Prior to editing Keiran’s review of the Xbox One version of Blacksad, I had actually never heard of the graphic novels or the titular character. However, as a fan of classic detective fiction and noir-styled storylines, I couldn’t help but be intrigued. So, despite Keiran’s review containing mention of numerous bugs and problems, when the Nintendo Switch version started being announced I couldn’t help but be curious.

The developers have mentioned that there are a few notable changes and patches that were made prior to the release of the Switch version so if I had to hazard a guess, some of the bugs were fixed that Keiran reported on in his review. However, there are still a wide array of bugs and issues, some of which I’ll get into shortly.

Before we go too far though, Blacksad: Under the Skin puts you in the titular role of John Blacksad, a detective who is hired to investigate the apparent suicide of Joe Dunn, by Dunn’s daughter Sonia. At first, people are inclined to believe that Joe Dunn killed himself but as evidence starts to point elsewhere, John quickly discovers that there are people who could profit off of his murder and the decline of his Boxing Gym.

Like any crime noir tale, things start out fairly normal, then slowly you begin to realize that everyone has something to hide, and what you think you know about the case may not be true. I won’t dig into any spoilers here, because with a game like this one it would defeat the purpose of you playing the game yourself.

Blacksad is played like a combination of a 3D exploration game and a Point-and-Click. As John Blacksad, you investigate various places, talk to witnesses or people of interest, and undergo Quick Time Events for most action sequences. Additionally, you can use your cat senses to examine things, smell things, and even hear the heartbeat of people you are questioning to see if they are telling the truth.

Choices you make can affect the way the story goes, as well as how certain people approach or perceive you. Do you play as a righteous, moral detective? Or a corrupt one who only cares about the most profitable outcome? Do you choose to be professional bordering on cruelty? Or do you show compassion for others?

As you play, you can collect cards depicting various athletes in Blacksad’s world. It is an interesting way to encourage folks to continue to search and explore entire areas rather than just finding points of interest and calling it a day.

The characters are interesting, though I found it strange that the motion capture doesn’t really seem to show the characters’ emotions all that well. Even a character that was attached to Joe Dunn seems to have very little emotional attachment. However, there are points where despite the visuals not showing emotion, the voice actors over-acted to compensate, which is less than ideal.

The world and environment have a very distinct 1950’s feel to it, sometimes in ways that don’t make sense, such as watering down racial tensions between humanoid animals as “blacks” and “whites” which is seemingly unnecessary. That’s just one of the problems with Blacksad: Under the Skin. There are lag spikes, framerate drops, long loading screens, and other visual issues, such as character models going entirely black, looking like a void instead of a character. How a game so poorly optimized received the rewards it obtained is beyond me.

It is very disappointing too because the story (while short) is very interesting, there are interesting concepts at work in some of the characters, and I find it very difficult to understand the lack of polish in the game. Even the UI and some of the core concepts are broken or simply unintuitive.

For example, as you learn things from witnesses, crime scenes, investigation zones etc, you are able to put together deductions in a similar way to games such as The Sinking City or the Sherlock Holmes franchise. The problem is, your various clues show up twice on screen, making it confusing because you often think there are more clues to work with than there actually are.

Your cat senses also have problems. As you use your cat senses to examine things, a small arrow is meant to guide you to points of interest. However, the color of the arrow blends in so well with the rest of the screen, that most of the time you simply fumble around trying to figure out what you’re actually meant to investigate. Even something as simple as walking around is sluggish and hard to manage.

On a happier note, quick-time events are fairly forgiving, though there is a tradeoff here. Dialogue is timed, so you’re basically constantly doing some sort of timed thing, whether you’re having to be quick to react or talk to a witness, or trying to fend off an attacker. The frustrating part about this is that often you don’t get enough time to process your dialogue choices, so you are often rushed to make the right decision.

The tutorial and subtitles are both turned off by default too, which makes me think that the developers really didn’t develop the game with accessibility or their user in mind. While I want to give Blacksad: Under the Skin a favorable review, and I do applaud the developers for fixing some of the bugs from the initial console release, there are still a lot of problems. If you are a fan of the graphic novels, or are a fan of games like this in general, I would recommend that you pick it up on sale. It isn’t worth paying full price for a game that is full of bugs and ultimately is not that long, to begin with.

A Nintendo Switch review copy of Blacksad: Under the Skin was provided by Microids for this review.

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Blacksad: Under the Skin

$29.99 USD

4

Score

4.0/10

Pros

• Interesting Concept
• Storyline is Intriguing
• Characters Have Interesting Motives
• Choices Matter

Cons

• Lots of Bugs
• Lag and Framerate Issues
• Motion Capture Doesn't Show Emotion Well
• Controls are Sluggish
• Dialogue is Too Fast