Lately, I’ve been all about trying new things in the gaming sphere. Trying not to discount things due to their primary genre or style. That’s how I came across Jessika from Assemble Entertainment. Anyone who knows me will know that I love a good detective story. My favourite book is a detective novel, and Murder, She Wrote has been my favourite show since I was a small child. I am not, and have never been a fan of full motion video games. But I read the plot for Jessika, and my interest was peaked instantly.
So, what is Jessika?
You are part of a group that specializes in processing digital footprints of deceased people – all on behalf of the relatives. Tracking down what they were posting, when and where. That kind of thing. This time around, you’re working on behalf of the family of a girl named Jessika. Jessika has inexplicably taken her own life, and her family wants to know why. Using only your laptop, you must access information on the deceased young lady, and piece everything together for her grieving family.
A crime worth solving?
You know, when I started playing this game I was excited. An FMV had never caught my eye before. But like I mentioned earlier, I LOVE a good detective story. Emphasis on good, but I’ll get into that in a moment.
On a technical standpoint, there isn’t necessarily anything wrong with Jessika. The screen had me genuinely confused when I first booted the game up. You’re thrown right into what’s meant to be a desktop loading screen. However, at least on Switch, I did not find this to be very clear. I felt the need to double check I had opened the right software. After the initial confusion, and figuring out what was what, I finally managed to start playing. Now, chances are that was just me having a slow brain moment.
However, I personally don’t feel like it ported well from PC to Switch. Moving between tabs is slow, almost clunky. There isn’t much to be said on the graphics standpoint. Your time is spent looking at a fairly generic computer screen. The videos of the titular Jessika are all the same. A woman basically just reading off a script with some basic movements thrown in. And personally, I didn’t find any of it interesting. I kept going for the sake of keeping going, but I just had no interest in solving the actual case. Like my favourite book has a similar plot. Thing is, the book executed that better than this game. It just did not hold my interest at all.
Maybe Assemble Entertainment‘s next endeavor will work better. Maybe they’d be better putting their leisure suits back on. For me though, this one was a flop.
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