Murder is sexy
After my somewhat-disappointing trip through RiME, I glanced at Tequila Works's resume and was like... oh, yeah, The Sexy Brutale! Yet another game that looked good, I bought, then got lost in my backlog.
The Sexy Brutale has a really compelling hook: murder mystery party! Also ... time travel! Imagine if the time-warping in The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask was applied to Clue, and you've pretty much got it.
Crucially, one of this party's rules is that you shouldn't be seen by other guests -- so there's no interviewing and no direct intervention. Instead, you'll observe guests' movements by peeping through keyholes, and learn their "loop" through the course of the day, to figure out how they die. Then you rewind time and manipulate the environment to, hopefully, prevent their grisly deaths.
This time-detective mechanic is at its best when tracking a guest spirals out into tertiary tasks, like overhearing a password to unlock a door, or watching someone open a secret passage. Unfortunately the puzzles never get more complex than two or three steps; but as it is, figuring out each guest's death puzzle is still enough detective-work to feel pretty cool.
As you track the guests, you'll pick up hints about what's going on in this murder-mansion, and each guest's relationship with its mysterious Marquis. The Sexy Brutale does a great job of ambient storytelling, as the conversations you overhear start to stitch together into a bigger overall story.
That story goes in some unexpected directions, but it's internally consistent, making sense within its established world. Many games with this kind of storytelling ambition end up tripping over themselves, but The Sexy Brutale concludes with a satisfying explanation for everything.
It mostly nails its aesthetics, too, with a distinctive chibi art style that highlights the guests' masks, and UI flourishes that fit right into the theme of a casino party mansion. The soundtrack is ... great, sometimes, if not all the time; some tracks are moody and thrilling, but at least one became really grating over the course of multiple time loops.
The Sexy Brutale is fun and engaging, though its puzzles are pretty simple and make me wish for more layers (and non-linearity) in a future iteration. Also for some better controls and system design, as I frequently had to mash the door-open button a few times before it "took," then watched the game stutter through loading in the next room.
Nevertheless, it's a really cool experience that unravels a uniquely interesting story, and I'd definitely look forward to another game in this format.
Better than: Her Story, Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors
Not as good as: The Witness (2016)
Maybe this needs comparison to: Return of the Obra Dinn?
Progress: 100%