Agathe Christie Returns

Late English crime writer Agathe Christie once again has her work highlighted in the PC gaming market with 4:50 From Paddington, based on her detective novel first published in 1957. The story follows Miss Jane Marple, a seemingly innocent elderly lady who is surprisingly good at solving crimes. One of her friends, Elspeth McGillicuddy (one of the best names I've ever written), was taking the train to visit Miss Marple when she looked out the window into the adjacent train and saw a crime being committed.

This kicks off our story. The game does an excellent job of folding the plot right into the adventure. Some games have a habit of giving you so much exposition, then letting you play a bit, then giving you more exposition, and so on and so forth, and the gameplay itself ends up feeling very disconnected from the story. But when it happens like this, where you're given a small tidbit of story and then it continues into the gameplay, it feels like a much more cohesive whole. 4:50 From Paddington gets major points for knowing how to tell an interactive story.

Hidden Objects Galore

This is a hidden objects game, so naturally you're going to search for objects that are hidden! The first thing you see when you begin to play is Miss McGillicuddy's messy train car. There are belongings scattered everywhere and there's a list on the left of the screen of all of the items that you need to find to continue. There's also a box at the top of the screen through which you're delivered little sections of story dialogue. This scene begins with Elspeth elaborating on what she saw that day. You unlock more as you find the story items.

The story items will be highlighted with bold text and they'll be mentioned in the blurb of dialogue. The first story item in this scene will be Elspeth's cup of tea. Once you find that, she'll mentioned that she opened her window blind, and at that point you'll have to click on the window blind. Again, it's great interactive storytelling.

This Isn't CSI

And it isn't a shabby story, either! Agathe Christie's detective stories aren't like the cop shows of today. They're much more like Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes. Not as much action and much more actual detective work. It's very intelligent plotting and it doesn't cater to those with short attention spans. That isn't to say that there aren't some twists and turns along the way. All in all, it's a very entertaining tale.

Here's a Hint: It's Good!

One thing I particularly liked was the way the hint mechanic worked here. In most products like this, when you click on the hint button, it will point out an object from your list at random. This isn't the best system because oftentimes it would point out something would be a lot easier to find than others on the list, causing you to waste a hint. The way it's constructed here, you have complete control. Click on the hint button, then click on the item in the list that you need to find and it will be highlighted.

Agathe Christie's 4:50 From Paddington doesn't do anything to turn the hidden objects genre on its head, but it offers a very good story told in a superb way with solid gameplay to back it up. It's an easy recommendation.