[quote]A review copy was provided by the developer.[/quote]
[quote]Follow my Curator page, [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41363546-Fruit-N-Doggie-Reviews/]Fruit N Doggie Reviews,[/url] so you can be updated whenever I post a new review.[/quote]
[h1]Overall Rating - Seriously Flawed ★★☆☆☆[/h1]
[h1]First Impressions[/h1]
I'm not sure whether the idea or word play came first, but I really like the title CluDoku (CD). It's not really a 50/50 blend of both concepts, but lightly borrows a little bit of Clue and Sudoku, in order to make something different. Unfortunately, it winds up being kind of bland, without many options available for changing up the gameplay.
[h1]Gameplay[/h1]
There's two game modes, but both start with the same goal. Using the various descriptions, find out where each suspect is on the board. I wasn't sure how Sudoku fit at first, yet it's pretty simple. Nobody on the board will have another person standing in the same row or column as them, ignoring the victim. For the basic version, whoever was in the room with the victim was the murderer. Investigation mode switches into a second phase, with three possible murder weapons. Each suspect will provide a statement, and from what I've seen, anything that doesn't mention the weapon will be correct, so they can be ignored. All statements about the weapon have to be checked, but based on wording, there will be a combination where one weapon will have a single lie told. This is the correct weapon, and whoever told the lie was the murderer.
Despite what others have said, I've seen a difference in the hard clues. The structure and wording covers things the easier difficulties didn't, such as one person being further left than another. To me, it seems like it was meant to be more complex. When working on these hard puzzles, I have made a mistake, and somehow screwed up the solution. Originally, I thought this was all my fault, but now I don't think that's the case, because I discovered a clear contradiction, which I used for two of my screenshots. A puzzle was made where a suspect is in the same room as the victim, yet also next to an object that wasn't in there. This is a massive problem. If the logic can generate an obviously impossible puzzle, there's no way to know any other one will work either.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3761814593
[h1]Controls[/h1]
Although I could easily see this title working with a mouse, I was surprised to find it very easy to play with my controller as well. It can be a bit slow moving to each box on the largest grid, but it's otherwise intuitive and responsive to mark squares with the corresponding characters. You can block out squares if you want to, yet it's not necessary for making progress. What's important is placing all the characters in their correct spot, and if you've chosen Investigation Mode, selecting the correct murder weapon and suspect.
[h1]Story[/h1]
Since it borrows from Clue, this would have been the means to incorporate a bit of plot into the game. However, oddly enough, the developer uses the same character portraits for each map, and even the first letter in everybody's name. Nobody winds up having a consistent name, like Professor Plum or Colonel Mustard, meaning there's no means of establishing defined characters. Instead, the guy in red whose name starts with an A might be Amir in one case, and Alvin next time. If each character is always going to look the same, and be put into the same order every case because the names are listed alphabetically, then there's no point in making slight alterations to what those names are.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3761813265
[h1]Visuals[/h1]
Sudoku is nothing but a grid of numbers, so you'd think various locations filled with furniture would be more interesting to look at. However, because every puzzle is randomly generated, and the rules for making them don't consider real-life logic, it leads to arrangements that don't look natural or realistic. Rooms often jut into one another in odd ways, making you wonder where the doors would be, and how you'd ever get into some places. Even though I played several puzzles, because it's common to have similar types of furniture in one place, I'd have to refer to the chart to distinguish between them. You wouldn't believe how many iterations of chairs there are for a game with four maps. Also, unless you have a fairly large monitor, it does get more difficult to see everything on the largest grids because everything has to shrink in scale.
[h1]Sound Design[/h1]
Despite having four locations, the same song plays no matter what set-up you create with the settings. It's fitting enough, as a calm piano tune plays in the background, although it might be a touch calm for the scene of a murder. Regardless, with only a single tune in the entire game, if you were to play for the length of time suggested with achievements for clearing 100 puzzles, this song will wear its welcome out far before then. I'm once again a bit surprised how the developer wanted to diversify the settings, yet didn't accompany it with matching tunes. Even with the music, it's an incredibly quiet game, as it's not very loud by default, and there's no other sound effects as you work through the puzzle.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3761813689
[h1]Pros[/h1]
🌟 Investigation Mode makes the game feel more like Clue, but it barely adds anymore time or complexity to the puzzle you've already solved. Figuring out everyone's location is the main focus.
🌟 It's a novel idea for the kind of logic puzzles you'd solve in grade school, “Johnny isn't in space A or D. Tim was not standing next to a girl.”
[h1]Cons[/h1]
❌ Windows are one of the hardest things to check for. They aren't as obvious as a piece of furniture filling an entire square.
❌ It can be a bit annoying when a clue means a person could be in as many as a dozen different places.
❌ Having to check between all the variations of chair gets old after a while.
[h1]Tips[/h1]
🔍 When describing a person's proximity next to an object, the person can't be in another room. For instance, if a potted plant is in the kitchen, and there's an open square to the right in the office, that wouldn't be a valid place the person could be. Otherwise though, any other opening is valid.
🔍 Certain objects cannot overlap with people. They sort of count as free squares, because you know a person would never be there.
[h1]Final Thoughts[/h1]
Even before I discovered an impossible puzzle, I was starting to feel a bit bored with the randomly generated puzzles in CD. Once you've figured out the game's logic and approach to creating puzzles, it becomes easy enough to solve them. The bigger issue is that the different maps don't in reality change anything, it's only a surface level alteration. Unless you wanted to earn the achievements, there's no mechanics or in-game progress to reward your commitment. Establishing distinct characters and developing a series of murders to solve might have been a way to hold someone's attention longer. However, adding the problem of something being wrong with the internal logic to create hard puzzles makes the current release almost unplayable. I never had this issue on the other difficulties, but not being able to trust the puzzle generator is a massive deal breaker.
[quote][url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/32732116-IndieGems/]Follow our curator page: [b]IndieGems[/b] if you like and want to see more reviews like this one.[/url][/quote]
[table]
[tr]
[th]PC Specs[/th]
[th]Performance[/th]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Ryzen 2700
RTX 2070
16GB RAM
ADATA SSD
1920x1080
[/td]
[td]The game ran without incident on default settings.
💖 - CD is healthy
[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]
