Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Silver Earring

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Releasing a new game for a genre that has been in a slow but seemingly irreversible decline for around six years requires either a publisher with guts or a developer that is committed to keeping the torch alive. Digital Jesters is a plucky publisher which has barely been in the business for a year. The developers of this game, Frogware already have two adventure games under their belt. The collaboration between these two companies brings us a Sherlock Holmes sleuth-em up, the mysteriously titled 'The Case of the Silver Earring'. In splendid drawing room murder style, the game sets up its premise. Wealthy construction tycoon Sir Melvyn Bromsby is about to make an important business related announcement to his guests, Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson among them, partying at his sumptuous Sherringford Hall when a single gunshot rings out, fatally wounding the man in the heart.

You start the game off playing as Holmes but you will get the opportunity to switch between the good detective and his faithful sidekick. Played in a third person perspective, you navigate the sleuths around the scenery with the left mouse button. Clicking on a person or hotspot will perform the relevant action and a click of the opposite button will bring up the inventory. From here you can whip out the all-important magnifying glass, scrape up a mystery substance into the test tube for later analysis, peruse the gathered clues or flick open the notebook. This is a comprehensive repository of all the conversations, clues and items of interest that the investigators come across in the course of their investigations. You will need to reference this quite a lot, so its good to know that it is well laid out and easy to navigate. At the end of every level there is a quiz which will test you on your knowledge of the clues gathered and how they add up. While not the trickiest thing in the world the quizzes help to splash a little variety into the cocktail.

The player also gets to travel to Holmes' home on Baker Street where you have access to his lab. It's here that you can analyse the various clues. There's a Bunsen burner, microscope and chemical analysis to play with and while the mechanics of the game remain the same this extra variety helps to keep the game fresh and atmospheric. While the third person perspective allows for a greater sense of place, navigating around the locations can still become a frustrating case of trial and error. There are a lot of invisible barriers that inhibit your movement and the cursor sweeping method that is often necessary to clear the room of clues also needs to be employed to get out of certain rooms and environments.

The voice acting is varied and it is obvious the developers have searched farther than their own Q&A department to provide the many voices in the game. The two main protagonists are both really rather good, although Watson and a few of the other characters do sometime show cracks in their respective actor's abilities. In general the pace of the dialogue is snappy enough to prevent aural tedium setting in. Watson does look a little comical with his googly eyes and the models seem to come from the same crucible as those from The Sims, with their elongated torsos and limbs.

Saying this, even in 1024x768 resolution the graphics are very crisp and clear, and while the animation of the background environments are minimal they convey the sense of a charming period world. However, the facial animations are somewhat stiff and don't sync up all too well. The interaction between characters and their environment is also a mite patchy, most noticeably when the pointer doesn't always become active when placed directly over an actionable object.

The system requirements are very forgiving so as long as your computer was made in the last four or so years you should be fine running this game. There are over forty different 19th century Victorian locations to explore and a wide range of characters to interrogate and interact with and with gameplay of around 20-30 hours the cheap asking price will deliver good value for money. Especially if you buy the game in the UK, where you get a free DVD of the Basil Rathbone movie Secret Weapon included in the package.

The sedate gameplay does not induce sleep but a feeling of tranquillity similar to the buzz from opium. The Case of the Silver Earring is not going to revitalise the adventure genre but it is well coded and written and acted with some flair and passion. Even if you are not an obsessive fan of the genre you could do yourself no harm by searching out this game, for it offers something different from the usual PC fare and it's a pleasant way to while away some lazy hours. Just don't forget your deerstalker.

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By Sam Gibson