We’ve seen revivals of all sorts of adventure games over this past decade, but there’s one classic series that has yet to see any prominent successors: The Carmen Sandiego games. Not just because it’s a series of educational games, but one with unique style and approach that requires you to do research into areas like history and geography. General Interactive Co. didn’t forget about these games, though, and with the help of Humble Games, they’ve created Chinatown Detective Agency, a new adventure game that sees you putting research skills to good use again as you try to solve various mysterious in the near future. But while an ode to Carmen Sandiego is unique, does this tribute necessary translate to a great game?
Set in Singapore in the future of 2037, Chinatown Detective Agency sees you playing as Amira Darma, a former Interpol agent turned private eye, who as the title suggests, has just opened their brand new detective agency in Chinatown. As Amira is broke, though, they have to rely on a few choice contacts to get started, initially getting hooked up with some rather eccentric individuals. As expected with a classic detective story, though, things quickly escalate, and before you know it, Amira is traveling around the world and being brought in to help investigate potential murders, ones that lead to powerful enemies who would stop at nothing to get rid of any loose ends, Amira included…
Right off the bat, the Carmen Sandiego influences become apparent through the visuals alone. The sidebars and bottom menus handling your phone, messages, flights to book, maps and more feel like something straight out of one of Broderbund’s classics, and the images showing each new location are vivid and filled with detail, bringing to mind the feeling of seeing a pixelated Great Wall of China for the first time. Not that the rest of the graphics are a slouch, though, as every location and bit of scenery is stylish and filled with color, and the unique style for the characters helps give them a memorable appearance.
The characters in Chinatown Detective Agency are memorable for other reasons, though. Be it mysterious societies of burglars, cult-esque religions, or police departments with tough-as-nails officers, every path features a nicely memorable cast with terrific dialogue that showcases their personality with well-done voice acting (even if the voiceovers are inconsistent or prone to occasional glitches). You first get introduced to them through a series of different cases before deciding which client to handle full time, all of them well-crafted stories on their own which lead to different paths and endings, allowing for replayability. It’s even possible to fail at times, should you pick incorrect dialogue or mess up a hacking puzzle, adding tension.
Gameplay-wise, it’s standard point-and-click, with a few bits like little shootouts or memory games to break things up. The big hook in Chinatown Detective Agency, though, is that its puzzles require you to bust out your phone, tablet or even web browser that can be opened through the game to do actual real-life research in order to find the answers to whatever puzzles are in your path, like researching quotes or works of art. It might sound silly at first, but in can be surprisingly engrossing at times. The intent is to try and make you feel like doing real detective work, and it’s where the Carmen Sandiego inspirations truly kick in. And the puzzles are well-designed and show their strengths when it becomes clear that you need to be specific in your work to avoid mistakes.
For example, a clue to find a book in a library is simply “Jubal.” With an initial search for “Jubal” online, I thought it was referring to something like the Book of Genesis, only to be surprised when I couldn’t find any biblical literature. But then a search for “Jubal character” made it more clear that it was pointing to Stranger in a Strange Land, the correct solution. It’s moments like these that truly show how the real-life research is nicely integrated into the gameplay, and it ends up being a unique gameplay element that future adventure games will hopefully take inspiration from.
While the central gimmick is unique and enjoyable, it also proves to be a double-edge sword after a while. Aside from a few moments where the research can get frustrating, the bigger issue is that while the game takes place in a fictional version of 2037, the limitations of the gimmick mean that your research is limited to real-life information from the 20th century. So you can’t research information on characters in-universe, news articles detailing what led to this future that have details relevant to the case, etc. In contrast to other mystery games likeL.A. NoireorThe Council,Chinatown Detective Agency’s central hook doesn’t make you feel like much of a detective, despite its intentions. Instead, it feels like most of the time you just go from point A to point B with occasional stops where the game quizzes you on subjects like World War II ciphers before it lets you progress.
On top of that, the aforementioned limitations of what info you need from your real-life research mean that all of your cases tend to inevitably revolve around subjects like classic artwork, world history and cryptography in various ways. Despite being set in future in “a world on the edge” and even having an opening message mentioning that the developers are not liable if the actual future ends up resembling the game, a lot of key moments feel buried in the past. In fact if it weren’t for a few elements, Chinatown Detective Agency could likely be set in a version of today with no real differences. There are mentions of anti-government tensions, futuristic union agencies,and collapses in certain parts of the world, but no such elements ever end up coming into play (not with the path I took, to be fair).
That’s the one flaw holding Chinatown Detective Agency back: it doesn’t fully utilize its world and gameplay elements to their full potential. You head to locations around Singapore and the rest of the world showcasing vibrant cities filled with life, depicted with stunning pixel art that brings them all to life…and yet most of the time, you have almost zero options when it comes to doing anything besides heading to the lone point of interest or the airport. It feels like an aggressively linear journey that lacks imagination at times. Then there are elements like having to pay for rent and utilities, complete with an office extension to make room for a partner that you’re able to here, requiring you to truly earn a paycheck and balance your money…except you only need to pay rent about three times, tops, and there was never any danger of running out of money in my playthrough.
Closing Comments:
General Interactive deserve applause for their unique approach to detective work in adventure games, but the central mechanic in Chinatown Detective Agency feels like it deserves to be in a more substantial game. Still, what’s here features a fun story with a lot of memorable characters and nicely-challenging puzzles that test how well your online research skills are, so wannabe sleuths or adventure game fans will still want to take a trip out to this version of Chinatown, where an enjoyable adventure awaits.
