Reviews

• gamedeal user

  Jun 12, 2014

  It wasn't till today i realized Castle had a game! I was really excited and decided to buy the game at the first chance i got. I was blown away by the characters and the story plot. It was such a twist! Really enjoyed it! Better than i expect it! Music may repeat itself from time to time entering a new cast but you can overcome that, So far best crime solving game ever! #CaskettAlways
• gamedeal user

  Jun 25, 2014

  Bought during the sale and I am glad I did. As a big fan of the show, this kept me entertained (and frustrated in a few spots) for many hours. The story was engaging and I liked the style. The only things that bothered me are that, like a lot of seek and find type games, it can get a bit repetative and some of the puzzles were mind-numbingly hard. Otherwise a fun game and worth buying if you like the game style.
• gamedeal user

  Jun 29, 2014

  For what it is, it kept me engaged during all of the gameplay. There are a few puzzles that are frustratingly random (there's no logic to their solutions, it's all trial and error), but the option to skip these puzzles was really nice. The atmosphere reminded me a lot of the silliness of the show, and it was just an easy, simple game to play.
• gamedeal user

  Jul 30, 2014

  This game went down way too fast and I purposely played through this slowly. I like hidden object games and this one did not dissapoint. Some of the puzzles were bizzare but the story made up for it. I have only watched enough of the show to know Castle is not a cop but a writer and the game was still good casual fun. Get it on sale and enjoy it for what it is. I'd love to see a new chapter to download or new story arc that would be nice.
• gamedeal user

  Sep 23, 2014

  I'm on the fence about whether to recommend this game, or not. (i.e. Yes, with caveats) Playing this game with no awareness previously that there even was a TV show called Castle probably meant that I missed a lot of the inside jokes/character interplay. On the other hand, the game was constantly offering to skip dialogue so maybe the game designers didn't consider it to be of high value either. In general, this is a Hidden Objects game. It's dead center in the middle of the genre, playing a lot like a PC Adventure game but with a lot more backtracking and one shot objects to solve specific situations. It was OK as a Hidden Object game. (Lots of chaotic jumbled scenes, very few AHA! moments when I suddenly recognized new patterns.) The puzzles were either fairly simple/straightforward, or extremely tedius where a monkey could solve them, given sufficient persistance and ability to randomly click. Luckily there was the SKIP/Hint feature in the tedious cases. The overall plot was very interesting; but the game had some specific irritant gotchas (for me at least), such as allowing us to use a potentially contaminated Q-tip swap from a crime scene as part of DNA lap work for a different piece of evidence. There were several instances where it felt like they were trying to play with the lab equipment, but it didn't really add to the overall plot. (Possibly a reference from the TV show I'm unaware of.) I really enjoyed the Literatured Themed Murders (Hard Back Killer), but very quickly all the details blurred together and I didn't see how the selected quotes, etc. really added much. (As demonstrated when they summarized them out of existence on the Evidence board.) Final Score: 3/5 Stars. I would definitely recommend other Hidden Object games ahead of this one. It felt like this was a product bundle with a known franchise with an OK game. Don't buy this one for $10. P.S. I did enjoy the fact that you could view your Hidden Objects search list by both English name, and by visual Silhouette. (I rarely used this feature, but this is the first gave where I've seen it.)
• gamedeal user

  Nov 2, 2014

  Hidden object + some adventure elements. This one is a mystery story. Entertaining game. No unlimited hidden object mode or bonus chapters. Puzzles are similar to those in other hidden object hybrid games. One small gripe is that if you are trying to read some text, like a journal, it automatically goes away after a few seconds as it considers it timed out. You can reopen it but may need to do this a couple times for lengthier texts.
• gamedeal user

  Dec 22, 2014

  [h1]Short version: 71%[/h1] A gripping serial murder story featuring characters of a television show in the form of a hidden object game, which strangely has no voice acting in it. [h1]Long version:[/h1] When a television series is adapted to a video game, there is always a chance to get some incredibly shoddy cash-in title, or something with an actual effort in it. Never Judge a Book by Its Cover is somewhere between the two. As a crime story, it is exceptionally well-written with good pacing, good setup, and it knows when to stop before it gets ridiculously overcomplicated. But why is it sold as a Castle game, I have no idea. It has no voice acting, theme song, or anything really related to the show. As a game it is a mediocre hidden object puzzle title with gorgeous, yet overcrowded scenes, and long and frustrating puzzles. But it’s the point ‘n’ click part that kills it: adventure game logic takes over every last shred of realism, which stands in stark contrast of what is seen in the original show. Still, if you like hidden object games, or just want something related to the Castle series and already read all the books, this one may be a nice afternoon pastime.
• gamedeal user

