Beta Test #19: Cluedo
Was it Puddin in the bronze age, with the big daddy? Fuji in the Cemetery with the gun? Or Listernator in the recording studio, with the loud obnoxious voice? NO. Fool! It’s Bethany, in a new apartment, with nothing but her whits and 5 kilos of uncooked white rice!
Share houses are hard, and I’m scared.
Good evening my murder suspects and welcome to my home, I’m Bethany Griffiths, and this is Beta Test. A game review platform where I, a lonely, family-less, 25 year old, choose one game a month to go ham on until either I get better or get wrecked. All in the hopes that I can provide you with a completely (un)biased review.
Much like the vast population of mid 20 year old’s, I have decided to do the stupidest thing imaginable for a person with a casual job, hella HECS debt, and no feasible credit score. I’ve decided to move out. Into a share house. With a cat. Let’s just say I was in the mood to John Mulaney this month’s review, in that ‘I said I was going to write my two cents – And then I didn’t’. However, John, no matter how alluring a testimony you present, I am once again at the mercy of the gaming world. Oh the feeling of staying up late after moving all my furniture seven suburbs away. I am in agony. Please kill me (With hugs, and chocolate). Also, Cluedo.
Developed and published by Marmalade Game Studio Ltd, Cluedo is an interactive online single/multi player version of its’ board game predecessor. With all your most of your favourite characters, this whodunit aims to bring the next level in murder mystery technology, as you strike out names, places and murder weapons in the hopes of finding the killer.
I was not disappointed with this game (Yes, that’s the bar for this month. Half the FRED team play it and I’ll probably be out of a job if I slander it too hard). There are some nice elements, like the auto checking of the cards if you guess something and a character doesn’t have it, and the game play was reasonable; you go round taking turns rolling die and crossing off clues until you have a pretty fair judgement on the murderer. Nothing wrong with that. But I felt like there could be something – more. A twist, a catch, something that makes me go ‘yes it’s Cluedo, but it’s so much more’. And really, look, Did I expect Tim Curry to prance onto my screen, blasting stories of yore? No. But it would have been nice.
What I should commend though, to be fair, is the art. As always I’m a sucker for good art; and though the music may be repetitive, the characters old hat, the game play pretty much the same as the board game, I do and can appreciate a good artist. There was a lot of time and effort in making the base game backdrops, and characters. They look appropriately mysterious, and they did my girl Scarlett justice, which really is all I could ever ask for. (I would die for her. Let me fight you)
From that though, I feel like they missed an opportunity for accessibility in the way of colour. For the most part, the characters are bright vivid colours, which for someone with colour blindness would make the game hard to play, what with the scorecard keeping tabs by colour only. I noticed it when one of the FRED fam was doing a run through, and how that seemed unnecessarily unfair. It would have been good to monogram the card accordingly to allow players ease of access. It would also have been cool to see a character sheet with colours that are on, say the Deuteranopia colour spectrum. (Baron Taupe, Mrs Peacock, Ms White, Lady Gold, and Pastor Olive are all ideas that spring to mind…some of them aren’t original. Sue me). With that said though, there are some things that do make the game just a wee bit more tight around the edges. When you go through the characters, a handy highlighted area helps guide you to who’s guessed what. It’s very helpful if you have a processing disorder, or have trouble concentrating.
In the end, Honestly, With Cluedo I got what I paid for, and I can’t really argue with that. I just wonder how much more could have been done to this to make it a show stopping game. As it is, you have to pay to play in different locations, and different characters. Mrs. White isn’t in the free version for example, so if you like that character, better hobble on down to Micro transaction town to buy yourself some white maid-ey goodness. (MMMM milk maids *gurgle*)
Because of the ‘we been knew’ of the whodunit, and the micro transaction fee, I give this game:
3/5 Dead Dudes for style
0/5 Dead Dudes for plot
4/5 Dead Dudes for easiness
Eh/5 Dead Dudes for having to pay to play, (Roger voice “ugh, it costs Money”)
So, my dudes! I’ve been Bethany Griffiths, and this has been Me, in the blog, with a Beta Test. A game review platform where I either got better or got wrecked. All in the hopes that I can provide you with a completely unbiased review. If you have a game that you want me to give my two cents on, Please let me know!
Until next time,
FRED the ALIEN Productions 