I really enjoyed this game, with a few caveats. The story and subject matter is well handled in my opinion. Things are not sugar coated. I loved uncovering new documents and listening to the testimonies, although I wish the testimonies were not riddled with hidden objects that you have to search for. If you miss hidden objects your rating decreases, and sometimes they can be super hard to see, and they spawn continuously through the testimony. The option to highlight them is nice but even with it on it can be easy to miss important things.

I also felt like this game does not hold your hand when it comes to coming up with the right conclusions. I had a hard time picking the right documents and sometimes had to use hints/spoilers. I like challenging deductive games but sometimes it was hard to know which document they were looking for to prove the point and when I looked up the answer it seemed like those docs shouldn't be the only correct ones. I appreciated the difficulty modifiers though.

I'd recommend this game based on the story and the attention to detail as well as the lovely voice acting and art style. I had a lot of fun with this one, I would love to play more cases if they ever come out with them! I definitely took my sweet time with the two cases that exist, and I finished in under 10 hours.

What an outstanding game. I very much recommend it to anyone who enjoys investigation and mystery games. I played on the highest difficulty from start to finish, so if some of the mechanics I describe don't apply if you play on lower difficulties, I wouldn't know.

TL;DR. Loved it, give me 14 more. I'm actually sad I finished the game and there isn't more of it for me to enjoy.

SOME NOTABLE HIGHLIGHTS:

+ The investigative process. You get acquainted with the many (so many) documents very organically. The sorting system is pretty intuitive: by the time I had to compile conclusions for the prosecution, I could recite the important paragraphs by heart.

+ Witness testimonies. Getting several versions of the same events, deducing who's lying, who's telling the truth, and who's simply misremembering --- I had a blast going through the same couple of rooms over and over again.

+ Art design. The game is gorgeous. I appreciate the darker tones and the lack of vibrant colours everywhere, so my eyes only focus on what's actually important. The art style really helped things stay cohesive.

+ Voice acting. Every single character was cast and directed perfectly. Every voice actor involved deserves nothing but praise.

+ Esther Katz. I appreciated the authenticity of Esther Katz. She's a woman of her time, but she demands respect, she's assertive, and she knows what she wants in life. I love a strong female protagonist that isn't either sexualized or treated like a passive accessory to the events of the story.

+ Simon Peters. Shout out to my boy Peters. I loved their dynamic with Katz. The progression from petty university rivals to true partners who trust each other to share the burden of their job and watch each other's backs. All that without shoehorning a romantic plot between them just because they're a man and a woman. Much respect for that alone.

+ Epilogue. With an asterisk, I appreciate the last part of the game where the narrative shifts directly to Esther. Without spoiling anything, I figured out where the story was going pretty early on and I think they handled it very well. Even if I found that chapter disappointingly short.

+ Cat. We get an office cat, and I think that's delightful. Best girl Marlene.

WHAT WORKED LESS WELL:

- Memory search. I can see the logic of "I interrogate witness --> witness remembers more --> can see more detail." I swear I'm with the developers on that one. But by god looking for the smallest changes of scenery in the sea of grey that is witnesses' memories is a task and a half. Pressing the button to make the clickable object gleam for half a second works only every fifth time and you still miss stuff! Honestly, I didn't really want to search for clues that way because it felt like cheating.

- What am I missing? You only need a few documents in total to prove guilt: not everything you find is gonna be used for anything other than context. Both times on my first playthrough I managed to miss ONE important document. Both times, ONE. I got the achievement for "hey, you found everything!" and then it turned out I didn't. Had to reload from the very first witness both times.

- Esther's colleagues. I wish we got more from both Wohlmuth and Fischer. Paula almost gets there, but Christoph falls a bit short. And I'm only putting this in the negative part of the review because I loved the characters and wanted more of them.

I just wished the game had been longer.