It feels like there were two competing visions for this game. Creeping in on the traditional Sherlock Holmes style is a pretty clear attempt at giving this franchise some AAA flair. The cases you know and love are still there, but now with an inexplicably younger Sherlock, bigger areas to wander around in, and more quicktime action setpieces, all culminating in an explosive finale. The stuff that publishers dream of cutting together for hype-inducing E3 trailers. These sections largely fall flat, as most of them are way too long and handle poorly because the game's controls aren't built for an action game.

Unfortunately this focus on action also comes at the expense of the mysteries themselves. Unlike most of those in Crimes and Punishments, each mystery funnels you down to only one reasonable conclusion once you've collected all of the evidence. Investigation and suspect interviews feel inconsequential here, just get through all the action scenes and you'll figure out who did it. There are a few large environmental puzzles that ring true, but they are sparse.

The Devil's Daughter tries to be two things at once, but succeeds at neither.

Dogs bark and he knows their breed
And knows where they went last night
Knows their masters too
Oh baby, hold me tight
Just pretend I'm Sherlock Holmes

the second of the "Actually Good Sherlock Holmes Games" trilogy, Sherlock Holmes: The Devils Daughter.
i have a LOT i can talk about with the handling of the victorian england setting compared to other games ie assassins creed syndicate or (especially) the great ace attorney, but i will refrain.
as much as i wanted to rag on this game for being pointless and mediocre it... actually kind of kicks ass???
puzzles are hit or miss, with a healthy sum of misses, especially in the second case. skip button exists for a reason.
story on the other hand... damn this one is hard to consider. on a case by case basis, i would say crime and punishment reigns supreme over this, but however the first and last cases of this game are far better than anything in C&P. if only c&p didnt crash every 20 minutes...
the gameplay is an expanded version of c&p, but however i found it to be a little better. being able to fully explore Baker Street at will is fun, and the moment to moment gameplay varies so much, but still blends in very well every time.
the game is pretty short, only about 7 hours long. definitely not worth 30 bucks, but for the extra 2 dollars that it was in a bundle with chapter 1, id say it was more than worth it.

After playing Crimes & Punishments as my first Sherlock Holmes game I was excited to try out The Devil's Daughter. Unfortunately, I was left mildly disappointed as everything here is a downgrade from the what came before.

The character models have taken a dip in quality and detail, which makes the performance issues all the more surprising. The game is no graphical powerhouse yet it would get jittery at times on my machine and even on an SSD loading times could get annoyingly long.

Poorly implemented action sequences are the bane of every adventure game that feels like it needs to do something "more", and that's no change here, unfortunately.

Some of the puzzles cross the border from complex into obtuse, which comes admittedly with the territory of the genre, but there are a few that seem at odds with the concept of being the ultra-logical Sherlock Holmes. As a character famed for their logical thinking, it was disappointing to have sequences where you are playing fantasy in imaginary locations with no evidence to support the detective's theories. Holmes is traditionally about attention to detail, not "I reckon this probably happened."

That's not to say the game is bad overall, but playing it soon after Crimes & Punishments puts in stark contrast how much better these games can be.

This is probably the best way a Sherlock Holmes story could be translated into a game, or at least the best straightforward way. Walk through the city, find clues, combine them, talk to people, sneak around. I just can't shake off the constant feeling about the production value while playing. You walk through gorgeous places for five seconds, interact with many people for a minute and wonder how so much effort has been put into a world that's almost too full, an uncanny level of detail. Probably not a bad thing in itself, but it would've been more impactful if the game had been memorable.

Based, underrated detective game. Respects time period and players intelligence. I only played C&P before and I would rank them about equal. Cases still rely heavily on red herrings and unreal coincidences, but I have faith that logic is intact. You just need to pay attention. Not everything is put into your journal. I suggest writing down your own notes, because fun factor relies heavily on putting it all together yourself. Unfortunately it ends abruptly. One second you are finishing 3rd case, and the next you are seeing end credits after underwhelming finale.

