It’s fair to see that Sherlock Holmes has been given a new lease of life in recent years. With big Hollywood films featuring Robert Downey Jr and the BBC series, the famous detective has been well and truly pushed to the forefront of the entertainment industry.
The Testament of Sherlock Holmes is actually the 6th Sherlock Holmes game from developers Frogwares, but is the first developed primarily for consoles. This isn’t a game with a modern action hero twist like the films, this is classic Holmes, and your main objective is to find clues and use them to solve the crime.
The game begins in an attic with 3 children finding the journal of Dr Watson, and begin reading the story. You are then shot back to London 1898, with all its clichéd English accents. You are put in control of Sherlock Holmes who, soon into the game, is accused of a crime, of which he cannot prove his innocence.
After this you’ll pursue a new case while Holmes acts in more suspicious ways to get to the bottom of it. The game also presents the story from Watson’s perspective at times, where you get to see his doubts over the great Holmes. It is great to see such a story driven title, willing to explore and question the character of Sherlock Holmes, who is such a well known and loved name in fiction.
The beginning of the game shows something that is immediately apparent and present throughout – terrible lip synching in the cutscenes. This makes them awkward to watch, and I found myself reading the subtitles and skipping through, rather than watching and listening to the cutscenes. Graphically the game is nice, but is let down by some ‘clay-like’ faces in parts.
The game has been touted as an ‘open world adventure’ game, but at its core, it is essentially a point and click story driven game. That comment may be a bit harsh, as there are elements of open world areas as you play in third person controlling the character (it’s not just Holmes being controlled, Watson is available at times, as is a dog, but I’ll get to that in a bit), and there is also a first person view available… But the way it has been implemented into the game seems needless. There is a quick travel map available to go from one area of interest to the next, and it could have been kept at that. But the attempt at including an open world simply creates time consuming walks in lifeless areas that aren’t needed to be there. There are NPCs to interact with, but again these bring clichéd, and at times, terrible accent and unimaginative lines. Along with the characters there are plenty of doors that are locked, if you want to hear Holmes say ‘closed’ just one more time. And Watson, who is tolerable to begin with, becomes one of the most annoying characters in a game I’ve ever come across. It gets to a point where muting the game is the only way to get away from the voice acting and the repetitive lines.
The majority of the game is played in certain rooms or areas where you are looking for clues, it won’t take long to find them as they are highlighted by icons such as a magnifying glass and hands. I think that the game would have proved stronger had they cut out the middle parts, and just been able to quick travel from area to area. The control system is also extremely annoying. The character feels clunky to control and regularly gets stuck on the environment. They turn on the spot which doesn’t feel natural at all, and while it’s possible to ‘walk faster’; there isn’t enough space in the most places to warrant it. I also discovered it’s possible to make Holmes ‘float’ by tapping RT (the button that makes you walk faster). It’s quite a surreal sight watching him gliding across the floor in a ghost like manner. When controlling the sniffer dog half way through the game, the awkward controls are ever present. He doesn’t control anything like an animal should, and some of the objectives you complete are completely unrealistic with the regards to the ability of a dog. There’s being well trained, then there is this.
One major drawback is that there is no autosave feature to be seen. I was lucky enough to remember this throughout, but it would be easy to play a large chunk of the game and forget to save. I genuinely believe that an autosave feature would be greatly welcome. Seeing as you are allowed to save at any point during, I don’t understand why it hasn’t been included.
That is enough of the negative and it is time to move on to the positive. The strength in the game lies in its story telling ability and the logic puzzles that are present throughout. Sherlock Holmes is a thinking person’s game. From the deductions, to opening locks, safe boxes and finding hidden areas through a chess style game. The deduction requires finding clues to solve; each new clue brings a different link to the solution. Each section of the deduction needs to be correct in order to progress. There are times where there will be many different combinations of options, and with one part incorrect you won’t be able to complete the deduction. This is frustrating, but very rewarding once it is solved. There is also a real sense of mystery when controlling Watson, where is Holmes? Why is he doing what he’s doing?
The puzzles can be extremely tough; they are all solved through careful thinking. There is no hand holding here, you are given the puzzle, with no help into solving it (you may have a riddle to figure out before getting in to the puzzle) and you will find yourself sitting thinking ‘WTF?’ on many a confusing occasion. It is a great feeling when you get a hard one right, and if you find one that you can’t figure out, the game allows you to skip to continue with the story.
I have to say that I did enjoy the story of The Testament of Sherlock Holmes, and the puzzle solving while tough, really does get the brain working. Take note of the age rating, there are mature themes and graphic images to be seen throughout. But while the game comes with its strengths, I can’t overlook some overwhelming weaknesses. I feel the game would have been better had the controls been more solid, and had cut out the attempt to make it an open world in areas, where it clearly has no reason to be. The game would have proved more enjoyable overall had these things been addressed, and as such would have warranted a higher score. The story line pulls this game just above the average mark. 6/10