Backbone
Review

Backbone (2019) is an adventure game inspired by film noir where you role-play as a human-like raccoon detective. As a detective, you search for clues and evidence, talk to witnesses, and choose which leads to follow.

You move left and right through the city and interact with people and objects and solve the various mysteries. As you progress, you talk to and investigate the animal characters and are offered more options on what you want to say to them. It unfolds like a detective movie but you need to ask the right to move the story forwards.

Backbone also features puzzles where you have to drag evidence around to look further into the investigation. There are stealth puzzles that you solve by hiding from or following a suspicious character and rooms and environments that you explore such as the busy city life, classy bars, and nighttime in the pouring rain.

It's a game where you step into the shoes of a detective and think like a detective. You become immersed in the investigations and puzzles to solve. It's your choice which cases you want to investigate and which leads you to want to follow.

Our examiner, Hannah Robertson, first checked Backbone 2 years ago. It was re-examined by Jo Robertson and updated 8 months ago.