The Big Scoop

by Johan Berntsson

Mystery
2004

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Number of Ratings: 11
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1-13 of 13


SPAG

[...] you start out as a woman being framed for murder who must escape an embarrassing situation, then switch over to a journalist who sets out to help her prove her innocence. Pretty standard stuff. Even the story behind the murder itself is a bit on the plain vanilla side, and the game even comes with its own "too-stupid-to-shoot-first-and-ask-questions-later" garden variety villain. This is not saying that it is badly done, mind you. Even with such a bland theme, the author does a competent job of putting together a well-paced story, complete with an action sequence at the end. Throughout, the game feels like a 50-minute episode from some 80's detective TV show.
-- Joao Mendes

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>INVENTORY - Paul O'Brian writes about interactive fiction

[T]he good far outweighs the bad in this game -- it tried something new in its conversation system, and it kept me interested with a compelling story and canny puzzles. I enjoyed my time with it.

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- Edo, January 26, 2022

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
A short murder mystery game with a mid-level of polish, March 30, 2018
by MathBrush
Related reviews: about 1 hour

This game was entered in IFComp 2004. It has two PCs, one featured in the prologue, and one who is a main character detective.

The opening scene was clever, but I soon find myself frustrated by small bugs and a lack of implementation. Without proper feedback, it was hard to know if I was on the right track or not.

The game has several puzzles which are fairly hard to guess on your own, and which seemed somewhat unfair to me.

Overall, it was interesting, and had a nice cat character.

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- Joshua Houk, October 18, 2014

- E.K., February 25, 2013

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
Not Spectacular, but Not Bad, June 15, 2011

It's not bad, per se, it's just ... nothing spectacular. The puzzles didn't seem to be particularly challenging or inventive. The descriptions, writing, and characters seem to be completely bare-boned, with nothing that really makes me care about them. If the characters had been more three-dimensional, I think I would have liked it a lot more. The "mystery" part of the game disappears after your first fail (and you'll probably fail the first scene many times), and that took a lot of the experience away from me.

As is, it's not a bad game to wile away some downtime if you feel like relaxing and not reading too much, but don't expect to come out with a fresh perspective or anything substantial like that.

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5 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
Engaging!, June 11, 2011

As soon as I started the game and read the introduction I thought: "Wow, this could be intresting." And it was! I became really engaged and played for a long time. I enjoyed solving the puzzles although the hints in the menu can be good to take a look at if your looking for a specific verb(especially in the Swedish version).

I like the story a lot, it's exciting. It's driven forward by an excellent conversation system which I think worked pretty well, though, it can sometimes give suggestions for topics which you shouldn't have heard of yet; and by doing so spoiling the story.

I found some bugs around (Spoiler - click to show)Turbot Street and around the safe, regarding locking and opening, but nothing severe. I gave this game four stars because I find the conversation system very good and complete, I like the story a lot, the hint system is very useful and well organized and I think the puzzles are great - they won't drive you mad, they'll just force you to think a little more, and more, and more... In the end, the good things makes up for the minuses.

The environments are pretty standard, but the thing that matters most in this game is the story.

The game might be a little too much if you're new to Interactive Fiction, although the hint system works fine. I recommend the game to everyone but the absolute beginner to Interactive Fiction.

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- Grey (Italy), December 25, 2009

- Shigosei, February 9, 2009

- Nathan (Utah), October 25, 2008

- Steve Evans (Hobart, Tasmania), April 26, 2008

- Quintin Stone (NC), October 23, 2007


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