By Chris Picone, 2 June, 2025

Casebook 1899 : The Leipzig Murders is a cleverly made and well-presented point and click adventure that thrusts you into the shoes of a detective and leans into mechanics revolving around your investigative work.

Aesthetics

Casbook 1899 features wonderfully detailed and high quality pixel art that’s very much in line the best modern point and clicks kicking around today.  There is voice acting but unfortunately (although understandably!), it’s not in English.  There’s a decent range of locations to visit and adequate variety – bridges, mansions, different parts of the city. Each scene has plenty to look at, though surprisingly few hotspots. Thankfully there is no pixel hunting, and in case you still feel like you’re missing something, visible hotspots can be activated.

Gameplay

Unlike most point and clicks, Casebook 1899 is a very focused game that wants you exploring your immediate scenes, investigating clues related to your case, rather than exploring.  There are NPCs to talk to but they’re all witnesses, suspects, or police and you can only talk to them about matters related to the case, and only as questions arise based on clues found.  You can certainly click around the scene you’re standing in but you’re looking for tyre tracks, tools, or things that seem out of place. Items are used in the traditional manner; a lamp to light dark areas, a hammer to hit things with.  However, Leipzig also utilises your notebook, where you automatically take note of any significant clues you find.  It’s then up to you as the player to combine your notes to have an epiphany (eg. the wire was found snapped and the mechanic’s wire cutters are missing from the tool rack, might they be connected somehow?). Epiphanies open up more dialogue options but also eventually lead to another plot device where you must connect all discovered clues, filtering the distractions from the reality and eventually deciding who among your suspects is in fact the culprit - and it isn’t always obvious. 

Verdict

Casebook 1899 is an unusual sort of point and click, focused on sleuthing.  I found lots of things to like, such as the fact that notes/clues found in different scenes may be connected, encouraging you to think broadly. I also really liked the clever implementation of red herrings; often, things are not as they seem, and you have to keep an open mind as you put the puzzle together or you’ll convict the wrong person.  Only the first case is available for play so far but it was fun and I’m looking forward to full release.

Links: 

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1841190/Casebook_1899__The_Leipzig_Murders/