Secret of the Silver Earring

"The Best Sherlock Holmes Game Ever Made"

To be fair, I'll be revealing all of my personal bias from the get go. I'm a huge fan of the Gabriel Knight series as I love deep characterization foremost, a rich plot of any kind, and a good "curl up to read by the raging fireplace in winter" mystery. I also love the writings of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and two of the previous games based on Sherlock Holmes (Serrated Scalpel and The Case of the Rose Tattoo, of course). Frankly, I even love the time period itself! One of my all time favorite films, Ingmar Bergman's Fanny and Alexander, is set in 1907, where the little Swedish village and fashions in clothing seem very reminiscent of the styles in 1897, the year of Sherlock's latest case. And well, biases proudly admitted, what a case it is...

Anyone who played the demo already knows the plot setup, so I won't bother to summarize (if you haven't played the demo, simply read the summaries in countless previews of the game all over the net). Years ago I remember thinking how well the spirit of Doyle's stories was captured in Serrated Scalpel and Rose Tattoo (and how pathetically in Consulting Detective). Forget it. Frogwares, after a less than majestic attempt with Mystery of the Mummy, has nailed it. They've taken everything up a notch from what's been done in past Sherlock games. Sherlock and Watson are fantastically realized, as is Lestrade. The interaction between the three of them is pitch perfect, and I can see why Frogwares chose this particular fan written story to work with (it simply has to be among the best fan made things ever done...in my mind's eye I always see those horrendous Star Wars fan videos and imagine gouging my eyeballs out with a spoon). At any rate, all of the major players new to this particular story are also wonderfully brought to life, and Wiggins and Mycroft are accounted for in their own ways. There is even mention of Gregson, but he's not in the game (no big loss in my view).

Generally, the voice acting provided for these characters is of high quality, but there is the occasional misstep. While I think Sherlock's actor is generally excellent in the role, he trips up occasionally on certain words. One character's last name is Fowlett, and Holmes runs the gamut with this thing: Flowler, Fowler, Flowlett...I think at one point he managed to say Flower or Flounder. Frogwares simply needs to limit the amount of hard liquor imbibed by the actors during lengthy voice over recordings, and all of this could be a thing of the past. For the most part the acting is very good though, despite the occasional bit part here and there, or a mispronounced word now and again. One should never scoff at the fact that I take voice acting very seriously, especially anyone who has played The Black Mirror where prostitutes and people living in boxes in the alley next to the recording studio were apparently employed to play all of the major roles. It can ruin the game if it's bad folks.

Graphically, the game is very well done. The pre-rendered backgrounds don't feature as much animation to liven things up as Syberia II, for instance, but they feel convincing and architecturally impressive regardless. The details are many, and it is obvious that the designers took great care to be respectful and faithful to the time period they represented. Of course, in addition to the visuals there is always that constant companion; the audio. Here the music is a very fitting selection of classical compositions by the likes of Tchiakovsky, Dvorak, and Schumann. The music never feels out of place or annoying, like it was prone to in Mystery of the Mummy. The only flaw of the music is that there just isn't enough of it. Many of the selections are heard at several different locations, and it made me wish there was even more variation. Oh well, we can't have everything I suppose.

As for the gameplay, I have to say, there is but a single truly awful sequence. In this age of entire games that are terrible, I should think we can respect this. Granted, there is also a puzzle that most players will require help for, as it is very vague, but even that is nothing compared to...Super Dog. Those are the only words that can be said for this foul beast from Hell itself. I won't give anything away except to say that there is a guard dog who you must avoid on two separate occasions, and the damn thing can see through walls and detect you with what can only be described as the psychic powers of an incredibly advanced canine mind (or just bad design). And if he detects you: it's Game Over. Reload. Try again. After you do that about twenty-five times you will finally figure out how to pass this part.

There is another sequence that the review at Adventure Gamers refers to (the author of which kindly helped me at two points when I was stuck), which is a timed sequence in a "forest maze". To be honest, I simply can't relate to the bit about "pulling out every last strand of hair as your last few precious seconds tick away while Holmes refuses to move where the cursor says you can?" In my experience (and there was only one because I completed it on the first try) this was a very easy sequence that I wished had actually been challenging. And if that's a maze, then adventure game developers should bring on many, many more like it because when I think of a maze I think of Frankenstein: Through the Eyes of the Monster, King's Quest (V and VI), and The Riddle of Master Lu; THOSE are the mazes that strike me as no-no's.

