Murdered: Soul Suspect Review Summary

A gripping ghost detective mystery with a compelling story and satisfying twists, but suffers from bugs and performance issues, and its short simple gameplay may leave some wanting more.

Story is compelling and engaging: The story is consistently praised as captivating, well-written, and engaging from start to finish. It holds player attention with interesting plot twists and a strong narrative structure.

Detective gameplay with twists: Players enjoy the detective gameplay focused on clue gathering and making conclusions, enhanced by neat twists and a cliffhanger ending. The game successfully makes the player feel like a detective.

Unique ghost detective premise: The premise of playing as a ghost detective solving one's own murder is highlighted as a cool and original hook. This unique concept adds charm and originality to the game.

Satisfying ending with surprises: The story is noted for its satisfying and unexpected ending, often featuring plot twists that enrich the narrative. The finale leaves a pleasant aftertaste and surprises players.

Overall game quality praised: The game is generally described as enjoyable, entertaining, and brilliant, with a good story. It provides a pleasant experience that players recommend.

Game is short and simple: Multiple players note the game's short length (4-8 hours) and simple gameplay, which limits character and plot development and feels underwhelming at full price. This issue appears frequently across reviews.

Gameplay highly repetitive: Many reviewers note that the gameplay feels repetitive and monotonous, with little variation from start to finish. The stealth and encounter elements become stale, diminishing long-term engagement.

Numerous bugs and crashes: A notable number of bugs, such as flickering textures, broken character movement, and occasional freezes or crashes, are frequently reported. These technical issues contribute to an unpolished and frustrating playthrough.

Stealth sections poorly executed: The forced stealth parts with demons are described as repetitive, illogical, and boring, with clunky mechanics that distract from the story. Players find them easy to exploit yet still unfun, emphasizing their poor integration into the game.

Demon combat is frustrating: Players repeatedly complain that combat against demons is cumbersome, tedious, and annoying, making encounters feel like a nuisance rather than fun. The demons are hard to deal with and require mitigation strategies, which detracts from the overall experience.

Core gameplay is investigation: The game centers on detective work, clue gathering, and puzzle solving rather than action. It is described as a linear, story-driven investigation experience with stealth elements.

Play as ghost detective: Players assume the role of a murdered detective investigating their own death from beyond the grave. The ghost perspective is central to gameplay and narrative.

Supernatural detective theme: The game blends classic detective mystery with supernatural elements, set in Salem. It features a ghost detective concept with paranormal themes woven into murder investigations.

Ghost abilities for investigation: Players use ghost powers like walking through walls, possessing people, reading minds, and gathering clues. These abilities are integral to solving mysteries and overcoming obstacles.

Stealth sections with demons: The game includes stealth encounters with demonic enemies that can be challenging and require careful navigation. These stealth segments are a notable gameplay element.

V-Sync locks to 30 FPS: Enabling V-Sync forces the game to cap at 30 FPS, regardless of refresh rate, and disabling V-Sync removes the cap for gameplay. This is a common complaint affecting performance and stability.

High frame rates cause bugs: Playing above 30 or 60 FPS can trigger script glitches, NPC pathing issues, and crashes. Some reviewers recommend locking the frame rate to 30 FPS to avoid animation and event bugs.

Game runs well on Steam Deck: Multiple reviewers report that the game runs excellently on Steam Deck, especially when V-Sync is disabled. The game is well-optimized for this handheld device.

Game runs with low resource usage: The game requires few resources and is well-optimized for PC, running smoothly on medium hardware with low system requirements.

Bugs in environment and gameplay: Reviewers note environment- or gameplay-related bugs, which may include geometry not loading, missing walls, falling through floors, and NPCs moving through walls.

Buy on sale: Many clusters advise waiting for a discount or sale before purchasing the game, stating it is not worth the full price. Several note it becomes a good purchase when discounted heavily.

Great for mystery fans: Multiple clusters recommend the game to fans of mystery, supernatural investigations, murder cases, and detective stories. The ghost detective theme with atmospheric vibes is seen as a strong unique selling point.

Strong story focus works: The single largest cluster strongly recommends the game for its narrative. Players say the story and mystery are the main appeal and that gameplay is relatively easy compared to story quality.

Moderate recommendation overall: A few clusters give general positive recommendations, either strongly or cautiously, with no clear caveats or specific audience tags. These reflect a broadly favorable opinion of the game.

Worth single playthrough: Some smaller clusters note the game is worth playing through once or a couple of times, but not something players would likely replay or invest many hours in beyond that.

Community fair range: $5.00 - $15.00.

Game completion: 14.5h.

Story completion: 8.0h.

Murdered: Soul Suspect starts slowly with repetitive stealth and investigation, but for some players the experience improves around 4 hours as ghost powers and story engagement increase fun.

Reported time to anchor: 4h.

Friction: Early slow start; Repetitive stealth sections; Tedious investigation mechanics; Lackluster controls; Boring demon encounters; Monotonous tasks.

Unlock drivers: Ghostly powers unlock; Story hooks and progression.

Story-Driven Mystery Seeker: Follows the main narrative and side stories, ignores completionist pressure, and values atmosphere and immersion over gameplay depth. Motivation: Engaging mystery and supernatural story. Stance: sale.

Achievement Hunter / Completionist: Methodically collects all items and achievements, uses guides for efficiency, and aims for 100% completion in a single playthrough. Motivation: 100% completion and achievement unlocking. Stance: buy.

Casual Relaxation Player: Takes a leisurely approach, follows the main path without stress, and enjoys the atmosphere and story without engaging deeply with mechanics. Motivation: Relaxation and atmospheric storytelling. Stance: sale.

Performance varies by VRAM: low and high VRAM users report good experiences, but mid-range 12-15GB VRAM users face significant problems.

Windows <8GB VRAM: positive. Players report smooth gameplay at 4K 60 FPS, with only minor issues like occasional freezes or a 30fps cutscene cap easily fixed by disabling Vsync.

Windows 12-15GB VRAM: negative. Players report severe issues including constant stuttering, FPS drops, poor optimization, frequent bugs, and crashes, making the game nearly unplayable.

Windows 16GB+ VRAM: positive. The single snippet indicates the game is well-optimized with no reported performance issues.

Steam Deck: Murdered: Soul Suspect on Steam Deck requires a forced 30fps cap via V-sync to avoid progression bugs due to Unreal Engine 3 quirks. While the game runs well on Deck and Proton, users must manually set this limiter. Cutscenes remain at 30fps causing minor visual inconsistency. Overall, the experience is playable with a known tinkering requirement.

Linux and Proton: All Linux and Proton feedback is positive; the game runs out of the box with default Proton settings and works fine on Steam Deck. No tweaks or workarounds are required.

External guides: The game's design with missable achievements and one-directional progression heavily compels players to consult external guides and wikis, creating a strong external data dependency.

Game is very short: The game is described as short, taking roughly 4 to 11 hours to finish. Many players completed it in one sitting or over a few evenings, with some noting 100% completion is also fairly quick.

Detective story genre: The game is a detective thriller with a film noir style and mystical elements. Players compare it to titles like L.A. Noire, Constantine, and Ghostbusters for its pacing and tone, though it is not horror.

Cheap to buy: The game is frequently purchased on sale or at a low price, making it an affordable option for players. Many reviews mention that the price is a good value for the short experience.

Set in Salem town: The game is set in the fictional town of Salem, which adds a dark and atmospheric mystery vibe. The setting ties into the town's witch trial history.

Developer closed after release: The development studio shut down shortly after the game's release, which explains why no future updates or DLC were planned. The game is now a complete product with no ongoing support.