Afterlife Is Best Life
The storyline, which revolves around Detective Ronan O’Connor, a young girl searching for her mother named Joy Foster and the serial killer who is terrorising the town of Salem (where they burned witches, way, way back in the day), is certainly the best part of Soul Suspect. As such, we’re not going to be spoiling anything further here, there won’t be any narrative elements mentioned from here on out. Players will be using their ghostly form to get to places that human investigators just can’t and conducting their own investigation into the murders that have been taking place – including their own.
Being Charged
As mentioned, the storyline is Soul Suspect‘s strong suit but it’s not enough to save this game on its own. There’s little challenge to be had and almost every investigation can be completed through guesswork, even if the frustration of hunting for clues gets too much and you don’t locate all of them. There’s a combat mechanic in place, which sees Ronan facing demons out to drag him… somewhere. Where isn’t explained, it’s all rather nebulous. But each confrontation is exactly the same: hide somewhere, sneak up on demon, banish it with a quick-time event (QTE). If it spots you, you either hide until it resets or die. Not exactly exciting and the challenge doesn’t increase at later stages, Murdered just throws an extra demon or two at a time at players.
Last Remains
Murdered: Soul Suspect is also short. It’s perfectly possible to blow through the game in a single sitting, assuming you’re not being sidetracked by collectible items but this also assumes you’re completing the side-quests for other errant lost souls. The game is artificially lengthened by the arrival of demons, who cannot be simply outrun, and by the construction of the world. You’re going to have to side-track around obstacles for no reason other than to add a few minutes to the running time. That’s just poor form on the developer’s part.
And it’s prone to glitching, though not so badly that progress needs to be resumed. This review was completed with an objective, long since completed, still cropping up from time to time for no reason other than the game hiccuped at that particular time.
Lastly, there’s the whole ‘replayability’ thing. Or rather, there isn’t. Soul Suspect has absolutely zero replay value. Restarting the game will have the same events and objects in the same locations as they were the last time around. You’ll have seen it all before and will know just how boring the road ahead is going to become…
Verdict
So we’ve got a decent story hampered by stunted gameplay and a short experience, with little hope of players coming back to it afterwards unless they’re completionists. Who should be playing this? Well, anyone who is keen on detective stories or the odd bit of history – especially as it applies to Salem’s past – will get through Murdered: Soul Suspect without too much frustration. For everyone else – keep it in mind for a bargain bin buy, there’s not enough to make you want it right now.