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- Evil Trout
- Evil Trout
- Evil Trout
- Evil Trout
The Roottrees are Dead
Released On: Jan 15, 2025
86
7.9
All Platforms
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 11 Critic Reviews
86
91% Positive
10 Reviews
10 Reviews
9% Mixed
1 Review
1 Review
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 11 Critic Reviews
86
91% Positive
10 Reviews
10 Reviews
9% Mixed
1 Review
1 Review
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
The best thing a puzzle game can do is make you feel smart; The Roottrees Are Dead made me feel like the second coming of Sherlock Holmes. Its exceptional mystery is bolstered by stimulating puzzle-solving, a satisfying ending, and a cozy nostalgia that makes it weirdly relaxing to mull over a cup of coffee. Don’t let this quirky search for answers pass you by.
The Roottrees Are Dead is a fascinating tale of a famous family with secrets in their closet. Exposing those secrets is some of the most fun I’ve had with a game in a long time, and anyone who has enjoyed similar investigative titles like Her Story, Return of the Obra Dinn, or The Case of the Golden Idol needs to look into the history of the Roottrees.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 27 User Ratings
7.9
78% Positive
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
11% Mixed
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
11% Negative
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 27 User Ratings
7.9
78% Positive
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
11% Mixed
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
11% Negative
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
A perfect puzzle experience for me. Part 1 is pristinely balanced from start to finish. The flow of information and clues is weighted to keep you moving forward in the investigation. There probably won't be a better gaming feeling this year then when you lock in correct characters in the **** 2nd part, Roottreemania, is much more difficult than part 1. There is probably about triple the information to sift through with multiple false leads and irrelevant info than before. The hint system was helpful here just for small pointers in the right direction.
Report
PC
Never has putting a family tree together been so much fun. I couldn't put down The Roottrees are Dead once I started playing it, leaving me feeling like a true detective, searching web pages, library archives and more to piece together this intriguing family's history. This is a must-play for any puzzle fan.
The Roottrees Are Dead is a triumph of investigative fiction, offering a compelling yet grounded family mystery within countless articles, websites, and archives waiting for you to uncover. The game has been much improved over its original iteration on itch.io, and the extra content “Roottreemania” adds a cool follow-up mystery to the main one. Any fan of investigation games will have a great time with The Roottrees are Dead.
As a carefully crafted mystery game, it won’t be for everyone. But for those who enjoy slow-burn investigations that reward patience and persistence, this title delivers a satisfying experience.
Filling in a family tree may not sound all that compelling, but digging up the sordid secrets of a prominent family of celebs is such voyeuristic fun that it’s hard to tear yourself away from The Roottrees Are Dead until not one but two sets of mysteries are solved in this polished and expanded commercial remake.
The game does a great job of letting players logically put together clues. It hides them well at the center of the Roottree's web, but the farther out it goes, it may grate over time. The writing is worth absorbing as players go along and this feels like a real family that could have existed. While this story is certainly told in a way that makes it one of the more unique mystery games out there, it's the method in which players are asked to discover it that holds it back.
A TON of reading but if you can stomach that then this is one of the best mystery games made in a while. The in-game search engine didn't make me feel like I had to be spot on every time with what I wanted to search and the story about this wealthy family is interesting enough to get you to want to play more.
Report
PC
Really good sleuthing game about filling out a family tree, but it's a lot to take in at first. Because of that, sorting notes efficiently and knowing when to go back to them can be tough to remember. And since the game fairly long, unless you take perfect notes from the start, it can be hard to remember who or what thread led to where if you first looked into something several hours prior.
But, the game itself in concept and story are both great and it feels really good getting that piece of the puzzle locked in. Following threads from search to search and digging down into different wormholes is really fun as well. However, you need to have some pretty good note taking and reading comprehension skills to not have to retread some old searches and rethink things. Sometimes the one thing you need is buried in an obscure search followed by a one off line you might not have thought anything off the first time you read it. There is just A LOT of text in the game, so it can be over bearing at times, but that's what the notes are for. And there is a good system for taking notes in game and linking to articles so you can go back to where you saw a specific piece of data, it works really well.
Overall the game is overwhelming at first, but once you get in the flow, it is very rewarding and engaging to put everything in its place. The game is also very long, as there are basically 2 full trees to put together and a side mode, all together taking about 20 hours to complete. It scratches that same itch Obra Dinn did and if you are a fan of that game, this is like a text based version of that more or less. It's well worth your time and money.
Report
PC
Summary A genealogical mystery straight out of 1998. Scour the early Internet for clues, uncover hidden connections, and piece together the family tree behind the secretive Roottree Corporation.
Platforms:
- PC
Initial Release Date: Jan 15, 2025
Developer:
- Robin Ward
Publisher: Evil Trout
Genres: