“Would you say the real killer is these long loading times?”
Looking back over this series of games on consoles and the PC, it becomes apparent that CSI Crime Scene Investigation has been notable for its mediocrity throughout its first three iterations. And not much has changed for this fourth helping of grisly forensic rummaging. Hard Evidence, a single-player game developed by Telltale Games and published by Ubisoft, is every bit as flawed as its predecessors, but once again it has an irritating little kernel of addictiveness somewhere at its heart.
Despite most locations being fairly static, the detail level of the environments and objects is disappointingly low. Worse is the lumbering pace at which the game plays, mostly thanks to its irksome loading times between almost every action taken.
There just don’t seem to be any great DNA analysis apps for the Mac...
Working your way around the process of evidence gathering is somewhat tortuous and certainly gets repetitive. Mucking about with forensic gadgets is fun, and examining pieces of evidence in order to discover minutely important details is amusing. But having to perform three-directional clicks to simply access a computer, or spending several minutes figuring out how to reach a clue that’s in plain view, is dead tiresome.
Even so, the awkward procedural stuff remains engaging, thanks in no small part to some tight scripting. Physically gathering evidence might be a pain, but the payoff is a fresh insight into the crime or the opportunity to question a suspect who has been slow in coming forward. Fans of the
TV show will, of course, love solving these five grisly cases. For the rest of you, while we can’t really recommend Hard Evidence on the basis of being a well-constructed game, it would be remiss of us not to mention that we kept coming back for more in spite of our reservations. One last warning is in order however: It’s not a game for youngsters. The ESRB gave it a Mature rating for “blood and gore, sexual themes, and violence.”
Good story lines. Lots of gadgets to use. Fun tie-in for fans of the TV show. ESRB rating: Mature.
Graphics are pretty basic. Clunky interface. Slow loading times.
