This game was reviewed using Version 1.0.4. Your experience on other versions may vary.

An excellent tribute to the point-and-click adventure games of the past that quickly cemented itself as one of my favorite games of 2024. The puzzles are a fun challenge, everything outside the gameplay is just phenomenal, and the worst I can say is that it sometimes gets caught in the trappings of old point-and-click design (e.g. confusing puzzle logic, unhelpful hints). Still, it's nowhere near bad enough to dissuade me from recommending it.

Loco Motive is a point-and-click puzzle game about a murder mystery where you are the prime suspect—all three of them, actually. The story takes place in the 1930s aboard the Reuss Express luxury steam train, where its wealthy owner Lady Unterwald was set to give an important speech in front of her family and close business associates. Lady Unterwald is assassinated before she can finish her speech, however, and you follow the events that happen next through the perspective of three of the train's passengers: Arthur, the late Unterwald's estate attorney; Herman, a writer of fictional detective novels that's in way over his head; and Diana, an undercover agent who's here to...well, that's classified. I can spare you the rant and just say that Loco Motive is not only a really good game, but easily one of my favorite games of 2024.

If you're a fan of old-school point-and-click games, then you know what to expect when it comes to gameplay. You wander around the map talking to everyone you see and shoving everything that isn't nailed down into your comically-oversized pockets, and then you try to solve puzzles that usually boil down to "use [this item you stole] on [that thing over there] in order to [do something wacky that progresses the plot]"—and trust me, I mean all of this in the most affectionate way. It's not always that straightforward, though: sometimes you have to combine items together, and some items are even red herrings that don't get used at all. If you get stuck, there's a built-in hint system available for most of the game that they cleverly incorporate into the narrative: a phone hotline where you contact famous detective Dirk Chiselton (yes, that's his real name) to help you work out any current puzzles. It's a lot of fun, but it doesn't always escape some of the common quirks of point-and-click puzzle design: you can often collect items long before you have a logical reason to do so (though the writing does lampshade this from time to time), some puzzles use bigger leaps in logic than you might be comfortable with, and it's possible to find yourself stuck on a puzzle where the hint only tells you the part you already solved. I never found it to devolve into "moon logic" territory or anything, and every solution did make sense in hindsight even if I struggled to figure it out without a little help.

That's really the only negative point I have towards the game, because everything else is just fantastic. The pixel art style is very reminiscent of the golden age of LucasArts and Sierra games, and the close-up artwork they throw in from time to time reminds me a lot of the old Humongous Entertainment games. I know these comparisons are done to death every time a new point-and-click game hits the market, but can you really blame me this time? If I hadn't seen the marketing before launch, you could've told me that this was a re-release from the DOS era and I might've believed you. The only things that would betray that identity at a glance are the wider color palate and a certain fluidity in the animation that make it feel a little more modern, yet not so different that it falls out of line with the old-school aesthetic.

Speaking of old-school aesthetic, almost all of the game's soundtrack consists of good ol' jazz noir tracks to fit the 1930s setting. The soundtrack was composed by Paul Zimmerman, who also did the music for Luna's Fishing Garden, Wildfrost, and a few others; and he knocked it out of the park with this one. I might be biased because I'm a sucker for jazz music in video games, but I think it manages to nail both the 1930s feel and the "hard-boiled detective noir" feel without being so hard-boiled that it stops fitting in with the otherwise lighthearted and silly nature of the game. If you get to the end of this review and decide you want to get the game, I'd definitely suggest getting the soundtrack DLC along with it.

Much of the fun from a point-and-click game tends to come from the writing, and that's especially the case here. Despite the morbid premise of "old lady assassination", it's a slapstick comedy at heart, and thankfully both the physical and verbal gags land more often than not. Sure, most of the jokes are really corny, but that's the type of humor that I like, and it got a lot of good laughs out of me during my playthrough. It doesn't rely much on the kind of referential humor that's bound to be outdated shortly after launch (e.g. internet memes), save for a couple "blink and you'll miss it" gags and an extended segment that plays on the modern-day use of machines and AI to analyze/grade creative works—one can only hope that last one will become a thing of the past, anyway. It doesn't try to do anything super emotional or complex in its narrative, but I don't really think it needs to—it's just supposed to be something that you can laugh at, and that's exactly what it is.

Suffice to say that the writing is entertaining on its own, but the voice acting is what pushes it over the top. I don't think there was a single performance here that I would describe as anything less than great, the only exceptions being the ones that somehow managed to be even better. My favorite had to be Sean Chiplock as Arthur Ackerman, who did such a good job pretending to be a man that loves bureaucratic paperwork more than life itself that I'm half-convinced he wasn't actually pretending. There were others that stood out to me, like Antonio Greco as Donny Donato, but I will stress again that every VA here delivered an excellent performance and added so, so much charm to the experience.

"Charming" really is the best word to describe it, because Loco Motive practically has charm coming out of its pores. It endeared itself to me almost immediately when I realized that every interaction point had its own flavor text instead of just "Examine X" or "Take Y", and it kept me constantly entertained like that for almost all of my 10-12 hour run—I left the game open in the background sometimes, so I don't know exactly how long it was. It doesn't matter, though, because it was well worth the purchase no matter how long it happened to take me.