In fact, I never had any trouble with the control in this game. You click once and begin to move there (or click twice to run in sequences where Holmes is "dressed down"), and the changes in visual angles are even labelled by the icon becoming a pair of footsteps. To me it was pretty simple, and for the most part responsive. It is somewhat annoying the way Sherlock will do a half-circle spin sometimes before moving, however. He'll turn one way and then another, as if deciding about whether or not to follow your instructions. This doesn't happen too often though, and it never occurs when time is of the essence.

Additionally, as another part of the gameplay, I quite enjoyed the quizzes at the end of each chapter. One of them had me stuck for a while (Chapter Three), but the others are logical and easily passed with a bit of researching your evidence and memory. The one that halted my progress I did find to be a bit unfair because there are several pieces of evidence that support one of the answers equally well, but the game will only accept a particular one. This part and the aforementioned "vague puzzle" were the only places I was ever stuck for an unacceptable period of time. The Super Dog sequence took me longer than it should have, but it wasn't a matter of being stuck so much as a matter of having a four-legged foe that rivalled Jet Li with Night Vision and X-Ray goggles.

The rest of the gameplay is a mixture of finding items and clues, talking to people, and solving a pretty small amount of inventory puzzles. I enjoyed this though as I don't need a lot of inventory puzzles to solve. There weren't a lot of puzzles of that nature in Jordan Mechner's The Last Express, and to my mind that's one of the five greatest adventure games ever made. One of the things that struck me as being very real in Silver Earring is the fact that many of these inventory puzzles are solved with the same item. I know that sounds incredibly boring, but it's really not, at least not to me. Personally, I think Sherlock Holmes is above having his pockets filled with all manner of trinkets that he's going to use to solve puzzles in the various places he's searching for clues. I like the fact that he has a small inventory, and effectively uses what he has even if some people think this was laziness on the part of the designers (unfortunately defensible since there is evidence of laziness in other respects, like the sequence where Sherlock must wear a mask, but you don't actually SEE the mask on his face...). To make a long story short though, I personally think the puzzles and design in this game fit the characters and the story.

I will say this: if you don't like a linear game you will not like Silver Earring. It's not like Serrated Scalpel and Rose Tattoo where there seem to be hundreds of places to go and it all results in a loss of an intimate storyline (the stories were good in those games, don't get me wrong, but mark my words: they've got nothing on Silver Earring). This game requires you to collect all the evidence and testimony in a location before leaving and going to the next. You have a map, but there are never more than three locations on it at any one time. Before you decide if that's a bad thing or not, let's examine what it results in...

Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Silver Earring possesses the BEST plot ever seen in a Sherlock Holmes game, and one of the greatest in any adventure game. Period. From beginning to end the game is consistently gripping, supplying you with new information in every chapter and allowing you to draw your own conclusions (I figured out some of it, but not nearly all of it, which is just how I like it). To make things even better, the ending is absolutely fantastic (and there's a quiz beforehand where you can try your detective skills at solving the case yourself). It's very lengthy, wonderfully executed, and thoroughly jaw dropping as the whole solution comes together. The ending made me want to replay the game in fact, just to see everything with my new eyes that know the answers. I was very, very impressed with the storyline in this game, to say the least. I believe it crushes Serrated Scalpel and Rose Tattoo put together. How's that for high praise?

In closing, I just want to commend Frogwares for a job very well done. They've captured the magic of Sherlock Holmes, visually and audibly, as well as supplied a truly well written mystery storyline. Though there were a few rough spots along the way, everything is paid back with interest by the end, in my view. I even appreciated the length of this adventure. It's not too long, nor is it too short. It doesn't overstay its welcome like The Longest Journey (affectionately known by me as "The Shortest Journey Extended Indefinitely By Characters That Never Shut Up"). Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Silver Earring is a real winner. Certainly not everyone will agree, but as far as I'm concerned, Darkfall: Lights Out, Myst IV, Still Life, and Fahrenheit have a lot to live up to.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 08/27/04