What I dislike, I can’t abide.
Books have been such a huge part of my life, as a kid I was reading adult novels (not raunchy ones) when I was in the 4th and 5th grade. I loved Sherlock Holmes stories and a detective my own age in the Encyclopedia Brown series. I never got around to reading any of Agatha Christie’s most famous detective; Hercule Perot but I have seen various films in which he’s featured and I must say I am a fan of the man, so when I was asked to review the latest video game featuring the great detective, I leapt at the chance.
MSRP: $29.99
Platforms: Xbox (reviewed), PlayStation, Switch, PC
Price I’d Pay: $29.99
Hercule Poirot: The London Case presents itself in an episodic format, which from what I have looked up is what the other games in this series does. The adventure here starts with a prologue/tutorial mystery, an amuse bouche so to speak to whet the mystery solving appetite. This intro mystery never really wraps up but serves its purpose in presenting the games systems and Poirot’s version of “Watson” young Arthur Hastings. He works as an excellent foil throughout the adventure and is someone for Poirot to bounce ideas and thoughts off of.
The main mystery in The London Case revolves around a painting of Mary Magdaline and its sudden theft during the grand opening of a new museum exhibit, despite a high level of security around it. Its up to the titular detective to use his arsenal of skills to deduce who dunnit before it’s too late. While the overall narrative and setup for The London Case is solid, its execution is shaky at best, starting with the characters. While the man himself, Poirot is charming and has enough charisma and style to almost make players forget that most of the suspects feel pretty one dimensional in nature.
Unfortunately, that overall feeling of disappointment also extends to the graphics in The London Case. Conversations all happen from a zoomed in angle, which would make sense to highlight the characters themselves. Sadly, most of the characters here exude about just as much emotion as the faceless nurses do from Silent Hill. The only characters that are sparred this fate are Poirot himself and to an extent young Mr. Hastings, but everyone else just feels lifeless. That’s not even mentioning the really bad lip movements, I honestly would have just been fine if their mouths didn’t open because instead of moving naturally, they just kind of open and close as sounds come out with no rhyme or reason, its hard to put into words but I assure you its extraordinarily distracting to witness.
I wasn’t a fan of The London Case, admittedly I am not a huge fan of Hercule Poirot outside of live action media though. But for me this game just felt unpolished and perhaps rushed, which maybe it was because as I write this a new Hercule game is set to drop this very week. Again, this is a sequel in a series that I haven’t played so this may be an improvement I don’t know, what I do know is that for someone who enjoys mystery, adventure games The London Case shall remain unsolved for this fledgling detective.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.