The mechanics improved since their last SH game even though I was sometimes still confused as to how certain things were supposed to work.

Not a fan of kids in games, so all soon as that little goblin was introduces I knew I had to save her at SOME point...I'm just glad, I was wrong about the parentage of the kid.

I had the feeling they really wanted me to like her but I just couldn't. She was too saccharine for my taste and had nothing to add to the story. She was there so we have an emotional connection to what happened in the last act.
Couldn't care less about her :/ But it's hard to make me care about any child character so this one had the odds stacked against her from the very beginning.

The game also ends rather suddenly which robbed me of a satisfying ending scene. A quick voice over to what exactly happened after the last scene would have been nice. :/

All in all, I had fun playing this game. :)

Following the same structure as Crimes & Punishments, The Devil's Daughter sees you returning to the homey, familiar vibes of Frogwares' Sherlock Holmes series to complete a string of cases that are connected via a surprisingly emotional wraparound story that ties into earlier games in the franchise in a way that will be a real treat for longtime fans. Right from the get-go you can tell things aren't where you'd want the second entry on the 8th generation of consoles to be from a technical standpoint. The graphics (specifically the character models, the environments are fine) are dated and ugly, there's light screen tearing throughout, and a host of weird bugs diminish the experience. Such as one where a line of dialog would constantly repeat in a certain area, often over other conversations, despite the character that uttered it being long gone at that point. As bad as these problems are though, the real issues holding this back are the gameplay and writing deficiencies.

Once again you'll engage in a variety of one-off, mini-game-esque segments designed to inject some action into the proceedings. They feel like the kind of things Telltale Games might have come up with had they continued to evolve the level of interaction players had with their titles outside of just making story decisions. While there are some genuinely inventive and enjoyable scenarios and puzzles, on the whole there isn't really anything that matches the level of fun and depth found in TDD's most direct predecessor, leaving me wanting a bit more on this front overall.

The real highlight of these Sherlock Holmes adventures is still how much freedom you're given in making deductions. You always have access to everything you'll need to uncover clues and are left to piece together what you've discovered on your own. So whether or not the right person is brought to justice depends entirely on how you interpret the information given. This can lead to some exhilarating moments of sweaty palmed second-guessing. At least when it's not leading you down the wrong path that is. In one of the mysteries you'll be tasked with solving there aren't just red herrings, but blatant, highly detailed misinformation that leads to an outcome more logical and supported by greater evidence than what the writers actually intended. It's so egregious I unapologetically sided with my headcanon over the case's legitimate ending.

For all of its faults however, it's hard to keep a good gumshoe down. You can still walk away from this feeling incredibly clever and that, along with the thrill of agonizing over whether you're about to accuse the wrong person and condemn someone innocent, remains a high worth chasing. It's just unfortunate that due to its flawed state only the most dedicated of supersleuths will find this a case worth taking on.

6/10

Una de las mejores historias, aunque corta, de Sherlock Holmes

Pongo sobre aviso, de que si no os gustó la trama de "Awakened" por ser demasiado fantasioso o sobrenatural, este no os gustará. En cambio, si disfrutasteis de la trama de "El testamento", "Awakened" y buscáis una historia de Sherlock más cercana a las películas actuales y series, disfrutaréis mucho, de sus 10-12 horitas de juego.

La investigación: si somos expertos en juegos de este estilo, la superaremos sin mayor complicación. Lo Difícil vendrá en nuestras moralidades, y en las acciones que creamos que son las correctas.

Nos encontraremos 5 casos, que al principio no pintan tener ninguna correlación, pero que al final sí que importaran, se conectaran y tendrán mucho que ver la elección de nuestros actos.

A nivel de jugabilidad con mando, es de los más fluidos, y lo dice alguien que no tiene el pulso para robar panderetas😂, y en los puzles de equilibrio y habilidad, los he superado sin problemas.

