Murdered: Soul Suspect Review
This is a game I admittedly did not go out of my way to buy. And early on with that confession do not let it sway you to think that this is a game not worth buying. I acquired this game in a Square Enix Christmas ‘5 random game keys’ bundle for PC and being one of the more intriguing titles that I received, I decided to download, install and play away.
This adventure, stealth game was developed by Airtight Games and published in 2014 by Square Enix for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One.
The game is set in Salem, Massachusetts, and you play as the dead detective, Ronan O’Connor. Throughout the game, you solve crimes, uncover the history of the city and it’s inhabitants and learn to harness your newly acquired ghostly abilities along with having the freedom to traverse the whole town in between key story levels. Ronan is everything you would expect to find in a convict, the complete opposite of a hard working, law abiding detective that you are, his appearance mirrors that of a 1960′s american outlaw. Your task is to find the identity of your killer. It is one of the more unique Square Enix games I have played but it is not without it’s shortcomings.
The town is large and very often I would get lost, or sidetracked to go off and explore somewhere new I hadn’t seen before. It is overlayed with it’s ghostly counterparts that existed from the town most prominent era, the 1600′s. Scattered throughout the town are other ghosts stuck just like you, and being the good detective you are, you solve their problems and it’s these side quests help to spread out the game play, from being purely story driven and linear. From the eerie town to the sinister graveyard, Murdered Soul Suspect gets the grim and ghastly atmosphere spot on. Throughout the town you can find clues and references to your past to flesh out the background to yourself and your past.
Although being a large town to explore, it makes little sense that a ghost with the ability to pass through walls can only pass through the ones that the game intends you to pass through, you can only enter homes that have not been consecrated. The exploration would have seemed much more fleshed out if from time to time I found somewhere to explore that didn’t have something to find, or someone to help, more of a visual prize, something to add a bit more life and depth to this town, it all seems a bit confined.
Ronan although interesting visually, leaves a little to desire in a video game character. His background is interesting, his tattoos each tell a story of his past, his appearance at first glance leads you to believe there is more to him. Ronan is everything that comes under the cliche that he is perceived as, and don’t get me wrong it’s performed well, but there is little else to his personality. He’s a tough guy with little in the way of emotion.
As you are recently deceased, you are not at first aware of the abilities you possess, and the game does it’s job of easing you into learning how to harness them. You can walk through walls, hide from enemies in ghost residue left throughout the city and buildings you enter – I found these to be quite a nifty way to teleport around a lot of the buildings, but I thought that it was something that could have been a lot more utilized. You can read people’s thoughts, turn on and disrupt machinery as a means to get past police officers. You can possess people and probably most fun, for me anyway, possess cats. A lot of these abilities are smartly used throughout the game and they do enhance the gameplay and give you a sense of growth and progression. There is however very little use for these abilities outside of the main storyline. The need for the abilities to be used more however wouldn’t have came to me if a lot of the puzzles would have been more intellectually challenging. Sure, I made mistakes choosing the most relevant clues to a case, but there was no room for error, and I never got punished for getting the wrong answer, it simply took a little while longer to complete the case.
What gave me the true feeling of terror in this game, was the demons that I encountered. The times I had to hide, attempt to sneak up on a demon to kill it were some of the most tense and nerve wrecking throughout the whole game. They are truly terrifying. This is where the game made me pay for my mistakes. Once spotted by a demon began the dash to freedom in which my thumb stick mashing became frantic, and let me tell you, these guys are not easy to lose. The mere sound of them was enough for a ‘…nope’ moment but I continued forward.
The game sometimes suffered with glitches and minor flickers, thankfully it’s not something i encountered all over the place and nothing that stopped the game dead in it’s tracks. There was no map to help navigate my way through the town like most other sandbox games come with as standard, which at times was frustrating when I just wanted to get on with the game.
The game overall was a mix and match of good and bad. A strong story with some equally strong twists kept me playing through the roughly 10 hour campaign. Also the game has a replayable appeal to it, with me not having gathered all of the collectibles or completed all of the side quests. It is a city in which I would gladly go back to, but not one I could fully immerse myself in. It is a game that could have so much more going for it, and included within, but it is not without it’s own charm.
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