James Patterson: Women’s Murder Club 2: A Darker Shade of Grey Review

An unidentified body is found on a rocky beach… was it an accident, or was it murder? The heroines of Women’s Murder Club are back. This time they must uncover secrets surrounding a recent murder at a prestigious Southern military academy. Investigate each crime scene with a professional eye. Take pictures and samples for examination back to the lab. Solve challenging puzzles and interrogate suspects to reveal the true killer in this thrilling adventure!

–Big Fish Games

From Iwin Games comes James Patterson’s Women’s Murder Club 2: A darker shade of Grey – the 2^nd title in the series, complete with sexy investigators, murders, treachery, false leads and death threats.

Synopsis: Right at the beginning, you’re introduced to the four ladies – Jill Bernhardt (district attorney), Claire Washburn (medical practitioner), Cindy Thomas (reporter) and Lindsay Boxer (detective, SFPD) of the Murder Club, sitting in a restaurant, discussing their everyday problems and daydreaming about the perfect vacation. Suddenly, Lindsay is called away to investigate a dead body. Is it an accident? Or is it murder? Watch as a seemingly simple case of student harassment by a gay teacher snowballs into a national level conspiracy, with our ladies putting their lives on the line to save America. (Cleverly enough, the story is set in July 2009, but the President of the USA is still shown to be George Bush.)

Gameplay: You play as 3 ladies – Claire for once or twice, and the rest as Lindsay or Cindy. You have to carry on autopsies, investigate murders, interrogate suspects, detect lies and ultimately catch the crook by the collar. What I like most about the puzzles is that they are varied and beautifully done. Even in the hidden object types, there is no need to search overtly hard, squinting into the last pixel of the screen – the required objects are justified and highlighted on the screen. The difficulty is moderate, but you can get plenty of hints – and what’s more, the hints keep accumulating over the investigations – so the flow of the story is never quite arrested.

Narration: The narration itself is linear but highly enjoyable, done in a graphic novel style. The only problem I have is that the speed of the narration was very slow – with no way to fast forward it either. At least the addition of character voices could’ve made the test of patience a little bearable. The in-game graphics are, as expected, marvelously done, but the graphic novel frames defy the mood of the sinister plot or the title itself – “A Darker Shade of Grey”. Well, maybe that bit of cheerful colour was intended, you never know…

All in all, it is one of the better point-and-click detective games released recently that completely immerses you in the plot. A must buy if you like story-driven games.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

James Patterson Women’s Murder Club: Death in Scarlet

It’s not often that you play a game series in the wrong order and be thankful for it. Yet that is exactly the case with Floodlight Games and I-play games James Patterson’s Women’s Murder Club. After playing the sequel before the prequel, I could say, in comparison – WMC 1 beats its 2^nd part hands down.

For one, the graphics seem better. The ambience is suitably darker, with no unnecessary splashes of colour. Unlike A Darker Shade of Grey, which has a seemingly simple story opening up as a sinister plot, Death In Scarlet seems better narrated. From the very beginning, the plot unfolds in all the complicacies of prostitution and uber-traditional Chinese customs, and in the end, you need to sit down and think about it a bit to figure out the heads and tails of it.

Of course, Death in Scarlet has its unattractive parts as well. It retains the brainless hidden object games, where rulers are hidden on shoes which are kept on top of the monitor…. At least DSOG had other and better puzzles. The game makes chemistry look like a joke – some alchemy type of mumbo-jumbo – and every time the forensic lab came up, I was in positive dread of having to check out Red Fizz and Green boils again (extreme convenience – every single person in the case had absolutely different blood types. What’s the probability of that happening?). So’s the case with the newspaper room – I got tired of collecting microfiche rolls everytime I had to enter a query. Level of difficulty? Easy to moderate… After all, the game is story driven. Wish we could’ve had a greater part to play in it – like the information cards could’ve been systematized better, so the player would’ve had to trim down suspects from time to time.

The ending for the game is truly and gloriously good. Not like all the problems are solved, not like the blood lotus racket is all broken up, not like all the strings are tied – just death begets more death.

Rating: 4 out of 5