Going Platinum #5: The Sexy Brutale 1
Image: Push Square

Platinum Trophy #5: The Sexy Brutale

Date Earned: 2nd December 2017

Dopamine Index:

While knowing every game that comes out is a feat growing less and less achievable by the day, I like to think I have a higher-than-average level of awareness.

I've never been formally diagnosed with autism, but I'm fairly sure I'm somewhere on the spectrum, because video games are an intense hyperfixation. I don't think I could stop thinking, reading, and writing about games even if I wanted to.

With that said, I had never heard of The Sexy Brutale until Push Square's review, written by longstanding contributor Simon Fitzgerald.

Made by Cavalier Game Studios and the now-defunct Tequila Works, it's a Groundhog Day-style puzzle game in which you must learn a grisly sequence of events at a masquerade party so that you can prevent a number of deaths.

It sounds unpleasant and macabre, but its stylish presentation has an aesthetic I've just now decided to dub "Tim Burton's doll house" — meaning it's dark, but in a fun and humorous way. The jazzy soundtrack certainly helps, too.

To be perfectly honest, I don't recall a huge amount about the game, only that I really loved it.

You pick apart the casino mansion's mysteries with each run through the building, getting a gradually broader picture of who goes where, and when, and why. As a big fan of puzzles, I really got into solving this clockwork conundrum.

One thing I do remember is that the platinum Trophy isn't totally straightforward. Most of the list is concerned with saving each character and uncovering certain plot points, but a full deck of 52 cards are scattered throughout the mansion, and you need to find every one.

Tracking those down sounds like a chore, but what it meant was I was extremely observant as I scoured the house. That's obviously a quality you need for a puzzle adventure game like this anyway, so it never felt like many extra steps were needed.

I'm really glad to have been made aware of this game from Simon's glowing write-up, because I may well have skipped over it entirely and missed out on an engrossing, very tightly designed puzzle box.

Cheers, The Sexy Brutale.

Do you have the platinum Trophy in The Sexy Brutale? Let us know in the comments section below.