Review - Agatha Christie - Death on the Nile

Nikolas Tolgyesi
2 hours ago
6 min read

Developer: Microids Studio Lyon, Oberon Games, Floodlight Games

Publisher: Microids, Oberon Games, Mindscape, Dena Publishers BV, Dream Catcher Interactive

Available on: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S|X, PC, Switch

Reviewed on: Xbox Series X

Let the Guessing Begin!

Oh, Agatha. You’ve done it all across many installments, books, and motion pictures. We’ve solved all kinds of head scratchers. How do you work your magic, time and time again? This is the crossroad where the cult classic board game Guess Who meets the beloved TV show Crime Scene Investigation. Agatha Christie - Death on the Nile sees a duo of protagonists, Hercule Poirot, team up with detective Jane Royce for an adventure unlike any before, except for the critically acclaimed book…and movie…and TV show. But those don’t count.

The game starts you in a nightclub, where you quickly learn things have gone terribly awry, leading you to navigate the club and the evidence to help piece together what has happened. But Chaz Mat Tante is only the beginning. From there, you will be investigating the Imperial Hotel, and take a trip to Majorca, where a pool party has taken a fatal detour, before heading out on 'Le Masarah' to hopefully find some peace, quiet, and serenity.

But fate would have other plans. What begins as a single murder will have you working the crime scene on the vessel before heading to New York to track down leads to further the investigation. Once back, hoping to resume what should be a nice vacation, tragedy strikes again while exploring the nearby ancient pyramids.

The game then sees players follow leads in Cairo, before heading back to the boat for what will ultimately be the longest of the investigations, as potentially several more unexplained deaths require your attention. A quick return to Cairo to try to nab the suspect has you slip through the local village, collecting the last few pivotal clues before you can finally return for one last stay on what is safe to assume is the cursed ship. Just when you thought everything was wrapped up and players can leave happy, returning to the resort isn’t what it appears, when you guessed it, another mysterious and devastating death. Back to work!

The really neat part of Agatha Christie - Death on the Nile is that you have to make crucial choices along the way that will change the course of your investigation and what happens as a result of those decisions. That decision-making really keeps you engaged.

A Game Set in the '70s was Just Awesome!

I wanted to touch on this because it really fit the story being told perfectly. The 1970s had enough modern tools and resources to provide a variety of solving techniques, allowing you to analyze the data, but not so much that you would record interviews on your iPhone 17 Pro and feed it to ChatGPT to do the heavy lifting and spit out a name while you scrolled social media.

One final remark about the retro theme is that the soundtrack Microid chose was a real treat; the blues riffs combined with Jazz Club vibes make you feel like a real investigator.

The Control Centre

I have decided to give the controller portion of the review a formal title since it is and always will be the heart of any review I write as a one-handed gamer. When it comes to button layout, there are a few must-haves on my list: Common Actions like running and jumping need to be assigned to the front buttons A, B, X, Y, or Cross, Square, Triangle, and Circle for our PlayStation friends. Beyond this, while a slight inconvenience, the important items are covered.

In Agatha Christie - Death on the Nile, the “run” action is assigned to the Left Trigger, which baffled me from the get-go. I really appreciated the Investigation center being assigned to Y for quick access, but constantly bending and twisting my hand into uncomfortable positions was less than enjoyable. To assist with this, it would completely change the accessibility aspect if there was a “sticky” setting for the run button so I could press it once and sprint without holding down the button. By making it a toggle my two-handed friends can still have the choice of how much cardio they want.

Collecting Moustaches was a Stroke of Brilliance

In addition to just sounding hilariously awesome, a golden moustache felt like a toast to that vintage theme. The ‘70s, were after all, the era of the legendary upper lip hair. I found myself pausing the adventure simply because I had to collect these things. That was a brilliant idea.

There were Some Rough Waters

Depending on your playstyle, you may agree, but you may also disagree with this one. This is the one that almost cost me a controller and was responsible for Chapter 2 and 7 taking just too damn long.

Alright, in Chapter 2, there I was, going about my business questioning and gathering like a champ, getting ready to piece it all together but without warning the entire story came to an ear-piercing screeching halt. I was sitting there, looking at the investigation log, quite literally clueless as I had talked to all the guests and collected everything I could see.

To spare you over an hour of hopeless wandering, in the corner of the living room, hidden until you were directly over the top of it, behind other unimportant items, was a statue that unravels the entire story. Until you found this, did I mention tiny item? No matter how many laps of the property you did, you were spinning your wheels in place. That was the first one.

In Chapter 7, on a side note, before we dig any further, this chapter is way too long, it could have and should have been broken into 2 more palatable chunks. Nonetheless, as with Chapter 2, all was good and dandy, tracking a lead here, cross-referencing there, having myself a time. Just like before, I went full speed into a brick wall.

No chapter should take almost 8 hours to complete. Again, to spare the colourful language and controller taking flight, Once I finally completed it and regained my sanity, I realized what would have saved me a total of close to 6 hours of headaches was hints. Not the hints already in the game that I am eternally thankful for, but an audible nudge to get you back on track.

For example in Chapter 2, if after zero progress has been made for lets say and hour, and you are no where close to where you need to be to progress, an audible queue could come from Hercule saying “Maybe i should have another look at the living room” or something like that to bring my blood pressure back down to safe levels and get the story back on track.

One Other Small Matter

While nowhere near as important, it is still worth mentioning because it can stump you, without warning, leaving you, while nowhere near as stuck as above, vexed will fit nicely here. At the end of each murder, part of understanding the order of events is recreating the timeline. Which was actually a lot of fun and a unique gameplay feature. The part that I want to highlight is that, as you fill in the movements, usually 4 or 5 characters across a 5 to 10-minute window, selecting the correct character does not lock in that choice. Meaning that there is no way to verify if you are on the correct track or thought process.

I found myself wondering if I had made a mistake, only going back to discover I was, in fact, correct in my choice. I would love to see perhaps an optional feature where selecting the right character in the correct action locks it in and removes it from the list of possible characters for other activities.

Speaking of Gameplay

Did I mention you get to drive the boat?! Talk about throwing in an action that takes things to the next freaking level. There you are writing notes, minding your own business, and kablamo, the captain turns to you and says, “You’re in control.” Like what?! Beware, there are rocks and islands in the water, so make sure you bring your best skills for this test!

The mystery has been solved!

The anticipation alone is enough to draw you in, but the twists and turns, sometimes presenting more questions than answers, are what make this worth the go. With an amount of variety, exploration, investigation, and thought provocation, get your magnifying glass out, cause it’s time to zoom in.