Murder on the Titanic (Nintendo 3DS) Review

Rewind to 1912, long before everyone owned a Nintendo 3DS and many a year prior to the craze of Hidden Object puzzle titles. Yes, just a few years back then, obviously! To mark the 100th anniversary of the infamous Titanic journey, Inspector Magnusson's Murder on the Titanic has been ported across to both Nintendo DS and its 3D-enabled sibling; except without Inspector Magnusson featuring in the title and a whole host of elements that made the PC game supremely enjoyable sadly missing from this portable edition.
 
Players take on the role of an assistant to globetrotter Professor Jacob Larsson, boarding what is meant to be a memorable voyage upon the venerable cruiser to New York. However, despite it indeed turning out to be one for the books, it is for all the wrong reasons. A gruesome murder has taken place deep in the bowels of the mighty vessel and at Captain Smith's behest Larsson is enlisted to solve the conundrum of who could possibly commit such a heinous crime. Thus begins the latest Hidden Object title to arrive on the Nintendo scene, this time complete with…well, no real 3D at all, to be honest, other than the main title and two small icons on the upper screen. In fact, most of the time the actual 3D light turns off completely, even during cut-scenes, making this basically the Nintendo DS game in disguise, merely playing at the correct ratio on the 3DS screens and costing an extra £5 for the privilege.

Sounds like a disaster, right? Well, not exactly as the content of the story is moderately interesting and ties together the fifty or so scenes depicting the luxurious liner, both inside and out, quite nicely. Unfortunately, there is no freedom of movement, with everything merely flowing from scene-to-scene and puzzle-to-puzzle automatically after completion of whatever task is currently at hand. There are sections filled with a plethora of carefully placed items to uncover and a long list to help with finding the missing pieces, plus a few interesting sliding tiles and block challenges, word jumbles, and even switch / trigger trials to keep the old grey matter working hard. With the PC version's 'Skip a Puzzle' function removed, for unknown reasons, it means getting stuck can cause major headaches as there is no way to progress until they are deciphered. Thankfully, the sense of satisfaction once a tough nut has been cracked is marvellous enough to keep frustration from taking over and spoiling proceedings completely.
 
Whilst Murder on the Titanic may not be the longest of titles (cynically thinking, perhaps this is why puzzles cannot be skipped in this iteration…), and sadly it features too many regurgitated Hidden Object layouts, the short ride is certainly fun (to a degree). With the core team from City Interactive departing to form its own group, chances of seeing superb puzzle adventures found on DS (Vampire Moon: Mystery of the Hidden Sun, Chronicles of Mystery: The Secret Tree of Life, Crime Lab: Body of Evidence, Murder in Venice) head over to the 3DS for the moment are slim, so anyone hoping to get their fill of Hidden Object puzzlers will have to settle for this, but should not be too disappointed with Murder on the Titanic. However, the differences between the DS and 3DS versions are negligible, other than the higher cost of the latter. Developer Joindots may have the playing field to itself for a while, but hopefully that does not lead to complacency and its next effort is closer to its PC source material, taking advantage of the increased power of the 3DS.