September 8, 2008

Investigating Unsolved Crimes with Director of Project Management P.J. Snavely
By Louis Bedigian

“...To have blood, violence and shootouts, [Unsolved Crimes] has more of a Hill Street Blues kind of feel.”

The popularity of fictional crime scene investigations started long before TV series like CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. Whether it's the intrigue of the case, the demand for justice, or the curiosity to know what really happened, people love watching others solve crimes. If Unsolved Crimes, a new action/puzzle/investigation game from Empire Interactive, has its way, people may soon enjoy solving crimes themselves.

"What I really like about what the developers have done here," said P.J. Snavely, Director of Project Management for Empire Interactive. "[Is that] in each case you'll get the briefing from your lieutenant and your partner will be with you. You'll hear the suspects, clues, hear the evidence, so you've got enough to go on and pretty much put you in the environment going into the crime scene. As you would do in real life, exploring the environment and looking for clues.

"When you find things that are specific to the case or that your partner wants you to explore a little further, you get a little query drop down in the right-hand corner. Your partner will then kind of walk you through the query with a series of questions. You basically explore your environment until you get to... I don't want to call it checkpoints, that's not what it really is. And then in between cases you'll get these action stages that give you a nice break from other parts and offers more twitch-based gameplay."

Unsolved Crimes packs nine different cases and five action stages. "We use the touch screen a lot to do things like turn a dial, writing notes, [moving] puzzle pieces around, things like that," said Snavely. "The game basically has only one real mode, and that's the story mode. After you've completed a case you can go back and re-play it to get a better grade, or see where you went wrong when you initially approached the case."

Unsolved Crimes incorporates elements of an "action game, a 3D crime investigation and a crime quiz." Insecticide attempted to do the same thing but was ultimately unsuccessful. If you're familiar with that game, what makes yours different?

P.J. Snavely: For me I think the main difference is the setting. It's one thing to have a detective game in an insect world. It's a little different to have blood, violence and shootouts, more of a Hill Street Blues kind of feel, rather than A Bug's Life with a detective story.

What things have you done to ensure each of the three elements are thoroughly developed and fully realized?

P.J. Snavely: Well, a big thing here was to make sure the difficulty curve was where we wanted it to be, not too hard or too easy, and that people actually enjoyed all three elements. It's not much of a game if it's fun to explore in 3D but once you get anywhere else it's just garbage. We worked really hard to make sure all three elements worked fine and that they made sense.

How are you going to solve the crime(s) within this game? Are there any touch screen puzzles?

P.J. Snavely: There are actually. You'll go through the case, and if you find, for example, a torn up piece of a memo... Your partner will think of it as a jigsaw puzzle and say, "Do you want to take this one?" And you'll see it on the touch screen, the pieces of the memo that you have to put together.

Tell us about the story. Is there an overall crime you're trying to solve, or a series of them?

P.J. Snavely: You're a rookie detective in the New York Police Department. [In the beginning] you go through a couple of basic cases just to teach you the ropes. Then you'll go through smaller cases until you get to the bigger, overarching storyline which involves a kidnapping. It's not a totally linear storyline, but there is kind of an overreaching goal at the end.

In what ways is the DS being used to enhance Unsolved Crimes' presentation?

P.J. Snavely: The transitions from your office or the crime scene back to an action stage. You'll see some nice transitions with both screens that have a real nice cinematic feel. It doesn't feel like a DS game and I don't think it plays like one either.

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