Half of all video game humor is “What if Mario’s mushrooms were actually drugs”, and the other half is “Can you imagine how people would react to a game protagonist in real life”, so I’m glad Contradiction made at least one of those premises funny for the first time with its live-action goofiness. Obviously, live-action adventure games have been done before, but this one strikes the perfect balance for making it work: it doesn’t play up the inherent silliness to eye rolling levels, but uses just enough to where the goofs of the player feel adequately contextualized. Making that work in an otherwise straight-faced murder mystery seems like a pretty difficult task, but it’s achieved with one of my favorite game protagonists of all time, Detective Jenks. He has a friendly, silly demeanor, but this innocent charm belies a sharp wit that’s ready to capitalize on the slightest slip of the tongue. Even when players are asking the wrong questions, it feels completely natural, as if Jenks is letting people think he’s utterly incompetent to make them drop their guard. Both you and the subject of his questioning may find his behavior hilarious and unusual, but when he points out one of the titular contradictions, it’s just as exciting as a real thriller. That’s what makes this game such a fun experience, it straddles the line between mystery, comedy, and drama in such an entertaining way that there’s really nothing like it. My only complaint is that the ending doesn’t feel like it was originally planned, and the director has made no secret that there was inadequate funding to fully deliver on all the plot threads. While I appreciate how not all the details of the town end up fitting together like a perfect jigsaw puzzle, the ending doesn’t capitalize on even half of what was set up, so it feels like a major missed opportunity. It’s like Spot the Liar is just the first episode of a much greater story, one which will, unfortunately, probably never be told. That is, unless a bunch of people were to suddenly buy this game and spread the word about how cool it is. I don’t know how someone would get the word out like that, especially while admitting its faults at the same time, but with any luck, the message can reach some people of impeccable taste and get the recognition it deserves.

P.S./Fun Fact: The game’s director was Tim Follin, who you might recognize as the composer of the mind blowing title theme of Solstice for NES and the prog trip that is Plok’s beach theme, among many others. The guy is genuinely legendary, just one more reason to check this game out.