If you follow the indie game development scene you've probably heard of Her Story, if only in passing. It's an incredibly unique game where you play a homicide investigator trying to solve a murder. But unlike most games with that description, Her Story doesn't task you with running around a noir-inspired city or shooting hundreds of criminals. Instead you have a series of police interview videos, all delivered in live action by actress Viva Seigert, which you must organize and decipher to solve the case.

Her Story is unconventional in a lot of ways. It fits broadly into the category of an old full-motion video game, and indeed, the 1990s setting and old-school PC interface evoke the time period that inspire it. But unlike those fairly straightforward and dated games, the narrative of Her Story is fractured - there are only a few distinct police interviews with the prime suspect, but they're split into hundreds and hundreds of video clips. Answers given to questions that aren't heard must be organized and tagged by the player, forcing you to reconstruct the narrative of both the crime and the interviews themselves.

Her Story was first released last year, and it was highly praised for its original game mechanics, solid story, and excellent performances - it still has a 90% positive rating on Steam and it's won multiple prestigious awards. The entire thing was written and directed by Sam Barlow, a former Climax Studios dev who created the indie game in the Unity engine. The Android version is $2.99 at launch (though the description says that's a promotional price only), and there are no in-app purchases.

Parents, please note that the game is rated M - the language and subject matter are on the level of a crime thriller movie.

Her Story Developer: Sam Barlow
Price: 4.99
2.8
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