izigame.me

Two weeks ago to the day exactly, I lamented the fact that Return of the Obra Dinn - a one of a kind masterpiece - hadn't inspired a whole genre of mystery games based on moment-in-time tableaus. I'm apparently some sort of idiot savant, because that's (almost) exactly what The Case of the Golden Idol (which came out three days ago) is.
That description is close enough for virtually anyone reading this to get the gist, so here are the main differences. Rather than a heavily stylised 1-bit 3D environment which seamlessly contains several scenes frozen in time, there are a series of loosely connected moments in time (also, coincidentally, marking the moment of death for one of the on-screen characters in each one) in a 2D pixel-art style. Where the aim of Obra DInn was to document the deaths of everyone who embarked on its cursed journey, Golden Idol has a more narrative-focused approach - by substituting in names, objects, and actions into blank slots in pre-written exposition, you establish the events as they unfold; in this way, the 11 (plus epilogue) chapters comprising the game form one whole, coherent story. In this way, the story is a little less 'show' than 'tell' compared to Obra Dinn, but not to the point of being contrived or boring; quite the opposite, it's great fun to see how the characters unfold, and even to realise, retrospectively, different character motivations and arcs that you hadn't noticed before.
The mechanics are standard point-and-click affair, with the game recommending that highlights are turned on in order to eliminate some of the 'pixel-hunt' aspect; this is inoffensive, possibly even good if you're easily frustrated by point-and-clicks (like me), but might negatively impact the amount of time you will spend on each scene, since it's clear when you have all the information and can get into the information synthesis/deduction part of the chapter. As a result, the game itself is short - I got through it in a little over 4 hours, requiring help for only one very specific part of a chapter which I would describe as not really fitting in with the rest of the game (this isn't cope!! i'm not owned!!) - but it's concise, such that while I would have loved to play for longer, the story would only have suffered if drawn out unnecessarily.
The story itself is interesting in some aspects, but my main criticism of it - and of the game as a whole - is that it didn't instill senses of awe, or horror, or tragedy in the way that Obra Dinn managed; it's a relatively straightforward murder mystery (playing into a lot of classic mystery/'whodunit' tropes) with some spooky elements, and doesn't get particularly dark or deep even at its creepiest moments; some parts, such as the ending, I would even call kinda goofy. Additionally, while I enjoyed the soundtrack the first time around, spending protracted amounts of time listening to the same music loops gets a little tedious - doubly so when they start reusing tracks in later chapters. All that said, we can't make perfection the enemy of the good - Golden Idol's story and soundtrack are both undeniably great.
On the whole, The Case of the Golden Idol is absolutely worth your time and money, and is a very solid addition to what I hope will become a growing mystery/deduction genre.