Coinciding with the release of the recent film, Warner Bros. and Frogwares have come up with an iPhone app to help promote. The game of course mimics some portions of the film. The game is basically a collection of mini-games with a few mysteries interwoven.

• Insights - Find hidden clues and use them to unravel the mystery. (put the pieces together to find the next step)
• Puzzle Boxing - Fight as Sherlock in a bout of fisticuffs and prove yourself a superior pugilist - some fun actually. (Timed tapping)
• Lock Picking - Find the path through the lock to open its secrets. (Classic pipe-connecting puzzle type game)
• Foot Chase - Chase your quarry through the winding streets of Sherlock’s London (Classic pipe-connecting puzzle type game)

This Sherlock and Watson are of course modelled after the actors playing them in the film. You don’t really see them much on screen so it’s not all that important. The game consists of an introductory case, much like a tutorial - The Missing Memento. Once solved you can take on the Case of the Innocent Man and begin the meat of the game.

While the game is not extremely challenging there is some merit to it and it can be a fun little romp through the 1890’s. Many of the puzzles are solved simply by talking to people then assembling the clues they give you. Sometimes they prove challenging but usually they’re solved quickly enough. Still the game is quite entertaining.

The graphics are a standard point-and-click style and while there are jagged edges and squarish models, for the iPhone they’re not too shabby. The sound is fairly basic and pointless at times. There are repetitive ambient sounds and some strange violin-like sounds for success and failure. They sound clipped as if they were taken from a much larger composition and just thrown in for some sort of aubible feedback.

You have to solve particular pieces at particular places even if you have assembled all the clues properly. It’s not the greatest as many should be able to be solved wherever you are. After all, you’re Sherlock Holmes! Laughably when you win a fight it tells you that it was because of your detective skills. There is also a lot of back and forth, retracing your steps and revisiting past locations. Oddly, I found a clue in an alleyway which I thought was very out of place.

Overall the game is interesting and poses some challenge from time to time, especially later in the case. While the graphics and sound are slightly lacking they are not so bad that they detract from the game. For an iPhone-based point and click adventure type game, especially one based on a film, this game is certainly worth a couple quid.

Perhaps if it sells well enough they might have updates at a later date that add new mysteries to solve or might have in-game purchases for a quid a mystery, that would certainly give the game some longevity.

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