  Dec 26, 2014

  Having clicked 'No', I will add the proviso that I WOULD recommend 'Castle: Never Judge a Book by its Cover', but ONLY to fans of the 'Castle' TV series! Anyone else should probably avoid. Whilst I enjoyed the game, that was primarily because, as a fan, I recognised the in-jokes to some of the episodes of the series and the faithfully recreated scenes from the sets of the show. The gameplay itself is a bit lacklustre. Most of the game is spent playing the missing objects mechanic whereby you pick out a small list of items from a large screen full of stuff. A bit 'Where's Waldo', but fine, although this does get tedious rather fast. Of more promise are the many little logic puzzle games which are many and varied - most are familiar and simple, but some are a bit more challanging. The only downside to these logic puzzles is that the 'Hint' mechanic allows you to completely skip the games, thus rendering them utterly pointless. And here we get to the big drawback to this game: the 'Hint' mechanic. In most games where hints are given, usually you get actual 'hints' to what to do, but leaving you to continue to work things out. In 'C:NJaNbiC' the 'Hint' machinic leads you around by the hand. Not sure what you should be doing? 'Hint' Go here, do this. Can't solve this puzzle mini-game? 'Hint' Solved. Really, the button should be labelled 'Bored Now' or 'Too Lazy'. I bought the game with the understanding that there would be no animations, just still scenes, but I was disappointed that there was NO actual voice-acting at all. The entire game takes place in virtual silence, with some barely adequate, low-key synth music to fill the void of all the text boxes as the characters 'talk'. This is a real shame since the game is based on the 'Castle' TV show which has characters with distinct and charming voices, so why not get them doing some voice acting for the game? And the synth music is hardly inkeeping with the music used throughout the TV series, which is chock full of funky current music tracks. I guess the licensing costs too much? As already mentioned, there were no animations, it was all character portraits and still scene imagery, but the game would certainly have benefited from animated characters and backdrops. But hey, costs, what can you do? And finally, lets mention length. It's short. I played it through in 4 hours, and that was by doing ALL the puzzles. If I skipped through all the ones I had trouble with, that time would probably have been halved. Considering that the game is made without animation or sound content, could they perhaps not have made futher episodic iterations with new games or mechanics to it? Shame, as that might have made it worth the money, to have further stories to work through, like actually playing a season of 'Castle', with themes continued in subsequent episodes. That would at least have given the game a lift in it's simplistic and obvious storytelling. Which leads me to what is probably the biggest issue I had with the game: the story. Without spoiling it, I will say that it was obivous from very early on what the situation was and who the killer was - Ok, so that reguarly occurs in episodes of the show where you can guess who-dunnit, but the story doesn't do anything clever with it, and comes to a boring and obvious conclusion. For a game based on a TV series with pretty decent storylines, and featuring a professional Author, it commits the ultimate sin of 'poor story telling', and that's the final nail in the coffin. To summarise: the game has some fun little puzzles and recognisable scenes/characters from the TV series, but lack of good sound, animation and poor storytelling make it very bland, and the short, limited story is too brief, with no hope of any kind of replayability. For a casual game, it's... Okay. Ish. For a point & click game, it's... Poor. One to avoid.
• gamedeal user

  Jan 2, 2015

  Do you like Castle? Do you like murder mysteries? Or maybe hard puzzles, decent art, and a generic but decent plot? Then this game is for you! I'll admit I was missing a level on this simply by never having watched the TV series, and never intending to. On a 1 to 10 scale, this was a solid 7, slightly brought down by it's steeper than average difficulty curve on its puzzles. Not majorly so, but definitely overall they tended to be on the challenging side.
• gamedeal user

  Jan 3, 2015

  You definetly shouldn't judge this as being a bad game because it's based on a TV show. If you do, then you will be missing out on a decent and worthwhile game. It's essentially a point and click game with a bit of hidden object finding thrown in. While the game isn't voice acted and all dialogue is displayed via text, the writing is solid enough that the game doesn't suffer for it. The puzzles are what let it down a little bit though, there is one puzzle where the solution doesn't match the clue at all (it should be a number 1,3,5 or 7 but it is a 2 which is not one of the numbers listed, and there are a couple of puzzles where the description could have used tightening up as while I techinically had a correct solution to the puzzle, the developer had a different solution in mind. Thankfully there is a skip button so these puzzles can be solved. Outside of that a couple of times the object you needed to progress could have been a little better layed out (for example you use a paint roller to haul in a boat...which based on the scene wouldn't really reach. Minor gripes aside I got a solid 4 to 5 hours out of it and enjoyed the story and gameplay overall.