The Roottrees are Dead

The best thing a puzzle game can do is make you feel smart; The Roottrees Are Dead made me feel like the second coming of Sherlock Holmes. Its exceptional mystery is bolstered by stimulating puzzle-solving, a satisfying ending, and a cozy nostalgia that makes it weirdly relaxing to mull over a cup of coffee. Don’t let this quirky search for answers pass you by.

The Roottrees Are Dead is a fascinating tale of a famous family with secrets in their closet. Exposing those secrets is some of the most fun I’ve had with a game in a long time, and anyone who has enjoyed similar investigative titles like Her Story, Return of the Obra Dinn, or The Case of the Golden Idol needs to look into the history of the Roottrees.

A great detective game gets a lavish remake and an improved expansion in one essential package.

The Roottrees are Dead is a great video game for any players who like experiences like Obra Din or the two Golden Idol titles. It feels good to investigate, starting with a list of names, and reveal the rich history of an entire family. The feeling that there’s something more to learn, to understand, is always present and the game has a decent hint system to help players who get stuck. As cool as the feeling of discovery is, the game is limited in terms of mechanics. Players search for text strings, read results, and make connections. The cool soundtrack helps with immersion, but the loop can become repetitive after one or two hours. The Roottrees are Dead is unlikely to draw new players to the deduction genre but has all the ingredients needed to keep fans engaged in the long run.

As a carefully crafted mystery game, it won’t be for everyone. But for those who enjoy slow-burn investigations that reward patience and persistence, this title delivers a satisfying experience.

The Roottrees are Dead, just like the giants in the image of which it models itself, is unmissable for any aspiring detectives out there seeking a good mystery to unravel. The game delivers a lean experience, user-friendly no matter the skill level, and now in Brazilian Portuguese as well.

The game does a great job of letting players logically put together clues. It hides them well at the center of the Roottree's web, but the farther out it goes, it may grate over time. The writing is worth absorbing as players go along and this feels like a real family that could have existed. While this story is certainly told in a way that makes it one of the more unique mystery games out there, it's the method in which players are asked to discover it that holds it back.

If you enjoyed Obra Dinn or Her Story (or just gossiping), this is an easy recommendation. The puzzles and storytelling are surprisingly fun.Also, whoever worked on the Chinese localization did an excellent job.

The only true "Obra Dinn-like" I've found. A very well-presented mystery that's fun to fiddle around with. Its premise and characters are amusing but not particularly compelling, but it will definitely scratch the same itch as Return of the Obra Dinn.

A TON of reading but if you can stomach that then this is one of the best mystery games made in a while. The in-game search engine didn't make me feel like I had to be spot on every time with what I wanted to search and the story about this wealthy family is interesting enough to get you to want to play more.

Really good sleuthing game about filling out a family tree, but it's a lot to take in at first. Because of that, sorting notes efficiently and knowing when to go back to them can be tough to remember. And since the game fairly long, unless you take perfect notes from the start, it can be hard to remember who or what thread led to where if you first looked into something several hours prior. But, the game itself in concept and story are both great and it feels really good getting that piece of the puzzle locked in. Following threads from search to search and digging down into different wormholes is really fun as well. However, you need to have some pretty good note taking and reading comprehension skills to not have to retread some old searches and rethink things. Sometimes the one thing you need is buried in an obscure search followed by a one off line you might not have thought anything off the first time you read it. There is just A LOT of text in the game, so it can be over bearing at times, but that's what the notes are for. And there is a good system for taking notes in game and linking to articles so you can go back to where you saw a specific piece of data, it works really well. Overall the game is overwhelming at first, but once you get in the flow, it is very rewarding and engaging to put everything in its place. The game is also very long, as there are basically 2 full trees to put together and a side mode, all together taking about 20 hours to complete. It scratches that same itch Obra Dinn did and if you are a fan of that game, this is like a text based version of that more or less. It's well worth your time and money.