Frog Detective
Review

Frog Detective (2018) is a comedy adventure game where you play a character, named (unsurprisingly) "Frog Detective". In the first mystery, The Haunted Island, you get a call about a ghost on the island. You set about solving the mystery by collecting the ingredients needed for an explosive device, to see if a ghost is inside a cave. As you do this you talk with different characters and trade items with them to get the ones you need.

It can seem like solving these puzzles is all a bit random, but that's because the puzzles aren’t really the point of the game, and neither is solving the case. It's the interactions with the world and the people that live in it that's the real enjoyment. As you get into this strange location there's an endearing off-beat feel to the inhabitants and find that it's surprisingly moreish like the Monkey Island games.

In the second game, Frog Detective 2: The Case of the Invisible Wizard, you follow up the original mystery but now have a notebook with assorted stickers. This helps you keep track of the people you've met and what they need to trade for the items you want.

As with the first game, it's the humour and character that takes centre stage here. You can note things like "This makes her much more suspicious than she realizes" and "Insists she is not suspicious."

The third game, Frog Detective 3: Corruption at Cowboy County is set in the wild west where new surprises await you as you meet new friends and uncover a spicy mystery. Again, you must talk to witnesses, collect clues and smile vacantly like a frog.

The Frog Detective are games that work for adults because of the humour but also works for young players because of the simple mechanics and memorisation required.

Our examiner, Jo Robertson, first checked Frog Detective 3 years ago. It was re-examined by Andy Robertson and updated 5 weeks ago.