap from the prior version to 1.0 was... significant.

1.0 feels like little more than a hotfix patch and in the "full release" of the game there are still a myriad of bugs that have plagued the game for a long long time. Crimes that are borderline unsolvable in any timely fashion and a new feature that doesn't even work out of the box.

This game is INTENSELY new player unfriendly and takes a significant timesink in order to fully understand all of the mechanics and possibilities in one of the most open Immersive Simulation games ever.

This review would be marked as "recommend" if the dev said that they would continue working on the game or at the very least working on Steam support for ease of access to mods. It does feel like they've put their feet up and said "cool, now the players can fix it" a la Bethesda.

If you are absolutely determined to play an entertaining, if not mildly confusing and frustrating Columbo-Em-Up then please, pick it up - however just know that the game is considered "done" so any gripes you have will have to be fixed with mods or HOPEFULLY future patched (although this seems unlikely).

If you were buying this game on a limb and aren't familiar with the game already - I wouldn't.

This game is the result of the amazing ambition to have you solve procedurally generated crimes in a procedurally generated city with a procedurally generated population any of whom could be either victim or murderer.

It is truly an amazing concept... but in practice it doesn't work. At least not very well.

Cases will be created constantly that just do not provide enough information to solve them. This is not me being dumb or missing something. Sometimes all the information you're given about the suspect is something you have absolutely no resource to search for.

Further more you will start off on the wrong foot since the tutorial will guide you through an absolutely perfect case, where all the necessary information is provided and you have multiple leads to follow. Most do not go this way. It also has an interaction with an NPC that just isn't possible in any other case so you're left believing you can do things you can't. What's more it doesn't tell you how absolutely vital it is for you to track down the underworld gun seller, when in many cases the a bullet case or a bullet hole may be your only lead (the idealised version would have you track the finger prints on the bullet case but that doesn't always lead you anywhere without something to compare it too).

Still, i am recommending this game, why?

That is because despite the fact that it is broken, it is incredibly fun! When cases work you feel absolutely awesome being able to solve them by going thru each of the steps, following the leads to their conclusion and arresting the suspect.

I think the key thing really is to just accept that, like in real life, some cases just can't be solved. And if you can accept that then i think you're going to have a great time, because i certainly do!

As many others, I purchased this game during early access, and it seemed like it had a ton of potential. This game would bring the much desired replayability in detective games. I played for some time and then waited for the release since it was certainly lacking in content and polish, but the potential was there.

I played again after release a few times, but something rubs me the wrong way. It still feels unpolished and lacking in content. The gameplay could have been much more dynamic and enjoyable, but it becomes repeatable really fast. I don't know why it went this way, but it certainly didn't reach its full potential. Would I recommend this game in its current state? No. Personally, I bought it so I could enjoy hours of procedurally generated case solving activity, and I don't think this game offers that. If it was up to $10, it might be worth it, so if you can buy it on sale you might enjoy a few hours of gameplay.

I love this game, it's a fun idea with a good execution, however it's not near a finished state or '1.0', and it sadly looks like it won't ever be.

The game have great potential and if it is properly developed and all the bugs are patched it will be a great production. If only.

Considering that developers under this publisher release unfinished games with basic fundamental bugs. Which they don't want to fix because "it's not worth it" and they are unable to provide basic functionality.

Don't buy this game or anything else from this publishers. They don't care if someone is scamming people. It's simply the most brazen fraud. And one of the developers says it officially.

I really don't recommend this game. It is very unfinished. The game has a solid and intriguing start, but needed so much work to really be fun or complete. Devs have since abandoned it and suddenly called the unfinished game "1.0".

Skip this game

Very buggy, could be amazing but plz fix oxox. 3/5, 5/5 if it worked bug free.

another game "released" prematurely, how surprising. i hope a more competent developer can run with this concept.

So much potential but not worthy of being called a "full release" game.

It is overflowing with potiential but really its kinda mid.
(Dev said something about making a sequel or something, might as well wait for that.)

