Murder by Numbers

Genre: Picross Puzzle / Graphic Adventure

Players: 1

.

Review:

Murder by Numbers is a game that combines a Picross Puzzle game with a Graphic Adventure, with players scanning a crime scene for clues, with each clue being a separate picross puzzle. These clues are then brought to various characters to advance the game’s story, about an actress in a detective TV show who finds herself at the center of a real murder mystery, while at the same time dealing with a strange floating computer who’s trying to figure out his own past.

This game has been compared by many to the Phoenix Wright games, and a lot of that comes down to the presentation here. The characters here are cartoony, but memorable and pretty instantly likable, even if they’re all pretty broad archetypes (the grizzled detective, the diva actress, the flaming gay hairdresser, you get the idea). The game’s story also does a good job providing just enough mystery to keep you interested. Which of the various shady suspects did the dirty deed? Where does that strange computer come from? Just what happened between protagonist Honor (yeah, the names in this game are like that) and her now-ex, spoken about in depressed tones? Finding out the answers to these questions is a good part of what drives this game.

Of course, the story and tone aren’t the only things here that feel remeniscent of Phoenix Wright – this game has a pretty fantastic soundtrack composed by Masakazu Sugimori of Phoenix Wright fame, and pretty much right from the start, this game’s energetic tunes are a delight, and definitely set this apart from most Picross games, which lean towards more relaxing fare. This game also features a cartoony art style with characters designed by Hato Moa (the creator of Hatoful Boyfriend), and while the designs themselves are quite good, it’s a bit distracting that the way they’re presented makes them all look like paper cut-outs with jagged white borders.

As for the gameplay itself, the game gives players an introduction to Picross rules and basic strategies if they’re not already familiar with how to do these sorts of puzzles, but otherwise it’s a pretty basic and feature-poor version of Picross. You can mark cells as filled, blank, or highlight cells to test them, and you can ask the game for a hint, but you can’t play in multiplayer, can’t check to see if you’ve made an error, and don’t get much in the way of display options. And if you’re playing in handheld mode, know that there’s no touchscreen support.

If this was just a Picross game, it would be a fairly mediocre one. Not bad, but definitely not great. Thankfully, the Graphic Adventure elements in the game pick up some of that slack, although I’m not completely sure switching between the two works well for the pacing. You’ll be trying to learn about the story and then get pulled into a puzzle, and then you’ll get through a puzzle and feel like going for more, only to find you’re back to searching for clues and talking to people. Thankfully, players can replay the puzzles they’ve completed from the main menu, though… well, if you’re doing that, you’ve already completed them.

In the end, Murder By Numbers mixes some different elements that don’t quite mesh perfectly well together, and some of those elements are a little lacking, but despite these flaws this is overall a solid game with a lot to offer, thanks largely to a great presentation with characters and story that keep you interested through the game’s pacing issues. If you’re a fan of Picross games looking for something unique, or a fan of Phoenix Wright looking for something with a similar feel to it, Murder by Numbers is definitely worth checking out.

tl;dr – Murder by Numbers is a game that combines Picross Puzzles with Graphic Adventure elements and a presentation that feels reminiscent in many ways to the Phoenix Wright games. The Picross and Graphic Adventure elements don’t always mesh well together and are cause for some pacing issues, and the Picross gameplay itself is a bit lacking, but the engrossing story and lovable characters still make this an enjoyable game well worth playing for fans of either style of game.

Grade: B

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