Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments

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Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments (Eng. About crime and punishments ) is a computer game from the Sherlock Holmes series . The game was developed by Frogwares for Windows and various game consoles . It is based on the fictional character Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and is assigned to the adventure genre. The name Crimes and Punishments alludes to the novel Crime and Punishment , in German Guilt and Atonement , by Fyodor Dostoyevsky .

Crimes and Punishments is the seventh installment in the Sherlock Holmes series and the successor to The Testament of Sherlock Holmes . In 2016, Sherlock Holmes: The Devil's Daughter appeared as a sequel.

Gameplay

Crimes and Punishment is assigned to the adventure genre. In the game, the player must play as Sherlock Holmes or Dr. Watson solve six different criminal cases. Of these, two of the six criminal cases are based on the short stories Black Peter and Abbey Grange written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle , while the other four are newly written. These six cases are not directly related to one plot, but are loosely linked. The player controls the character, either from the first person perspective or from the pursuer's perspective , through different parts of Victorian London.

To clear up the cases, the player has to gather clues by talking to other characters or securing traces. The player then has to combine these clues into conclusions and thus determine a perpetrator. It is up to the player whether to hand the perpetrator over to the police or to let it go.

Development and publication

Crimes and Punishments was developed by the Ukrainian developer Frogwares. As the first game from the Sherlock Holmes series, the game does not use the Frogwares own game engine used in the previous parts, but the Unreal Engine 3 . Furthermore, in the development of Crimes and Punishment , as with the predecessor The Testament of Sherlock Holmes and unlike in the first parts of the series, the game was developed from the start in addition to the PC for game consoles .

While the game was initially only planned for PC , PlayStation 3 , PlayStation 4 and Xbox 360 , Frogwares announced in a press release in early May 2014 that the game will also be available for Xbox One . Furthermore, Frogwares announced that the game will be released in early September 2014 instead of, as initially planned in the first quarter of 2014. In a trailer released in August 2014, September 30, 2014 was announced as the final release date.

reception

Rating mirror
German-speaking area
publication Rating
GameStar 85%
PC Games 7/10
4players 77%
International space
IGN 7.5 / 10
GameSpot 8/10
Eurogamer 7/10
Meta-ratings
GameRankings 69.98%
Metacritic 77%

Crimes and Punishments was largely praised by critics and received mostly good reviews. On Metacritic , the game received an aggregate rating of 77% and thus the best meta rating of the entire series, followed by its predecessor The Testament of Sherlock Holmes with an aggregate rating of 73%.

Critics praised the game mainly for the detailed and realistic graphics and the immersion it made possible , as well as for the interesting and varied cases. The game was particularly criticized for the insufficiently linked, short cases and the sometimes somewhat stiff animations of the characters.

“To be part of the action and to develop in a strange world, no other medium offers me that. And it is precisely in this respect that Crimes and Punishments succeeds in a feat that many other adventure games fail: It not only tells an exciting story, but actually gives me the feeling of playing a role, of slipping into the skin of the master detective. "

- Dimitry Halley in GameStar (rating: 85%)

“The six well-portioned crime fiction bites make the investigation less tiring than before. Most of the time I had fun with the interesting, sometimes psychic cases. The nicely designed locations as well as numerous investigation methods capture the flair of the model well [...]. However, there is a lack of implementation: Somehow everything seems a bit too stiff and bulky. The somewhat wooden handling, bland mini-games and the poorly explained multitude of investigation and interpretation options occasionally ensured that I was in the dark looking for an important clue. "

- Jan Wöbbeking in 4Players (rating: 77%)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. a b c Dimitry Halley: Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments in the Test - Gnade oder Galgen , In: GameStar .de ; dated September 30, 2014, accessed June 10, 2019.
  2. a b Felix Schütz: Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments in the test - Beautifully packaged mini-thrillers , In: PCGames .com ; dated September 30, 2014, accessed June 10, 2019.
  3. Ingmar Böke: Olga Ryzhko - Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments - Interview , In: AdventureGamers.com ; dated August 6, 2014, accessed June 10, 2019.
  4. Tobias Simon: Publication in September, also for Xbox One , In: Gameswelt.de ; dated May 7, 2014, accessed June 10, 2019.
  5. Michael Bonke: Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments - Release September 30 , In: PCGames .com ; dated August 8, 2014, accessed June 10, 2019.
  6. a b Jan Wöbbeking: Test: Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments , In: 4players .de ; October 8, 2014, accessed June 11, 2019.
  7. Chuck Osborn: Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments Review , In: IGN .com ; dated September 30, 2014, accessed June 11, 2019.
  8. Brett Todd: Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments Review , In: GameSpot .com ; dated October 7, 2014, accessed June 11, 2019.
  9. Stace Harman: Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments review , In: Euro Gamer .net ; dated September 30, 2014, accessed June 11, 2019.
  10. Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments , In: GameRankings .com ; accessed on June 11, 2019.
  11. a b Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments PC , In: Metacritic .com ; accessed on June 11, 2019.