Cate West: The Vanishing Files (Wii) - Review by Chris

Introduction

For all the wrongs you may find with the Wii's library, one thing it and the DS have done is bring back several genres that have long since been dead. The point and click and detective genre games have seen a marked resurgence in recent years thanks largely to the interfaces that these consoles have provided and the vast majority of them have been thoroughly enjoyable experiences from start to finish and have brought back memories of much older games. Cate West: The Vanishing Files is one of these new detective games helping the resurgence and like many of the other games in the genre it'll take its place alongside in stores, this too is a great, but frustrating, experience.

Gameplay

The story goes that the city of Arcadia is being gripped by more and more unsolvable crimes, which are being dubbed 'The Vanishing Files' by the media. With police unable to get to the bottom of these mounting crimes and the city being pulled into a state of paralysis, they decide it's time to call on renowned crime author and visionary Cate West to lend a hand and hope that her experience of writing crime novels will help rid the city of Arcadia of its unrelenting crime sprees and return the city to a state of normality once again. Like many similar titles, the story starts off simply enough but soon falls into the idealisms of conspiracy and solving the mysteries surrounding Cate's past, making for an engaging game that will hold your attention for its considerably lengthy run time.

Stretching out over the course of 15 chapters, each of which is split into 5 acts that section off the differing types of gameplay, you'll endeavour to take on and solve one mystery at a time as Cate. With each chapter, you'll be given a short introduction consisting of Cate and her compatriot characters speaking about the case you are about to tackle, most of the time involving a short cutscene highlighting what it is that has happening. With this intro over, you'll get straight into the game and your usual first port of call is one of the 5 forms of gameplay, which simply comes down to finding a certain number of clues that are necessary for the case and are hidden throughout a picture made to represent an area of Arcadia. As you progress, the number of clues needed to be collected at the beginning of the case increases and you'll be fighting against the clock, not only here but in the other games as well, to find them all. But you don't have to worry about having to deduce what is a clue and what isn't, as a list of clues needed are given to you. There is no illusion as to why these clues are necessary nor is there any indication as to how supplementary acts of the chapter follow on from this and so while it provides a healthy story that connects the chapters at the beginning and end, during the actual gameplay it's completely ignored.

From this initial starting point of finding clues, you'll go on to undertake tasks such as spotting the difference between two pictures, tracking down evidence which has been split up into increments, searching criminal hideouts and finally solving the crime by determining who the actual perpetrator. It keeps the game varied enough and becomes increasingly more difficult as you progress, meaning you'll have to comb each of the tasks with a fine tooth, with the help of your trusty magnifying glass, to find all of the clues as well as piecing the clues together correctly to get the right perpetrator. But rarely are the clues truly helpful. Some of the games, such as the spot the difference, have you looking for things so trivial that it begs the question as to why you need to spot that specific difference or why you need that clue, with some being so trivial that even with the help of an ever present and replenishing hint option you'll have trouble finding the items needed. At the end of each chapter, after completing all the tasks, you'll have received a score based on how well you've done over the course of the case and this score is largely redundant unless you are the kind of person who finds pleasure in replaying specific cases to improve your scores, which you can do through the Quick Play option. That being said, there is something righteous and enjoyable about piecing together the clues and solving a case and that sense of satisfaction is something that the game really levels well.

And while the game sticks mainly to the single player option, the entirety of the story can be played out and solved by two players at the same time, so you and a friend can look for clues together. Or, if you're the competitive person, you can go head to head in clue finding games to determine who the better detective is.

Controls

Only the Wii-mote is needed to play the game, with a simple control scheme in place that harks back to the days of the old point and click games. You'll use the pointer and the A button to select items, with the B button bringing up a magnifying glass to help you investigate the images in the spot the difference and search tasks. It works almost perfectly, with the only real issue arising when the game splits the screen in two for the aforementioned mini-games, making searches along the edges between the two halves problematic as the cursor flickers between the two until brought away from the edge. It's a slight hindrance but you'll still be able to fully investigate and complete the tasks, so it is something which you'll adjust to and quickly learn where the optimal area is to point the controller.

Graphics

The graphics in these kinds of games are always of a high standard and that sentiment remains true here. Cutscenes are presented in a hand drawn style that looks fantastic and it really sets the mood of the game well. In-game, the interface seems rather cluttered and is difficult to see through. Some of the tasks will provide a list of items to find on the left of the screen but the font is so small that the magnifying glass is necessary to read it properly. Likewise, the images used for some of the tasks require you to really comb through the detailing and while the images contain a high level of detail, the colours are saturated and the layout is just a general mess making it difficult to find items, even when you use the hint option and the magnifying glass. It's an annoyance because if the graphics in these areas had been of a higher standard, the levels of frustration wouldn't be nearly as high.

Sound

Again, games of this genre have managed to carry with them a score that matches the high standard of the visuals and this is true here. A sweeping score weaves in and out of the gameplay, stitching the story and the characters together perfectly while setting an atmosphere that calmly pulls you into the game but keeps hold of you, making it hard to stop playing. The game does provide an equally high standard of voice work for certain cutscenes, with the work always flowing beautifully and never feeling as cheesy as other games. But for the most part, the game and its story are told through subtitles with a snippet of voice work to accompany it which feels like a step back when you consider the calibre of the audio work on offer.

Final comments

Cate West: The Vanishing Files continues the ever growing presence of detective style games on the Wii and keeps up the high standards, but only just. With an interesting story that will grab hold of you for its duration, some fantastic visual and audio presentation and a simplistic control scheme, it's one of those games that you can really get sucked into. Just bear in mind that the level of frustration you'll get from it as you progress will grow largely due to the game's misgivings which do bring the game down a tad. It may not be up there with the likes of Broken Sword or even the Secret Files games, but it's still a very good, if simple, game.

Pro: Engaging storyline, audio work is expertly done, cooperative play is a great inclusion
Con: Game falls into repetition quite quickly, some visual issues make some of the game unnecessarily difficult
Final score: 7.1

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