Duck Detective: The Secret Salami is a 2024 adventure game developed and published by Happy Broccoli Games. It is a comedic detective story where players solve puzzles to progress through a mystery.
| Duck Detective: The Secret Salami | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Developer(s) | Happy Broccoli Games |
| Publisher(s) | Happy Broccoli Games |
| Engine | Unity[1] |
| Platform(s) | |
| Release |
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| Genre(s) | Adventure |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
Gameplay
editPlayers control a down-on-his-luck duck detective in a city where all the residents are animals. His latest case starts simply: figuring what what happened to a missing salami. Players solve puzzles in the form of phrasal templates where the correct words must be inserted in the detective's notebook. Players can guess words, but investigating the scene and talking to non-player characters gives them clues.[2] The game reveals how many of the chosen words are correct. Though the ultimate solution to the mystery is always the same in every game, players can make choices about how to proceed. After completing the mystery, players can see what percentage of people made each choice.[3]
Development
editHappy Broccoli Games released Duck Detective for Linux, macOS, Windows, and Switch on May 23, 2024.[4]
Reception
editDuck Detective received positive reviews on Metacritic.[5] Polygon praised its charm and humor, which they said made backtracking to find more clues fun. Given that it only takes a few hours to complete, they hoped Happy Broccoli would add more episodes.[2] Digitally Downloaded enjoyed the parody of hardboiled detective fiction, which was a good hardboiled story itself.[3] PCGamesN called it "funny, entertaining, and satisfying" that is a good value despite its short length.[6] Hardcore Gamer recommended it to gamers who enjoy indie games and crime mysteries, who they felt would not be disappointed by the short length.[7] Nintendo World Report praised the writing and art, though they said they wanted to more cases to solve.[8]
References
edit- ^ Saver, Michael (2024-06-10). "Games Made with Unity: May 2024 in review". Unity Technologies. Retrieved 2024-09-07.
- ^ a b Carpenter, Nicole (2024-07-30). "Duck Detective: The Secret Salami takes the hard-boiled detective trope and makes it quack". Polygon. Retrieved 2024-09-07.
- ^ a b Sainsbury, Matt (2024-05-24). "Review: Duck Detective: The Secret Salami (PC)". Digitally Downloaded. Retrieved 2024-09-07.
- ^ "Duck Detective: The Secret Salami". Gamepressure. Retrieved 2024-09-07.
- ^ "Duck Detective: The Secret Salami". Metacritic. Retrieved 2024-09-07.
- ^ Kelly, Paul (2024-05-23). "Duck Detective The Secret Salami review - a bite-sized detective game". PCGamesN. Retrieved 2024-09-07.
- ^ Murphy, Matthew (2024-05-23). "Review: Duck Detective: The Secret Salami". Hardcore Gamer. Retrieved 2024-09-07.
- ^ Cygan, Allyson (2024-05-23). "Duck Detective: The Secret Salami (Switch) Review". Nintendo World Report. Retrieved 2024-09-07.