Because I am a big fan of movies like the Maltese Falcon, The Big Sleep or the more recent Black Dahlia, excitement got to me when I heard that Phoenix Online Studios, the folks behind the amazing Cognition: An Erica Reed Thriller, were working on the localization of Face Noir, a game from 2011 that revolves around the same issues and has the same noir "soul" as the flicks quoted before.
Were the folks at POS capable of improving upon the work of the original Italian developers, Mad Orange?
Story
You are Jack Del Nero, a former police officer that got kicked out of the force a few years back and now earns a living as a private detective. Del Nero is clearly disgusted with his life, the many years of low profile cases that mean nothing and pay even less have clearly left a mark on him. Still, in an era where the big depression affects everyone and racial tensions are at an all time high, our private investigator has no other choice but to cope with it, even if that means gaining a nasty alcohol addiction just to be able to withstand it.
The game starts off with Harvey Webber, a wealthy business man that wants to hire you, your objective is a simple one, spy on his step daughter and find out enough evidence that will release him from the obligation of paying her astronomical bills.
Everything seems simple enough, but as the plot evolves you will find yourself trapped in a web of murder, conspiracies and drama.
The overall plot moves along at a decent pace, the quality of it is also acceptable, just leaving a bit to be desired in terms of originality. Everything that happens is pretty much expected in a 30's noir influenced detective story, which is not a bad thing because the noir atmosphere and style is what the game actually does best.
Gameplay
All the pointing and clicking done in Face Noir is pretty much standard, the only thing that stands out is a little mini-game during conversations where you have to match certain words and facts previously "acquired" through investigation. It's a pretty nice idea even if a bit superficial as only the right combination will work and no penalty is given when the player makes a mistake, that means the mini-game turns into a process of trial and error until you get the right match, a shame to see so much potential wasted.
Aside from that, the actual investigation bits can be pretty interesting and fun when they work and flow correctly, too bad the game logic at times gets confusing and especially picky when it comes to the order in which you have to use items, slowing the pace of the game to a crawl and thus making it more frustrating than it actually should be.
There are some other gameplay elements that add a bit of variety to the final experience but never really amount to much more than that, they are nice distractions when you want to move away from all the pointing and clicking but lack consistency, sometimes being detrimental to the overall quality of the game, thankfully most of them are skippable (I would have been stuck in the first lockpicking section forever) and don't affect the pace of the game too much.
Graphics and Sound
Like it was said in the beginning, Face Noir was originally released in 2011, it probably wasn't the prettiest game in the block back then and it certainly isn't now, still, the artistic value of the game's visuals really outweigh the lack of technical prowess. The heavy colors, mixing a lot of grays, blacks and vivid reds carry a lot of emotion and atmosphere into the game, helping the player grasp the ambiance of depression and despair so characteristic of the 1930's.
A pity that the character animations feel so stiff and artificial, when the game gets up close for conversations you can really see how archaic the models look.
The soundtrack is mostly composed of some nice jazzy tunes with a lot of saxophone solos that fit nicely enough within the game's gritty look.
When it comes to the characters actually speaking, it's a whole different story, while most of the main actors do a decent job, even if not great, the quality drastically drops in a few of the supporting characters, totally and immediately killing the immersion of the player. Yes, I am looking at you, Chinese cab driver!
Final Thoughts
I never actually played the original game, from what I read though, the POS version feels a lot better, correcting some of the mistakes that plagued the original like the mandatory and cumbersome 3D inventory, and the unskippable mini-games.
Unfortunately not all is good, POS clearly dropped the ball when it comes to the voice acting, also a few technical improvements would have been nice, especially in terms of character animations and aspect ratio.
Still, if you are someone who enjoys the 1930's gritty atmosphere, you owe it to yourself to give Face Noir a try.
Year of Release: 2013
Platform(s): PC
Developer(s): Mad Orange, Phoenix Online Studios
NRLB would like to thank Phoenix Online Studios for providing a review copy of the game
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