Crime and Punishment: Who Framed Raskolnikov?

This time the Big Fish Games ventured to put into casual game language the masterpiece of classical literature, Crime and Punishment by F. Dostoyevsky. So, a new point of view on this classical story was titled as Crime and Punishment: Who Framed Raskolnikov? This extraordinary hidden object adventure game has you traveling back in time to 19th century Russia to prevent an old woman’s murder.

Crime and Punishment: Who Framed Raskolnikov? opens with cluttered scenes that are drawn in quite muddy colors. Despite photorealistic graphics the result is fuzzy and leaves much to be desired. So, it is often absolutely impossible to tell what this or that is. Who likes to search anything for 15 minutes or so? It is really boring and annoying to gaze at one and the same scene without result. Of course, you can use hints but they recharges very slowly. The music background is also kind of depressing and at times seemed out of place that not really fitting in with the locations.   

We could close our eyes on poor artwork and sound, but not clumsy and illogical gameplay. As you progress through a quirky plot, you have to solve the usual mini-games scattered in the mix, which can be skipped after a timer has filled. All mini-games are very trite, easy to complete and deserve no attention. The storyline is also very questionable, clashing with the title of the game. Being the investigator from the future, you have arrived there to reveal why the main hero commits a murder and try to stop him. In this context the title “Crime and Punishment: Who Framed Raskolnikov?” sounds quite ridiculous as the game’s plot is far from crime theme at all. What a scene of confusion! Well, another fine story turned out to be just a silly fantasy.

20, April 2010