Lack of Evidence

"I walk in eternity."

"Doctor Who: Pyramids of Mars"

Umineko no Naku Koro ni Saku on Switch and PlayStation 4 will be released in January 2021! Let's hope I'll be able to finish the game and write a review by December 2021...

Videogames can provide a unique experience in the mystery genre, as it's an active genre: in most mystery games, the story won't proceed unless you (the player) actively interact with the story and characetrs and solve puzzles, as opposed to mystery plots in novels or films, which will go on regardless of how involved  the reader/viewer is with the plot. Of course, the other side of this story is that in novels or films, you at least don't get stuck in the story simply because you don't know what to do next...

While crime might not be rare in Washington D.C., the murder of Walter Edwards near the John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame was one that caught the attention of everyone. Edwards was not only the chief of the Liberty Town police, he was also in D.C. conducting a secret investigation in cooperation with the FBI. Secret documents pertaining to this investigation, believed to be in Edwards' possession, also disappeared after his death, so initially the police suspects Edwards' death has to do with his assignment, which is also why everyone was shocked to learn that the pistol thought to have killed Edwards was found in the apartment of his eldest son Frederick, who goes to college in Washington D.C. The local police is satisfied that they have found their man with Frederick, who apparently had a fight with his father earlier that day. Many people who know Edwards and his family personally aren't quite convinced though and the Liberty Town Police Station decides to send their man J.B. Harold to Washington to investigate the death of their deceased boss. Not only is J.B. personally acquainted with Edwards and his wife, J.B. also knows Washington D.C. well because he studied here ten years ago and as he starts poking around in the city, he finds he still has some old college friends in the city who are willing to help him with his investigation in the videogame D.C. Connection, originally released in 1989 for PC-98 systems, but it was later ported to other systems like i-mode feature phones. The most "current" version of D.C. Connection is the 2011 iOS version, which is the version I played.

D.C Connection is the fourth J.B. Harold game published by the late Riverhillsoft, a Japanese company which specialized in mystery-themed adventure games for the PC in the late 80s-early 90s. While it follows Murder Club, Manhattan Requiem and Kiss of Murder, it's considered the third numbered entry in the series, because Kiss of Murder is considered a parallel world version of the second entry, Manhattan Requiem. In terms of gameplay, D.C. Connection is very similar to the previous Riverhillsoft adventure games (which also includes Kohaku no Yuigon), so when I started this game, my intentions were to complete it in just a few hours, a perfect way to spend my Sunday afternoon. I mean, I already knew very well how Suzuki Rika designed these games, so I could hardly be that far off with my estimate of how long it would take me, right? In the end though, it took me at least double the time I had anticipated, and I had to spread it across three days...

As always in this series, D.C. Connection starts in a non-linear manner: after the short prologue, the player (J.B.) has the freedom to visit more than a dozen different locations spread across Washington D.C., where you'll find suspects, witnesses and other persons willing or unwilling to assist you with your investigation. You can decide the order in which you tackle these persons yourself and you progress, you'll uncover more locations and people to see, and in the end, you may have to interact with over 20-30 different locations and persons. Speaking with these people on various topics like other characters or their alibis will provide you with information and ultimately, the J.B. Harold games are about collecting information: by collecting all available information on a character or a certain topic, you can induce characters to give you new information, for example because you noticed a contradiction in the statement of Character A after you collected the statements of everyone else. This new piece of information allows you to press everyone again on old and new topics, and rinse and repeat to progress in the story. These games are about collecting a lot of information on a lot of topics (I'd estimate about 50 different topics) in a non-linear manner: this is what gives these games a unique vibe, as they are really focused on bringing you the experience of a cop who does his job by going over the crime scenes dozens of time and repeating procedural questionings of witnesses, but it can definitely be a boring experience too, and at times very frustrating too.

I have the feeling the story of D.C. Connection is a bit longer than previous games, but what really made my playthrough of this game take so long was I got stuck a lot. In the original PC-98 version of the game, it was possible to get actually stuck in a way you could never proceed again (a bug), but while it's technically not possible to arrive at a state where it's genuinely impossible to proceed anymore in the iOS version, it can be veeeeeeery difficult finding that one piece of statement you missed that allows you proceed in the story. With approximately 30 characters who at any time have about 20-30 topics to talk about, and other locations you can check, it's pretty easy to miss that little piece of dialogue that is necessary to move the plot forward, especially if it's a very insignificant message. In D.C. Connection, the plot can move forward if you have collected all information about a certain character or topic, or when you reach certain percentages of the total game progression (there's a bar that shows how far you are in the game). Sometimes, you're just stuck because a story event will only happen at 46,6% of the game, while you're at 46,5% and accidentally skipped that one single piece of dialogue with that one character who obviously has nothing to do with the crime, telling you how they have nothing to do with the crime, but which will still add that 0,1% to the bar... It happened more than a few times I really didn't know what I had missed, so then I was forced to talk with every character about every topic once again just to see what I had missed. And this takes ages of just sifting through dialogue you have seen already. And despite the age we live in, there's strangely enough no full walkthrough/guide or even a full Let's Play of D.C. Connection available anywhere, so whenever I got stuck I had to do with that hint book came with the original PC-98 release and only explains specific parts of the game (and naturally, I always got stuck on the parts not explained in that hint book). D.C. Connection really feels like an old PC adventure game: looking for that necessary piece of dialogue is at least as vexing as old-fashioned pixel hunting and it's always something small you missed.

Despite these frustations though, I think D.C. Connection is one of the better J.B. Harold games. Like I said, I have the feeling the story is a bit grander in scale this time and we also have a new mechanic in this game where you can make allies out of certain characters who can help you in different ways: the taxi driver Nelson for example can shadow suspects for you and find out where they were going, adding new locations on your map (Is the fish market ever used in this game by the way?). Story-wise, D.C. Connection is also plotted more tightly than previous games, with a plot that keeps you guessing who murdered Edwards and for what reason. There are also some major plot developments halfway through the game that keep you on your toes. The plot also involves J.B.'s own past a bit, as he meets old college friends and reminisces about days past (certain parts were already mentioned in Manhattan Requiem). If I hadn't get stuck so often in D.C. Connection on very minor obstacles, I have no doubts this would've been my favorite entry in the series.

Despite a few minor innovations, D.C. Connection follows the same formula as the previous J.B. Harold games and thus offers a very sober, down-to-earth mystery adventure where you, as the player, simply have to digest a lot of information through conversations with other characters. There's not much genuine puzzle solving to be done by the player themselves, but it can be very difficult finding the right triggers that allow the story to move forward, more so than in previous games I think. Definitely wouldn't recommend anyone to start playing these Riverhillsoft adventure games with this one, but for fans of the series, D.C. Connection is certainly an entry you shouldn't miss as it's perhaps the most polished one in terms of story and characters.

Original Japanese title(s): 『D.C.コネクション』