A goofy detective-themed adventure game inspired by the point-and-click classics that never takes itself too seriously, Darkside Detective is at its best when it's cracking jokes but some of the boring puzzles slow you down from enjoying the writing.

Out of the gate, with the simple first case, the writing and humor of the game won me over. I loved the meta jokes, goofy tone, and the dynamic between McQueen and Dooley. After Case 1, I was pretty harshly reminded that this is a point-and-click adventure that requires you to click specific things, combine items, and follow occasionally opaque logic to solve puzzles. On several occasions I found myself knowing what I had to do, but unable to figure out in what order the game wanted me to click on things to progress. Eventually I gave in a pulled up a guide because I was more interested in enjoying the fun writing than stumbling my way through the puzzles.

If the writing weren't so fun, I probably would've dropped the game mid-way through. I enjoyed my time overall but not enough to check out the sequel. Annoying because the game ends with a cliffhanger.

+ Great writing and fun jokes
+ Good visuals that work well with the style

- Obtuse adventure game puzzles that were more annoying than puzzling
- In-game hint system would've been nice
- Audio design was a bit sparse. Nice ambient music but no sound effects
- Controlling a cursor with a controller sucks