While playing Zack and Wiki, it occurred to me that the Wii would be a fantastic place for point-and-click adventures. How great would it be to play any of the classic adventure titles like Full Throttle, Grim Fandango, or any of the Monkey Island games? It’s a shame that The Adventure Company failed to capitalize on this wide-open genre with something of quality, because Agatha Christie: And Then There Were None is a mess of a game. The real mystery isn’t just why this game was ported to the Wii, but why it came out three years ago on the PC to begin with.
"... you’d be better off with the book."
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The game is based on Agatha Christie’s seminal novel of the same title, and the book is widely considered a masterpiece. It’s inspired a whole sub-genre of stories and a fantastic board game; if you’ve played the board game "Clue" then you know. However, the tale is not the best fare for video games, because there isn’t any real action. For all the talk about murder, you spend a lot of time rummaging through people’s belongings looking for knickknacks or notes to read for clues. Every time you want to enter a room, you have to "turn the doorknob" with the Wii remote, which is kind of cool initially but becomes tiresome shortly thereafter because you’re always going from room to room.
The puzzles are fairly obtuse, leaving gamers wondering what to do next in an inconvenient way. Early in the game you find a flashlight, but it doesn’t have any batteries in it. In a different room is a small metal scoop on a shelf, along with several other items. Since there’s no clear way to see which items you can or can’t pick up, it’s up to the player to move the cursor over everything and click. This occasionally results in picking up some kind of doo-dad, but usually the main character spits some kind of quip at you. My favorite is where he denies being a pack-rat, despite walking around with four glasses he pilfered from the dining room.
Now, the scoop is used to empty a sack of flour, which is in the same room. The problem is, the sack, like the items on the shelf (or anywhere else in the game, for that matter) has no distinction about it. The pre-rendered backdrops make it look like it’s just there for show. How would you know that’s what the scoop is for if it wasn’t in the manual? After "scooping" with the remote, you find a set of batteries for your flashlight. Oh, now things makes sense— I always hide my batteries in my baking supplies!
"... it does not have the proper elements to be considered user-friendly, or even fun. "
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Movement is handled simply enough – just point somewhere, click, and your character will move there. Exploring the rooms is simple as well, but the game’s insistence on talking to you whenever something is useless bogs the pace down, and the horrible voicing makes it downright unbearable. Your character is searching for clues for a murder, but vehemently refuses to "go through a lady’s luggage" because it would be "improper." Hm... trying to put together a mystery without searching everywhere for clues, eh? Makes you glad he’s not trying to solve a murder for you. Every time you find a scrap of paper, the character says "I’ve copied the contents into my notebook." This is a nice feature, since you never lose track of what you pick up, except for the fact that you have to open three different menus to read the damn thing!
While this game has enough radiators ("You can’t have enough of them, really"), it does not have the proper elements to be considered user-friendly, or even fun. The click everything in sight method of gameplay died years ago, and this title is doing nothing to bring it back into favor. This game does alright as a doorknob simulator, but if you’re looking for an adventure title, you’d be better off with the classics, and if you’re looking for an Agatha Christie story, you’d better off with the book.
