According to a Twitter post by game developer Francisco Gonzalez of Grundislav Games, their latest offering, the steampunk detective story Lamplight City will be released on September 13.
The game follows the story of private detective Miles Fordham, a middle-class man being slowly driven up the wall by his deceased best friend. Once a well-respected police detective, he quit the force after the death of his partner, Bill Leger, during their investigation of a burglary case gone awry. Now he's stuck with Bill's voice in his head 24/7 and his sanity is slowly starting to unravel. With Bill's help and hindrance, as well as some of his old contacts from the police force, Miles sets out to solve a few cases and catch the elusive burglar turned killer so that Bill can finally rest in peace and so Miles himself can get a decent night's sleep.
What promises to be an unusual feature of Lamplight City is that the game does not force you to solve the cases correctly, if at all. Want to declare a case unsolvable? Go right ahead. Miss a key piece of evidence and convict the wrong culprit? That's on you, buddy. While a certain number of missteps are permitted, if you muck up too badly, the final case will be unavailable to you. Your interactions with suspects and other characters will also determine their attitudes and actions toward you and can either help or hinder your cases.
Lamplight City also promises to tackle tough topics head-on, confronting issues like racism and bigotry and class divides, all in front of the backdrop of the fictional city of New Bretagne, a locale that seems to be heavily influenced by turn of the century New Orleans.
Lamplight City is published by Application Systems Heidelberg and will be available for PC on Steam.
Are you excited to play Lamplight City and see the latest offering from the Shardlight developers? Let us know in the comments below!
