Review: Crime Scene: Brooklyn

Become a NYC detective and solve this crime together with your friends!

Designed by Markku Heljakka, Petter Ilander, Richard Heayes and published by  Selecta Spel & Hobby
👤  1-4 players
🧩  Cooperative, Crime Solving, Puzzles
⚖️  Light-Medium

Overview & Gameplay

Brooklyn is one of the four original Crime Scene Games. It is a mystery solving game that combines three main elements:
1) A modern mystery story written by professional crime author Arttu Tuominen. 2) Finding details from a "Hidden image" picture.
3) More or less classic puzzle solving.

The puzzles range from single to four card ones, and from light to quite heavy.
Players can use hints to help with the solving, but it costs them Reputation cards. Giving a wrong answer also makes the players lose a Reputation card.

Thoughts

I've had some bad experiences with Escape Room / Detective type games in the past so I was a bit hesitant to try out Crime Scene: Brooklyn. However my partner really likes these types of games so I figured I would try it once more.

The Crime Scene series mixes intriguing story telling by a professional crime author with clue finding and puzzles. The story in Brooklyn is really good, you can tell it is written by a real author with lots of details and he did a really good job at setting a dark and gritty atmosphere. There are some details in the story and images that make this a game you should play with adults only (as also noted on the box).

The puzzles are well executed and not too hard, we managed to complete all the puzzles without using any hints. Some were pretty obvious while others were a bit more far fetched but we figured all of them out eventually. This makes it so the story progresses at a good pace that keeps you involved. The puzzles are mostly related to pattern finding.

Besides the puzzle you'll need to find hints in a "Hidden Picture" board. This "Where is Waldo" type mechanic I really enjoyed in this game.

Overall we clocked in at around 2 hours and 15 minutes for the complete story. Which is perfect for an evening of Crime solving. However after playing there is no reason to replay it (like with most Crime Solving / Escape-Room games).

If you're an experienced Crime Solver / Escape-Room gamer you might find the puzzles too easy. For me the complexity was perfect as we breezed through the story and time passed very quickly. And before we knew it we finished the game (which is a good sign!).

While the box says 1-4 player I doubt this would be a good experience when played with more than 2 players. Some of the details are very small and we've had many occasions were we picked up some game components for closer inspection. This might lead to other players disengaging from the game.

👍 Intriguing story telling by a professional crime author
👍 Puzzles are accessible, fun and not too hard
👍 "Where is Waldo" elements are fun!

➖ Play once experience, luckily you can forward it to the next person who can enjoy the experience
➖ Maybe too easy if you already have played heavier Investigative / Escape-Room typed games
➖ Some details are very small so it might be hard to play this with more than 2