Games

If you're liking the feeling of solving a mystery with no handholding, give Shadows of Doubt a look. 1920s detective noir set in an alt-history retro cyberpunk 1970s where the Coca-Cola corporation is the president of the USA. Yeah, that's a mouthful, but what you get is a proper hard-boiled detective story where you are in total control of how you pursue every case. The game gives you an honest to God murder board with string and sticky notes. There's no "detective mode" bullshit where you scan for clues and then the game solves the mystery for you. It's completely on you to find the evidence, follow leads, canvas witnesses, scrub through security footage, stake out a suspect's apartment or place of work, and finally make an arrest (and hope like hell you didn't finger the wrong person). This all plays out in a fully simulated city district. Every room in every building can be entered. Every NPC has a complete life; a partner (maybe), a home (usually), a job, a medical history, a shoe size, fingerprints, the works.

The voxel graphics aren't for everyone, and there's some areas where it's less complete than others, but those only really stand out because of how shockingly complete the world is in so many other ways. All in all, it's a brilliant game, and like nothing else out there.