Let me start by saying Evidence: the Last Ritual is without a doubt one of the most disturbing and realistic games to come around in a very long time. Evidence is the sequel to the puzzle game Missing: Since January, that was released a couple of years and had you trying to find the killer known as The Phoenix and the reporter Jack Lorski. This time around, Publisher DreamCatcher and developer Lexis Numerique have you trying to track down the Phoenix again with a little help from other “people” that have also been assigned to the case. The DVD of the game is made to look like a piece of evidence from the investigation that is loaded with clues from the killer himself. As you fire up the game, you need to log in to the ICPA (International Committee for the Phoenix Arrest) database and enter your password and your email address. Without an internet connection the game is unplayable so be sure you are with us in the 21st century and you have one. Once you have logged into the ICPA’s system, the Phoenix’s first clue will play in the form of a live action video and then the puzzles will start from there on out.

The game is a series of Macromedia Flash puzzles that will need to be solved to continue through the story to gather more clues and more information as to the whereabouts of the killer. Each time you solve a puzzle, you will be shown a video clip, first from either Officer Manuela who is a Portuguese detective searching for Jack Lorski from the original game, who has disappeared, or a video from Jessica, a girl who is on a mission to find more information on her missing brother Adrian. Eventually the two paths meet up, but for the first part of the game, you will be shown the separate stories which can get kind of confusing and pull you out of the storyline as it jumps back and forth. When you see each video clip, the killer will cut out parts of the audio that could give you help such as names of people and places and only giving you what he wants you to see and hear. It is a chilly reminder when it happens, that this “evidence” is given to you by the Phoenix and he is playing games with you, letting you see only what he wants you to. The video scenes are all live action and are all portrayed pretty well and quite believable by the actors involved.

Once the game starts up and the initial videos are shown, the puzzles will start immediately. The puzzles are simply an image on the screen that will either have numbers or letters that need to be entered. There are many different types of puzzles but the majority that you will run into will be of this ilk. The puzzles will feature an image, some of the most ghoulish and sinister seen in a while and there will be more than a few that are guaranteed to give you goose bumps. One such puzzle which sets the tone very early on a close up of a woman that seems to be in a world of pain, cold and shivering, with stringy hair. As your mouse hovers over her face, her eyes open and she stares at you unwaveringly until your mouse hovers over the dashes at the bottom of the screen. For each dash, the woman will blink a certain amount of times which gives you the numbers that you need to enter for each space. Sure it’s a spoiler but if you want to play this game, it’ll be one of the easiest puzzles in the game that you will be able to figure out on your own. The puzzles in this game, to put it lightly, are incredibly mind busting. If you are not very good at all with puzzle games, then just walk away right now. You will be given clues on the screen but this is just the first step, a starting point, in actually finding out the answer needed to proceed. The internet is your best friend when playing in more than one way and you may find yourself searching the web for answers more than you are staring at puzzles.

Clues you are given during each puzzle will direct you to a larger, more complicated way of finding the true answer on the internet. The Phoenix will talk to you in a short sentence to give you a very brief clue of the puzzle and from there you will need to go and track down the rest of the answer on the net or by using the built in tools that the ICPA give you like the Decrypting Tool which allows you to enter a jumble of letters and gives numerous answers, one of which will make actual sense. Some of the puzzles include finding the names of places or people, all which are not that easy to find out right away. One such puzzle is a map of New York City where you need to find out the name of a street. The puzzle allows you to zoom in and out on a map image, which is not apparent right away. Once you realize you can zoom in on the map, you will then need to go to Google Maps and try to match up the image found in the puzzle and find out what the street name is. Puzzles like this are not rare and many of them you won’t be able to solve on your own. You will receive e-mails from other investigators that are trying to solve the case like you. This is one of the most intriguing parts of the game. There are many clues that you will come across that are audio reliant as well as visual and it all adds to the intensely disturbing atmosphere.

These people that e-mail you asking if you have had any luck or progress are not real and are totally are part of the game. They all have e-mail addresses from places such as Hotmail and such which makes it seem more realistic, but they really aren’t. Detectives from the ICPA will e-mail you with clues when you have been on a puzzle for a while and these will really give you a push in the right direction if you are stuck. Detectives and other “investigators” aren’t the only ones that contact you however. The killer himself will drop you a line from time to time to really creep you out and make you wonder if you are really being watched. There’s nothing like relaxing out at your computer hours after you have stopped playing and your email goes off letting you know you have a message waiting. When you check to see what kind of wonderful spam you received, it’s The Phoenix goading you and you are pulled right back into the game when you aren’t even playing it.

Evidence: The Last Ritual is definitely a difficult game and you will be searching for help as often as you are searching for answers to clues. Do yourself a favor though and be sure not to look for help until you are absolutely frustrated. It really is a great feeling of accomplishment when you solve The Phoenix’s clues on your own, especially the most difficult of them. Evidence is not a computer taxing game so even your old Pentium 3 will be able to run it fine, but having good sound will be a great benefit to your playing. One of the problems that occurred at first were that some of the game sites that you are directed to, as well as some of the instructions from the ICPA are in French – since it is from a French game company – but even then, having to translate pages and text is no big deal given all the other things you are needed to do in the game. The ability to pick up and play at your own pace is another definite good thing about this game that is great for the casual gamer. If you want a game that really gives your brain a run for its money while giving you the creeps at the same time, then Evidence is a game right up your alley.