A few weeks ago, the folks from Equestrian Dreamers released a game called My Little Investigations. Yes, the game features characters from the very popular show My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. But the game is put together very well! My Little Investigations is a video game featuring the characters and settings from the TV show and featuring gameplay inspired by the video game Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth. Within the game, players play as Twilight Sparkle, who plays the part of an crime-solving investigator in Equestria. During the course of the game, she must investigate crime scenes for evidence, question and interrogate ponies who either were witnesses or otherwise know something relevant to the crime, and ultimately confront the culprit and prove that pony did it.
So, when you start a new game, you get a montage of the entire crime which takes place at Rarity’s Carousel Boutique. The crime was the theft of a True Blue gemstone and her cat Opal. At the same time, Scootaloo was spotted near the crime scene at the same time. So, Twilight has to clear Scootaloo’s name and find who really committed the crime. One of the primary goals at Equestrian Dreamers is the desire to bring Equestria to life, such that players playing through their games really feel as though they’re part of Equestria while they play them. Inter-character relationships and interactions are one of the biggest strengths in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, so they really wanted to involve players in those interactions in a meaningful fashion.
Since the Ace Attorney series’ gameplay very nicely facilitates precisely that kind of inter-character interactions, since it requires players to have detailed conversations and confrontations with the characters within the game, it really seemed like a very natural fit for this game. In the game, you will have plenty of conversations with numerous characters. At some points of the conversations, you might have to challenge someone’s statements or present evidence to someone that is lying. Outside of conversations, you might collect evidence, examine evidence, collect statements from other characters, and more. Some characters in this game are just there for filler, kind of like what investigators deal with in real life.
The artwork and animation in this game was done very well! The creators of the game spent three years working on this game, and I really liked the special still animations you see from time to time. Through parts of the game, Pinkie Pie pops in to explain to you how to do a part of the game, if you get bored with any of the conversations, there is an option to fast forward through them. And if you encounter a conversation you had before, you can fast forward through them as well. Yes, at times you might have to combine evidence you have collected or use Rarity’s horn to search for items. The good news is, the creators have created a cheat sheet if you get stuck. Access the cheat sheet at: http://www.equestriandreamers.com/walkthroughs/case-1-true-blue-scootaloo/#Section2
As of right now, there is only one case, but more cases will be coming! I thought the creators worked very hard to create a game that anyone would enjoy, even if you are not a My Little Pony fan. The game is free and can be downloaded on Windows, OS X, and Linux. If you want to download the game and learn more about My Little Investigations, go to: http://www.equestriandreamers.com/
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