Game: Chronique des Silencieux
Genre: Adventure, Indie
System: Steam (Windows)
Developer|Publisher: Pierre Feuille Studio
Controller Support: No
Price: US $24.99 | UK £20.99 | EU € 24,50
Release Date: January 29th, 2024
The review code was provided with many thanks to Strange Signals.
Chronique des Silencieux is a 2024 adventure game developed and released by Pierre Feuille Studio.
Premise
In Chronique des Silencieux, we play Eugene during different periods of his life and career as a private detective, from when he was a young boy to an adult. The primary part of the game is set during the 1970s in the south of France.
The central part of the story is about our heroes investigating the case of Victor Dousvalon, an old history professor who is a friend and mentor of Eugene. Victor hires our hero to investigate his life and report his findings to his daughter, Catherine. Very mysterious!
The Gameplay of Chronique des Silencieux
Chronique des Silencieux is a classic point-and-click detective game where we interview suspects and witnesses, read through testimonies and documents, make hypotheses, and look for inconsistencies. In short, you’ll do a lot of reading in this game.
Movement is either WASD, with holding Shift for running, or entire through the mouse with double-clicking the right mouse button for running. Movement is mostly smooth, with the occasional hiccup when you need to interact with a person or an object and click the icon that appears around the object itself rather than the object. It’s a minor complaint, but I did it more often than I thought.
Items such as documents and proof are collected automatically. They can be accessed at any point of the investigation, along with transcripts of the conversations. Eugene has a unique tool from his mother: the recorder. It can be used to record anything of need, such as a piece of a melody, which then can be playback to witnesses and suspects to unlock new lines of conversation.
I commend the way the collected information is organized in Chronique des Silencieux. Since most of the hypotheses and, indeed, the investigation are based on said information, it is essential that the player can find everything easily. Chronique des Silencieux manages that perfectly without taking away the genuine pleasure of coming to a conclusion all by yourself. You do that by connecting pieces of information with a red rope, much like a private eye on a corkboard.
Decisions are made by placing information and possible motives within a padlock; if everything is correct, the padlock is unlocked. You can see all the leads on a separate page and, at the same time, have access to a hint system if you get stuck.
Besides a lot of reading, we, as Eugene, do a lot of walking throughout the game. While there is an option for running, the game would have benefitted from a map and fast travel option. Still, it’s not that big of a deal: the map itself is not that big.
The World of Chronique des Silencieux
I love games like Chronique des Silencieux, where you get to read a lot and learn things about our world and history. It doesn’t have to be indisputable facts. Just the spark of interest is more than enough.
One of the game’s strong points is its host of characters, all unique in appearance, characterization, and story. The relationships, personal stories, and sometimes tragedies are compelling and make for a good detective story.
As mentioned above, Eugene grows up during the game, but with him, the world within the game changes as well- some characters grow up and grow old, and the town and the buildings change. The world gets bigger and smaller at the same time.
The changes echo the growth of Eugene. In the prologue, we meet a naive teenager, Eugene, who has just arrived in town and is looking for a way to help his uncle. The city is picturesque even in the rain; people walk around the market, and everything looks lively. Five years later, Eugene is a young man, somewhat grown up, and the world has also started changing- the picturesque town with its market has turned into a construction site.
Chronique des Silencieux looks like a hand-drawn piece of art or the very best of the European comic book scene. In any case, art-wise, it’s a beautiful game, a pleasure to play, and its visuals were one of the reasons I Wishlisted it in the first place.
The soundtrack is quirky and well-suited to the game. The cutscenes are voiced in French, and I really liked them. On the one hand, I wish the rest of the dialogue was expressed as well; on the other, given how much of it there is, I wouldn’t have listened to all of it. Ultimately, the developers made an excellent, balanced decision on that topic.
Some Side Notes
Chronique des Silencieux has some basic audio and video options. It has yet to have Steam achievements or cards. I want to mention that the developer has continuously released updates and bug fixes from the time I received a copy of the game to review until now, and they will continue to do so. Chronique des Silencieux was a labour of love, with the attention to detail and improvements they’ve made.
The game is now released on Windows and will be released for MacOS and Linus in the following weeks. I didn’t experience any severe bugs, except for a slight delay during a cutscene. Still, I am hesitant to blame the game rather than my overpopulated task manager.
For language support, the game is released in French and English. I played it in English, and I’ve seen enormous improvement in the quality of the translation. It will only get better from here on. If you are going to play in French, all the better for you!
Conclusion
Chronique des Silencieux is a game I’ve waited quite a while for, and I am happy to report it didn’t disappoint at all. It was everything it promised to be. I hope this is not the last I see from Eugene, a private detective.
Final Verdict: Two Thumbs Up: 