So I played for the most part in Early Access and when the devs dropped their first announcement that the 1.0 Version is almost ready and coming soon I was worried that they're rushing things. I've a good grasp on the game by now and I can tell from my experience that the before/after effect when you compare the two builds is just not there.

While the game can deliver a fun experience for many hours on end you will eventually get to the point where you realize just how limited some of the games features are, most importantly its fundamental gameplay loop. In my ~40 hours of playing I've never made it past social credit level 6 in any of my generated cities, the main reason for that is... there is almost no incentive to ever continue past this point. Of course moving to the meadows is only there to be a literal (in universe) carrot on a stick and the fun stems from solving cases, but if you reach that point in the game you'll realize just how shallow this sandbox gets.
Is that reason enough to not recommend getting the game? I'd say yes if you consider that the initial immersive experience will wear off pretty quickly once you realize just how on-rails everything is. I don't even need to get into how you can brute force solve murders because you will slowly find out for yourself how obvious some of the crime scenes become once you understand some of the fundamental parts of the game.
It becomes less of a murder mystery and more of a "Oh I guess I got there too fast and caught the murderer red handed, again. If only my psychic Detective Powers didn't immediately tell me that there was a disturbance in the force and I should visit this exact location quickly if I want to get this case solved before dinners ready." This was my experience playing the full release and I dropped the game completely after solving 3 cases where the murderer was standing over the body with police officers in the room with them, wondering whodunit. The fact that spouses never seem to be too bothered by watching their partner get murdered also becomes less and less funny each time it happens and the fact that they will fade from existence after the murder has been solved doesn't help with this experience. I once ran into the issue of never being able to solve some cases because the partner of a victim got involved in multiple quests, but were now homeless since they can never go back to their apartment after being part of a murder so they just roam the streets and become as unresponsive as every other NPC.

Don't get me wrong though, this is a fun game, you can really have a grand time following every clue there is to a murder even it it all leads to dead ends, it only makes it more rewarding if a case actually takes you 2 days irl to actually solve if you're on the wrong track. But that really only happens during your initial experience because like I mentioned, there just isn't too much to the game that will have you wanting more once you've clocked in a good amount of hours because you start feeling like you're the only sentient being in the matrix (metaphorically speaking obviously). There is a general lack of interaction with citizens or cops and this limitation really bites the game in the ass when you start to get that feeling of all cases play out the same way. Was it a co-worker or a random guy in the victims address book this time? I can't wait for the grand reveal!

"So what was your motivation for writing these phrases in the victims blood on the wall you psycho? Nothing in particular? You're really just the secretary in this office who has never interacted with the victim before and there's no hard evidence that would make you killing them in the way you did make sense at all? Not even your confession? I guess that makes sense in this part of town. Book 'em boys in blue who I never see actually arresting the victim, I'll just drop this call and oh shit you're coming after me now because there is literally no option to have the police arrest a murderer?? Guess I gotta jump out of the window to escape you with no real consequences, later suckers! I'm grabbing my meager reward for solving this case at city hall real quick and then I'm off to throw food in someones face without any consequences." Fun times.

What I'm alluding to is this overarching lack of feeling like your actions matter at all to the world. The random generation is just too generic and predictable at points and the fact that you can go on a rampage in a hotel with a huge bounty on your head, that'd make anyone move to the Echelon apartments immediately if the got you, but then you step out that front door and suddenly all is forgiven is just too stupid and I can't believe that this is what the final version "was always meant to be like". I'm just extremely disappointed that this is what the peak this game will ever reach looks like seeing as there are no substantial updates planned and there is zero plans to make the game actually run good in the future. It performs largely the same as it did in EA, the only noticeable difference for me was that NPC could get softlocked right after city generation with their paths broken and stuck in place forever. That didn't happen during EA for me as much as it did in 1.0.

There's no shame in admitting that you bit off more than you could chew with this project devs, or even if there were money troubles forcing your hand into releasing the project as is, but the way you keep up this façade of being satisfied with things as they are just feels shameless and really nobody believes it at this point - even if there are die hard fans who go to great lengths to defend you publicly.