Off the Record: The Final Interview Collector's Edition

Coincidence can be difficult to differentiate from bad luck sometimes, especially when two events appear to be connected when they are actually not. Many people suffered punishment for deeds they had nothing to do with, except for the fact that they had the bad luck to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Off the Record: The Final Interview Collector's Edition is a casual puzzle game that touches on the subject of coincidence, but in a much more morbid way. As such, you’ll have to deal with an interesting case regarding a murder while defending your own innocence at the same time. The game is not very complicated from a gameplay point of view, but the actual puzzles can put you on the spot every now and again.

The story begins with the main character taking an interview with one of the most famous horse breeders in the world. After you finish your job and leave, an unfortunate turn of events leads your character to have a car accident and lose her memory. Not only that, but the police arrives soon after as well, blaming you for the death of the horse breeder you interviewed just hours earlier.

To keep you from getting bored, the game features a variety of different puzzles and mini-games, some of which even require you to react quickly. Hidden object sequences are also part of the mix, although you usually just have to scour the environments for any useful items and store them in your inventory. Some items need to be combined with something else in order to be used, which means that you’ll constantly be looking for something.

The dialog and the plot do not evolve past the intriguing phase, but it’s interesting enough to keep you invested in the action for a couple of hours. The designers did a very good job when it comes to level design and artwork, since almost every location holds an impressive amount of detail. The same goes for the sound quality, although the soundtrack is a bit disappointing.

All things being equal, there are better puzzle games than Off the Record: The Final Interview Collector's Edition out there, but this one isn’t too bad either. As long as you do not mind the consistent supply of cliches, the puzzles and the mini-games should be more than enough to make you happy.