Overview: 5.0/5.0
Developer: Lowbirth Games
Genre: Mystery
Release Date: November 1, 2023
Platform: PC, PS4/5, Xbox One/Series X/S
Price: $24.99
This Bed We Made is a point-and-click mystery in which you play as a hotel maid in the 1950s. From the very first moments, the tone of this game is made clear. It’s quiet, a bit eerie, and aware of both its place in genre and its target audience. For example, one of the first tasks you must complete is cleaning up a spilled ashtray with a bulky vacuum cleaner that disappears into Sophie’s pocket, never to be seen again. But who doesn’t love a game that lets you straighten a crooked painting?
There were a few inconsistencies that broke my focus a bit, but not enough to significantly interrupt the game. For example, at one point you are tasked with retrieving a mop, but when you go to clean up the spill afterwards, the icon is still a hand with a cloth. This left me thinking, Did I just go get a mop only to clean this up by hand?! Of course, this is not at all significant and does not remotely interfere with the plot or mechanics of the game. In another example, many doors present the “Open” prompt despite being locked or otherwise unavailable to the player. Again, not disruptive, but has been handled more elegantly in other games.
Unfortunately this game does suffer where so many in the genre do - in occasionally having too strict requirements for advancing the story. For example, I read a guest log to get a room number, but because I didn’t enter “selection” mode in that view, the game did not recognize that I had the necessary information to proceed. Let me forget things! Let me make mistakes! Let me trudge back to the front desk and check the log again because of my own negligence and not because I didn’t click an extra button.
Outside of those two very minor complaints, the game is short but close to flawless. The game manages to be incredibly cinematic without interrupting gameplay. It’s beautiful. The music is lovely. The story is tight and meaningful, with opportunities for player interpretation. I think the real success, though, is the character of Sophie. You can’t help but root for her as she backtalks to lockers and gets more and more gutsy in her invasion into the guests’ privacy.
Throughout the game, you can (ab)use your access in the hotel to snoop through the guests’ belongings and learn all of their secrets. You’ll get to choose a confidant and dig deeper and deeper into letters and locked luggage and the safes that are meant to protect things from your prying eyes. All under the guise of cleaning, which you’ll have to do to some extent. And that’s also up to you. Nearly every object with which you interact has an option to throw it away. What’s important, what’s garbage, and what’s important but should be thrown out anyway… that’s up to you.
(Spoilers ahead.) Eventually, there will be a murder on your floor of the hotel. And at that point, you need to make some very important decisions. And by this point, the game won’t hold your hand anymore (which is a good thing). You’re on your own to decide what to do, what to touch, where to walk, what to throw away, what to believe. And you’ll need to remember all of these choices and be sure you can justify them when you are inevitably interviewed by the police. When they ask you if you touched the body, you’ll need to have an answer that lines up with what you’ve done… or at least, what they can prove you did.
The multiple endings of this game depend on your decisions both before and after you’ve encountered the crime scene, which really make it a unique experience. Not only do you have the chance to solve the crime, but to decide if that’s the truth you want the crime scene to tell. And once you’ve made that bed, well…