[b][u]This game was reviewed using Version 1.0.4. Your experience on other versions may vary.[/u][/b] [h3][b][u]Short Answer:[/u][/b][/h3] An excellent tribute to the point-and-click adventure games of the past that quickly cemented itself as one of my favorite games of 2024. The puzzles are a fun challenge, everything outside the gameplay is just phenomenal, and the worst I can say is that it sometimes gets caught in the trappings of old point-and-click design (e.g. confusing puzzle logic, unhelpful hints). Still, it's nowhere near bad enough to dissuade me from recommending it. [h3][b][u]Long Answer:[/u][/b][/h3] [i]Loco Motive[/i] is a point-and-click puzzle game about a murder mystery where you are the prime suspect—all three of them, actually. The story takes place in the 1930s aboard the Reuss Express luxury steam train, where its wealthy owner Lady Unterwald was set to give an important speech in front of her family and close business associates. Lady Unterwald is assassinated before she can finish her speech, however, and you follow the events that happen next through the perspective of three of the train's passengers: Arthur, the late Unterwald's estate attorney; Herman, a writer of fictional detective novels that's in way over his head; and Diana, an undercover agent who's here to...well, that's classified. I can spare you the rant and just say that [i]Loco Motive[/i] is not only a really good game, but easily one of my favorite games of 2024. If you're a fan of old-school point-and-click games, then you know what to expect when it comes to gameplay. You wander around the map talking to everyone you see and shoving everything that isn't nailed down into your comically-oversized pockets, and then you try to solve puzzles that usually boil down to "use [this item you stole] on [that thing over there] in order to [do something wacky that progresses the plot]"—and trust me, I mean all of this in the most affectionate way. It's not always that straightforward, though: sometimes you have to combine items together, and some items are even red herrings that don't get used at all. If you get stuck, there's a built-in hint system available for most of the game that they cleverly incorporate into the narrative: a phone hotline where you contact famous detective Dirk Chiselton (yes, that's his real name) to help you work out any current puzzles. It's a lot of fun, but it doesn't always escape some of the common quirks of point-and-click puzzle design: you can often collect items long before you have a logical reason to do so (though the writing does lampshade this from time to time), some puzzles use bigger leaps in logic than you might be comfortable with, and it's possible to find yourself stuck on a puzzle where the hint only tells you the part you already solved. I never found it to devolve into "moon logic" territory or anything, and every solution did make sense in hindsight even if I struggled to figure it out without a little help. That's really the only negative point I have towards the game, because everything else is just fantastic. The pixel art style is very reminiscent of the golden age of LucasArts and Sierra games, and the close-up artwork they throw in from time to time reminds me a lot of the old Humongous Entertainment games. I know these comparisons are done to death every time a new point-and-click game hits the market, but can you really blame me this time? If I hadn't seen the marketing before launch, you could've told me that this was a re-release from the DOS era and I might've believed you. The only things that would betray that identity at a glance are the wider color palate and a certain fluidity in the animation that make it feel a little more modern, yet not so different that it falls out of line with the old-school aesthetic. Speaking of old-school aesthetic, almost all of the game's soundtrack consists of good ol' jazz noir tracks to fit the 1930s setting. The soundtrack was composed by Paul Zimmerman, who also did the music for [i]Luna's Fishing Garden[/i], [i]Wildfrost[/i], and a few others; and he knocked it out of the park with this one. I might be biased because I'm a sucker for jazz music in video games, but I think it manages to nail both the 1930s feel and the "hard-boiled detective noir" feel without being so hard-boiled that it stops fitting in with the otherwise lighthearted and silly nature of the game. If you get to the end of this review and decide you want to get the game, I'd definitely suggest getting the soundtrack DLC along with it. Much of the fun from a point-and-click game tends to come from the writing, and that's especially the case here. Despite the morbid premise of "old lady assassination", it's a slapstick comedy at heart, and thankfully both the physical and verbal gags land more often than not. Sure, most of the jokes are really corny, but that's the type of humor that I like, and it got a lot of good laughs out of me during my playthrough. It doesn't rely much on the kind of referential humor that's bound to be outdated shortly after launch (e.g. internet memes), save for a couple "blink and you'll miss it" gags and an extended segment that plays on the modern-day use of machines and AI to analyze/grade creative works—one can only hope that last one will become a thing of the past, anyway. It doesn't try to do anything super emotional or complex in its narrative, but I don't really think it needs to—it's just supposed to be something that you can laugh at, and that's exactly what it is. Suffice to say that the writing is entertaining on its own, but the voice acting is what pushes it over the top. I don't think there was a single performance here that I would describe as anything less than great, the only exceptions being the ones that somehow managed to be even better. My favorite had to be Sean Chiplock as Arthur Ackerman, who did such a good job pretending to be a man that loves bureaucratic paperwork more than life itself that I'm half-convinced he wasn't actually pretending. There were others that stood out to me, like Antonio Greco as Donny Donato, but I will stress again that [i]every[/i] VA here delivered an excellent performance and added so, so much charm to the experience. "Charming" really is the best word to describe it, because [i]Loco Motive[/i] practically has charm coming out of its pores. It endeared itself to me almost immediately when I realized that every interaction point had its own flavor text instead of just "Examine X" or "Take Y", and it kept me constantly entertained like that for almost all of my 10-12 hour run—I left the game open in the background sometimes, so I don't know exactly how long it was. It doesn't matter, though, because it was well worth the purchase no matter how long it happened to take me.