“Grissom, any evidence that this game will be better than the last three?”

There are going to be a lot of fourths on the shelves in the next year– Devil May Cry 4, Metal Gear Solid 4, Grand Theft Auto 4. But who’s searching for Crime Scene Investigation 4?

CSI has a huge fan base, but there may not be as much crossover into videogames as Ubisoft and Telltale would like. The latest sequel in the forensic adventure series tries to simplify the evidence-gathering interface as much as possible for consoles, but unimpressive graphics might turn off the CSI fans.

The cast is all rendered as blocky, low-res character models that don’t even come within driving distance of the uncanny valley. We’re seeing realistic graphics pushed to the limits in console titles like Heavenly Sword and Bioshock, but the latest CSI doesn’t try very hard to mimic the real life actors from the show.

The voice acting is there, at least for the male characters, and grainy non-HD video clips remind us that this is in fact a game based on a TV show. But between the crime lab and murder scene environments, there’s little wow factor in these graphics.

The gameplay involves clicking on pieces of evidence, examining them in the lab, and tracking down killers through five cases. Some of the dialog seems to be from the show, because it’s written by the author of the CSI novels. If the low-impact visuals don’t impress, at least the crime-scene adventure gameplay and story-driven plots could be satisfying to wannabe detectives.

Don’t expect any plot-shaking developments in CSI: Hard Evidence, because you play as a blank slate of a character that doesn’t appear on the TV show. One thing this game does have in common with the TV show, however, is the inundation of advertisements. Billboards and taxi cabs will show sponsored messages, which either adds to the believability, or detracts from it, depending on your view of such in-game ads.

We’ll save final judgment until the full game comes out, but CSI 4 doesn’t seem to add anything new to adventure or crime games. It’ll be a big surprise if gaming websites like this one are impressed by the quality of the final product, but CSI 4 might sell anyways to non-gamer fans of the show who don’t know that games are supposed to be fun. CSI 4 will be available on PC, PS2, and Xbox 360 this week, with a Wii version due in November.

Tags: CSI:-Hard-Evidence

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