Cold Case Inc. - "Murder in the Pines"

Photo above is property of Cold Case Inc.

Company: Cold Case Inc.

Game: Murder in the Pines

Country: United Kingdom 🇬🇧

Language: English

Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻

Genre: Mystery, Detective

Date Played: August 15, 2024

Difficulty (based on 2 players): 6.5/10

Size of Team: Unlimited

Time: Approximately 4-6 Hours

Price: $29.99

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Back again with another excellent Cold Case Inc. game. This time it's “Murder in the Pines”.

“The tranquility of a camping trip in Pinewood Woods is shattered when Chloe Bennett, an investigative journalist, is found dead.”

Important to note this game sees the usual case file format evolving to suit a team of players as an exercise in their successful collaboration - an experiment in transporting mystery games into the world of corporate team building . So it's a little more on the straightforward side, although I wouldn't characterize any of these cases as being easy, this one included.

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I'm biased. I've played all of these and I've universally relished and like them all, they are quality mystery games that are as close as you can get to what you might think a real police detective case file would look like. It's on the more hardcore side, with a sea of evidence, twisted and challenging deductive scenarios, that you slowly piece together, following and tying up leads, until you unravel the big picture, honing down the information to the essential elements and facts, until you identify that one absolute piece of evidence that is the smoking gun. You will definitely be taking notes, and also definitely be driven almost to the point of ecstatic madness as you play detective and try and work it all out.

What this particular case does really well is that it segments the pieces of the evidence so that they can be delegated within a team, and also supports an internal note taking mechanism between players, while also being in itself a solid mystery, with a very clever smoking gun. My only minor gripe - and I say this because I know the cases all so well - is that the defining piece of evidence might possibly be too front and center, potentially robbing the player of having to work through the rest of the cases' clever layers. That being said, this scenario unfolded brilliantly, taking me to that point of feeling of being at a complete loss before challenging me to build a coherent picture of what actually happened from out of the mass of information that lay before me.

Photos above are property of Cold Case Inc.

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It's a deductive feast, full of twisted syllogisms and puzzles. Four people go on a camping trip to celebrate the anniversary of their dead friend, one storms off and is later found dead, and you are basically tasked with tracking the movements and motives of the three suspects throughout the night to figure out which one could have possibly killed her. The scenario is perfectly suited for a deductive mystery, as it involves a lot of interesting elements from which to deduce the facts of the case: the movements of the specific characters as they searched for the victim that night, the web of motives surrounding their feelings towards the victim, recent developments, fragments of witness statements and their own testimonies, the hard forensic evidence, along with a whole bunch of other circumstantial pieces. The final solution itself is quite clever and coherent, and satisfying.

Photos above are property of ESCAPETHEROOMers

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This is another successful entry into what is becoming a dynasty of solid Cold Case Inc. cases. I think these types of well done mysteries are perfect for corporate team building. They are engaging, they stimulate people to think and dialogue with each other, much in the same way you might work over any other project. These games are honestly best played with someone else for starters, it's just fun bouncing ideas off each other and it makes the sifting that much more manageable. It's also fun sharing those Aha moments, of which there are a good few. Rumor has it that the next case might be a collaborative creation. I look forward to how the two or more heads might take the legacy of Cold Case Inc. to the next level.

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Disclosure: We thank Cold Case Inc. for providing us with samples of the game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever.

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