In a dark and smokey room, with coffee stains on every surface and abandoned dreams clouding the air, there is only one duck to solve the case, Eugene McQuacklin. A Noir-esque tale of stolen salami, Happy Broccoli Games’ Duck Detective is a delightful little mystery adventure in the most appealing art style you could possibly find. I’m almost reticent to say family-friendly given people are up in arms over media simply featuring certain relationships, though the only “adult” thing is the mention of adult novels and a satire of their material.

You play Eugene McQuacklin, a former cop turned private investigator who is down on his luck. Clichés? I hardly knew her. In an act of desperation, both for money and over lost love, he takes on a case he knows very little about and must proceed to figure out not just who everyone is at the location but also who called him and what for. The story itself isn’t very long or very complicated, some parts of the mystery you’ll figure out straight away, others you’ll be a little stumped on. For the most part it is simple enough that children can keep up.

Voiced by Sean Chiplock, Victory Buchanan in Wasteland 3, and Noob Saibot from MK11, the titular Duck Detective sounds like 40 cigarettes a day is his morning breakfast. In fact, between that and several other clichés, it wouldn’t be hard to deduc(k)t the level that Duck Detective: The Secret Salami is going for. Its comedy is heavy-handed and its plot isn’t all that new to figure out, however, its presentation and ability to charm is what makes the few hours it sticks around an utter delight to play.

Of course, there are minor issues I’ve had. Issues range from running back and forth searching for clues, all broken up with load screens, to being stumped and brute forcing something being tiresome. Generally, load screens aren’t an issue, though when you are running through multiple rooms trying to connect the dots, it can feel like multiple seconds are wasted staring at the ceiling and feeling frustrated. Meanwhile, the obligatory safe with a post-it note attached so the owner can “remember” their code is a nightmare to brute force with a keyboard and mouse.

With a graphical style this colorful and cute, which could generally be described as 2.5D dioramas with sticker cut-outs hopping along, it shouldn’t be a surprise to know that there are very few graphical options or performance hitches. The Steam frame counter that I often use did note a minor drop here and there, possibly due to several other things, but I think any PC of the last 10 years should run Duck Detective: The Secret Salami fairly well. I’d hardly call it a resource hog or anything of the sort. It is a bog-standard wholesome adventure in that regard.

Gameplay is where you’ll spend a good portion of your time, and it is mostly good. Basically, you are given sentences with blanks: “[blank] did [blank] to protect [blank] from finding out about [blank].” Real simple and really easy to set up, you, or rather Eugene McQuacklin must walk around these colorful little dioramas of a bus station office and investigate. Either through talking to people (well, anthropomorphized people), inspecting things, or questioning everyone. Clues eventually turn into keywords standing out and you can use those to fill in the blanks.

The trouble, I think, with such a simple system is that once you are in those last few stages of each section of your investigation, it can be a little frustrating tramping back and forth through scenes looking for details. The hints, which are there, aren’t always the most helpful as I’ve seen it. I wasn’t looking for the answer to be given to me, but I’d have liked at least a vague direction to be pointed in instead of all the details I’ve already covered.

Don’t get me wrong, I fell in love with Duck Detective: The Secret Salami earlier this week as I played it, though its minor gripes stand out when realistically there isn’t much to complain about. What bothered me about the gameplay was when I’d made a mistake in my deduc(k)tions, as there was no way to reset or strike out the words that weren’t right. Luckily the game time is rather short, so you can probably complete Duck Detective in one or two sittings, so there isn’t much room to forget, though it is still notably an issue.

Really, Duck Detective: The Secret Salami is a delightful, endearing, colorful, and downright brilliant couple of hours with similar problems to Lucas Pope’s Return of the Obra Dinn. As much as you are hired to investigate someone’s missing lunch, you’ll spend a couple of hours getting distracted (duckstracted?) by a greater conspiracy. All of which is heavily characterized, full of personality, and is generally fun to play.

Ultimately, Happy Broccoli Games’ Duck Detective: The Secret Salami is short, sweet, and to the point, utterly morish, and yet never stays long enough to get bored of it. I love it wholeheartedly for how it leans into the noir-theming and perfectly makes its world far more delightful despite a similar idea to Spanish comic, turned game Blacksad. Warm, delightful, and probably a little “cringe,” to someone younger than me, but I don’t care. Minor problems are just that to a fantastic duck deduction full of color and delight.

A PC review copy of Duck Detective: The Secret Salami was provided by Happy Broccoli Games for this review.

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Duck Detective: The Secret Salami

$9.99

9

Score

9.0/10

Pros

• Perfect-fun tone.
• So colorful and delightful.
• Utterly morish.

Cons

• Very minor bugs and stiffness.
• I can't replay Duck Detective anytime soon.