Starts off strong but ends with confusion and disappointment.
Indigo Prophecy was released in 2005 and was reviewed well by most larger gaming websites and magazines. This leads me to believe they did not finish the game, but more on that later.
Indigo Prophecy is unique in its field. By mashing many genres into one game, it loses its identity by trying to combine too many ideas into one. If we were talking about TV shows and movies this would be a X-Files, Matrix, Law and Order, and Exorcist all in one feature presentation. This *could* work but the team did not give the game enough length for anything to develop coherently. Actually, the end of the game is so convoluted and rushed that I believe they simply ran out of development time. For a story that needed to be 20+ hours, they compacted it into a 7-8 hour mad dash.
Which is a damn shame since the first two thirds of the game is excellent and has great build up. All this comes crashing down in one sentence at a key moment in the story ("plot twist".) From here the entire story crumbles apart, from the laughable plot climax to the w-t-f relationship development.
If I scared you off of playing the game, I'm sorry. I think it is worth playing up until a certain point. The investigation is very rewarding. Playing both the murderer trying to hide evidence and the detectives trying to piece it together is a totally new and refreshing experience. There are some incredibly awesome action scenes that accompany a badass plot twist (first major twist.) The characters are very likeable and there are some raunchy sex scenes (for the Euro edition.)
As for gameplay... The character movement controls remind me of Resident Evil 2. The character is controlled by the WASD keys and the mouse controls the camera. To active certain items or perform certain moves, the mouse must be moved in various patterns shown on screen. When the action heats up, a mini-game of "simon says" pops on the screen. Two sets of D-Pads show on screen and when a certain direction lights up, the player must push the bound key in that direction. It can be very hard at times since the directions are lit in fast succession. This is nicely integrated into the screen so the player never misses any of the action. The gameplay is surprisingly good for a game of this type.
Although the beginning is excellent, the gameplay is novel, and the characters have personality, this game simply can not stand on its own without the backbone of these types of games, story. To have a proper and satisfying story the plot must be surprising (which it is) but also be enlightening and meaningful. It must make the player go "Ah Ha! I get it now, it all makes sense." This never happens. If only the development team had more time or the writer wasn't a scattered brain **** then this game could have been extremely awesome. I can think of 10 different ways to take the story that would have been a hell of a lot better. I would have never come up with the ending they did in a thousand years. To top off the lousy ending, they play Theory of Deadman in the credits. A fitting end to a "could of been" game.