“Deduction mysteries” are a classic gaming genre, so I’m surprised they aren’t that popular. It wasn’t until last year that I got into that genre. I played a few last year and when I heard about The Roottrees are Dead, I wanted to check it out. There are aspects of this game I enjoyed a lot, but at times, I got bored.
You’re not solving a murder
The key distinction around The Roottrees are Dead is that you’re not here to solve a murder. It’s made clear at the beginning that’s not the case. The Roottrees are a wealthy Pennsylvania family. They own a successful candy brand and a popular clothing line. The main family dies in a plane crash. A shadow figure approaches you to help investigate the family’s lineage.
Control of the Roottree empire has always involved a direct “blood relative”. Your job is to determine who of the living Roottrees can claim ownership. The game starts you off with the easy task of identifying the three model Roottree sisters. After that, you need to complete the entire family lineage. This goes back close to 100 years.
With the 90s time frame, you don’t have access to a lot of information. Outside of a few photos given to you by the shadow character, you only have the internet. This is the mid-90s, so the internet of that time is restrictive. So, you’ll have to make do with what you have and piece together this family tree.
Reading, Examining, and Guessing
For the majority of the game, you will spend it on the internet. While most of your time is spent in the game’s search engine, you also can use a library and periodicals system. Switching between the three is key as you uncover more details. When you’re not searching on your computer, you spend the rest of the time examining the photos given to you. You will also download/print a few images as you come across them in your search.
The search function is both good and bad. I loved it when I could go down “rabbit holes”, which there are many of. You’ll search for one term and it will open up so many other topics worth examining. The game makes it obvious when something is important. Yet, you may go deeper into a topic and realize it’s not key to the story.
But on the flip side of searching, there are a lot of limits to the search function. You can’t be too specific. An early example involves the Roottree sisters. One of them goes by their middle name, so you need to find their first name. You can’t just type in “Rhose Roottrees birth name”. This gets you nothing. This got to be a bit annoying when trying to find the names of spouses. Most of the time, these people are insignificant to the story, but necessary to fill out the tree.
Because of that, there will be times when you guess to progress. All major family members need a photo, name, and occupation. At some points, you can do a process of elimination to solve them. This takes away from the exploration. Also, there is a crafty hint system, which can become a crutch if you rely on it too much.
Immersive but boring after a while
For the first 90 minutes of this game, I was so engaged and excited as I pieced together the first group of Roottrees. It was fun to go through pages and find the details I needed. But, as I got further into the game, the requirements stayed the same.
You tend to do the same thing over and over again. You are either on your computer searching or looking over your hardcopy evidence. There is one instance where the gameplay changes, but it’s short. There is a small mini-game involving descrambling some photos. You get a program on your computer that allows you to correct the images. It’s fun but brief since they are quick and easy to solve.
I wish there was more variety. I needed something else outside of photos and text. The limitations of the internet prevented the ability to include videos. There are a few songs you uncover. But, the game makes it clear early on that there are no hidden clues in them.
If you dig deep enough, there are a few easter eggs, but these don’t impact the story too much. In all, it took me close to five hours to complete the game. My time was a bit longer as I started the game on Steamdeck and that’s not the ideal format for this game. Also, I encountered a bug where I lost all my progress. It was an odd bug because the corkboard reset, but all the evidence I collected was still accessible. This forced me to add everything back to continue the story.
I wouldn’t mind playing more of these
Although I’m not as keen on The Roottrees Are Dead as I thought I would be, I liked the game. There is some post-game content that I didn’t get to try out at the time of this post, but I will check it out later. I doubt it changes my perception of the game. If it does, I’ll share my thoughts. In all, those who enjoy sleuthing will enjoy this. I’m not sure if this has wider appeal beyond that.
