The newest Steam Next Fest is here and with it comes hundreds of demos and games to play. Duck Detective: The Secret Salami is part of the fest this year and players can experience ten minutes of the game before it releases later in 2024! Fully voiced and incredibly interactive, Duck Detective promises two to three hours of entertainment and mystery.
The game comes from Happy Broccoli Games in Berlin whose debut Kraken Academy made waves for its unique premise.
Duck Detective has a similarly fun premise. Solve crime as a down on your luck detective! Who is a duck! Reeling from a divorce and trying to make enough money to pay rent on your PI office, you must investigate a the mystery of who keeps stealing lunches at Bear Bus Office! Oh no!
And if you don’t crack the case you won’t have money to make it back home. Oof.
As Eugene McQuacklin, you must use your powers of deducktion to inspect evidence and interview suspects to learn their hidden secrets. Then use that information to locate the right suspect and crack the case.
The game is a mix of narrative mystery and point and click adventure. When speaking with characters, you can mouse over them with a magnifying glass that will indicate when there’s something of interest.
After you hold the magnifying glass there for a short period of time, the clue will register and you’ll get a list of new information about each character that can be used later when trying to fill in the literal blanks.
While the demo is pretty short, it is a great first look into what promises to be a hilarious and entertaining experience. The full game will be roughly two to three hours long, depending on how fast you read and investigate.
I found myself smiling and laughing throughout the entire demo and really enjoyed how interactive the game is for being point and click focused. When you move around, even though you’re a 2D entity in the larger world, you actually move things too! The paper doll style art actually adds depth to the backgrounds and settings, and the noir-esque music was the perfect background for the Very Serious mystery.
(No seriously, it’s very serious and clearly we’re in for some twists!)
I can’t wait to see the full Duck Detective when it’s out later this year! You can check out the demo now on Steam.
Images courtesy of Happy Broccoli Games
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