Crime Lab: Body of Evidence (Nintendo DS) Review

Hidden Object puzzles, cryptic clues, point-and-click adventure mechanics, item manipulation, logic conundrums - Crime Lab: Body of Evidence has them all, as well as some instances where the microphone can be utilised, or even the camera on the DSi (XL) can be used to physically wind cranks up, wipe areas clean, or pretend to read your eye print for opening doors! City Interactive has already impressed with its Match 3 effort, Jewels of the Lost Tropical Island on DS, but has definitely upped the ante for Crime Lab, giving fans of the genre a piece of puzzling heaven. There are more than 300 puzzles and riddles included, plus even a hefty supply of mini-games to unlock during this intriguing crime thriller. Just as the Professor Layton games mix a good mystery story betwixt its brain-teasing collection, Crime Lab: Body of Evidence comes complete with a tale of its own.

Taking on the role of a young FBI agent by the name of Nicole Bonnet, players control her as she receives an unusual package in which a complicated mechanism has been included, along with a message from a serial killer, who continues to leave playing cards at the scenes of each crime he commits, thus leading Bonnet on a merry dance, with her only hope being to try to get inside the mind of the psychopathic murderer in order to outwit him and put a stop to the heinous happenings.

As you progress through the story, piecing together various bits of evidence, using numerous items to open up new avenues in the investigation, and interrogating those potentially involved in the dastardly deeds, certain puzzles may impede your progression simply by being a little too clever or tricky for their own good. In Professor Layton’s outings there is the chance to collect hidden hint coins along the way, whilst in Hidden Object titles like Tropical Lost Island the hint option can be used repeatedly, albeit at specified time intervals. In Crime Lab: Body of Evidence, there is no out-and-out choice of skipping a puzzle or gaining clues, yet if the game sees the player fail repeatedly, it offers to bail them out by charging a set number of points (accrued by collecting items and solving parts of the case) in order to bypass the source of the brain ache.

Each section of the main investigation is broken into chapter segments, with a set time limit put in place to add an extra slice of challenge and encourage players to keep making through roads at a decent enough pace. With an hour being given to crack each part, it is generally enough time to reach the conclusion of a chapter, although there may well be the odd moment where purists will repeatedly tackle a tough puzzle instead of skipping it, thus taking longer than expected. Running out of time does not result in a Game Over, however, and simply means that any remaining time on the clock that would otherwise have been translated into bonus points is instead lost.

There is smart use of the touch-screen throughout, be it using the in-game navigation function to move from place-to-place, tapping different areas of a new location to check out further details related to specific objects, interacting with particular site paraphernalia, scrolling along the item list to find something best-suited to the situation at hand, uncovering any items Nicole must acquire, or merely going hands-on with one of the numerous brain-teasing puzzles included. Not only that, though, but City Interactive has seen fit to make use of the dual-screen layout to make navigation and item manipulation as clear as possible, as well as letting players blow into the microphone at times, or, as touched upon earlier, if you own a DSi or DSi XL, use the internal camera functionality.

With ten long chapters to work through, each with a wealth of puzzles and conundrums to tackle, as well as an end-of-chapter ‘Question and Answer’ recap session, little handy reminder messages when finishing a play session then coming back to turn on your DS a few days later (thus refreshing your memory as to where in the investigation you previously were), and a wealth of extras to unlock (including a large batch of Hidden Object maps), Crime Lab: Body of Evidence is not only a fantastic prospect for puzzle fans in general, but is bursting at the seams with content that puts many of its genre stable-mates to shame.