Controlar de nuevo a Toby❤️ y tener un Sherlock, más humano y cercano, el humor de algún capítulo (el exorcismo con los irregulares de Baker Street😂😂😂) y las deducciones en profundidad, sin duda, son mi 10, aunque le restarían nota, su corta duración, para mí (te deja con muchas ganas de más) y lo poquito que sale John Watson😔

The Devil's Daughter, Frogwares' follow-up to Crimes and Punishments, tries its best to shake the formula up a little more, for both better and worse this time. Better, in that the parts of the previous game that needed refining or adjusting are improved and fixed.

Lockpicking, for instance, is a much simpler affair that hearkens back to Oblivion or the old Splinter Cell games in its design. The overarching plot is also given a lot more prominence this time around instead of being relegated to a barely-mentioned side note in the background of certain cases. This time, there is a clear and concise narrative that follows through gradually with each case until culminating at the final one.

The freeform detective work is still strong in this one, albeit perhaps not as vast as the previous game due to this one's truncated length. The individual cases all once again deliver compelling stories that are on par with or, in some cases, exceed those in C&P. The overarching plot is decent, although not as strong as the mysteries you uncover along the way.

As for the worst aspects of The Devil's Daughter, perhaps the most baffling one is the decision to recast Holmes and Watson with a younger voice and face model. They do a decent enough job, don't get me wrong, but both of these men are supposed to be pushing 60 in this canon, and yet here they are looking like grizzled gentlemen in their mid-30s.

The newest and perhaps biggest addition to the gameplay this time is also baffling: a semi-open world. At any time, you can leave your Baker's Street office and explore the surrounding area, which is surprisingly large, at least more so than I was expecting. What is there to do in this semi-open world, however? Well, nothing really. There are mini-games and colorful NPCs dotted around, but as far as I could surmise, none of them contribute much of anything useful or helpful. They merely exist for flavor. Mostly, it seems to just exist as a 'next-gen' showpiece of what can be capable, but beyond that, it contributes next to nothing, unfortunately.

There's also an overabundance of action scenes, in particular action scenes that involve QTEs. This could be fine if they were sprinkled with some variety or decision-making that leads to different case outcomes, but again, it seems to mostly exist for flavor and to spice up some of the mysteries.

All in all, The Devil's Daughter is a decent entry in the series, but not one that many would be clamoring to return to any time soon. For every great decision or narrative moment, there are a lot of things that it gets in its own way with.

Also, how Frogwares didn't get sued by Jon Hamm for using his likeness for Sherlock is the real mystery to me. It's uncanny.

6/10

This seems less popular than the previous entry, but I enjoyed it as well. It has a very strong Guy Ritchie influence which works in its favour, though some of the "discombobulate" moments became silly at times.

The more personal attachment of each case to Holmes' life, as well as an overarching plot, made it feel more personal. I really like the individual disconnected case approach, but this works to bring the character more to life.

The more open environments, bigger variety of puzzles, and (for me) more interesting and challenging scenarios than the previous game.

The downside: sometimes the mini-games and gimmicks became to much.

The gameplay is obsolete and stiff as hell, and some of the mini-games are frustrating to say the least (God, that temple section was a nightmare). It looks like they tried to make the game more appealing by throwing in a bunch of elements from different genres, but couldn't manage to do a decent job with any of them.

The cases and investigation parts are good enough to make it worth playing, though. I was always wanting to find out what comes next, and not all resolutions were as obvious as I expected. You have the freedom to choose the culprit based on the evidence you could collect, but the game does not show you the direct consequences of your choice. The case just abruptly ends without any kind of closing scene or cutscene. There are also some leaps in the plot that disorient the player quite a bit. For example, at the end of the first episode you find yourself in a completely different place being hunted by someone with no transition nor explanations about how it happened.

Maybe we cannot expect polished gameplay from such a small studio, but there's a lot of room for improvement.