Games You Might Have Missed: The Sexy Brutale
The Sexy Brutale is a situational puzzle game from Cavalier Game Studios and Tequila works released April, 12th 2017. Set in a hotel/casino called The Sexy Brutale, you play as Lafacadio Boone, a man wrapped up in the mysteries of the hotel in ways he yet doesn’t understand. You’re given a brief run-down of the situation by a woman covered in glowing red slime: something in the hotel has gone terribly wrong and now the staff are killers and the guests are victims. It’s up to you to save the other guests from their grisly fates with the help of a pocket watch that allows you to restart the day.
Gameplay-wise The Sexy Brutale is like Clue meets Groundhog Day. You guide Boone through different areas of the hotel, searching for the victim and trying to discern how they were killed so you can stop it. Once you see how they die, you’ll have to start over to start foiling the murder. This is where the puzzle elements come in. Even if you watch the entire murder from start to finish, you may not have the solution. Exploring the rooms around the crime scene is key, as they provide the tools you need to stop the staff from succeeding in their murderous quests.
Figuring out how to stop each murder is fun and challenging. The puzzles scale up in difficulty as you advance You start off in a fairly small area and can save the first victim in a relatively straight forward way, but as you go on, the crime scenes get larger and more elaborate, forcing you to think more and more outside the box. The game helps with this kind of thinking by providing you with additional skills to help navigate the hotel and spy on victim and killer alike. Time management is also a priority as certain events will make or break your rescue attempt. Keep your eyes on the clock, or you might have a body on your hands!
This game is fun because everything from the game design to the art direction puts a positive spin on the murder mystery genre. Instead of something like Danganronpa, where someone ends up dead no matter what you do, The Sexy Brutale is all about saving people. Even when you watch them die, it’s all ultimately in the pursuit of not only keeping them alive, but also freeing them from the creepy spell of the hotel. Bright colors, campy situations, and some genuinely sweet moments between characters make this game feel less oppressive than others that take on this kind of subject matter.
If you’re looking for a break in the upcoming season of AAA multiplayer games, The Sexy Brutale is a great pick. It’s only about 4-6 hours long, depending on how much time you spend looking for collectibles and secrets, and it’s well worth the time and money at only $19.99. It’s available on PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC. Check it out and reveal the secrets of The Sexy Brutale.
