Carmen Sandiego Review
Blog Andrew Joseph 07 Mar , 2025 0
Revisiting your youth game series is like exploring the basement of your childhood home. When you sift through boxes and shelves, old memories come back – that’s exactly what I started playing Carmen Sandiego, the latest game in the multimedia series that spans forty years. I was eight years old again when the Master Thief appeared on the screen of her iconic trench coat and fedora, and my face was inches from the computer screen when I used my new knowledge of math, geography and history to solve Carmen's latest cape. 40 years later, Carmen Sandiego gave me the same pleasure of solving puzzles by collecting clues, even if some modern additions to visual novel-style interfaces missed their mark.
As a former kid, gumshoe, whose geography mastery is collected around the globe tracking the world’s worst criminals, I’m ready to revisit the Carmen Sandiego-verse by releasing Gameloft’s new adventure of the same name. While it gets some storytelling tips from the animated Netflix series ending in 2021 and mimics its cartoon-like visual style, it doesn't have to learn about Carmen's backstory to be associated with the evil organization's evil organization to enjoy her latest mission. It is worth noting that this is the first time players have stepped on Carmen's shoes and put on the famous fedora, but this has no real impact on the curved hunting formula.
The series begins as an entertainment game, with modern Carmen Sandiego blending puzzle-solving, quick activities, a lot of third-person top-down exploration and (of course!) occasional trivia questions. In some ways, newer elements make the world bigger and more exciting than earlier iterations. In addition to simply clicking on the icon that represents the key position, analyzing through conversations and answering questions that won’t be inappropriate for the fifth-grade final exam, there is more work to be done. That said, if not included, I wouldn't miss new activities from roof to roof, such as hanging suspension and grabbing.
When you focus on evil thieves from one country to another, you need to gather two types of clues: those that help them figure out where to go next, and those that help narrow down the list of suspects in ACME Detectives’ database. In the 1980s and 1990s, Carmen Sandiego's games relied on physical history full of geographical and historical facts to help answer trivia questions in the game and figure out what their clues mean. This time, all this information is saved in the game itself.
Throughout your campaign, you will find data on airport codes, exports, ethnic languages, government structures, and more. This homemade yearbook comes in handy when you are on the tail of an evil villain and need to decide what to do next. Usually, you will have some clues to pass – the color or pattern on the flag, spoken language, or whether the residents drive on the left or right side of the road. You will use these clues to determine the next city from the three offered options.
Similarly, you will use personal information to narrow down the criminals behind each caper. The reimagined ACME database makes this process smooth and streamlined. You can easily filter suspects based on details about their hair and eye colors, hobbies, favorite foods, and fears. It is very satisfying to reduce the list of suspects in their 30s until only one suspect is left and an arrest warrant is issued. Just make sure you have the right people, otherwise Carmen's game (and when you start over for you).
Find clues in between by exploring the key positions of various exotic globally, from New Orleans, Barcelona, Singapore to Brisbane. This is similar to how early games work, but this time there is more room for exploration and choices. In some places, Carmen walks around, questioning multiple witnesses and looking for local trivia that might come in handy later. You don't choose where the activity is happening, but there are more actions involved than before.
Each case has several chapters, a personal robbery linked by a total villain. The case begins at the crime scene, whether the crime is theft of a Japanese bullet train or the replacement of a city’s free Wi-Fi hotspot with a paid version of “VI-FI”. In each city, you can visit three locations to collect clues that will take you one step closer to solving the case.
How it works in practice is as follows: When you visit landmarks and regions within each city, such as the statue of Merion in Singapore, or the Viking themed museum in Reykjavik, you need to complete a scheduled event to reveal clues to the location. Sometimes this means walking around and questioning suspects and witnesses, often bringing up some geographically interesting facts in the process. Other times, you may have to complete a hacking puzzle or locking puzzle, or use Carmen's hanger or grab hook.
Some of these game elements are more interesting than others. It is satisfying to complete puzzles to attack security or enhance wireless signals, but more physical exercise is primarily on track rather than being particularly excited. I have a specific beef with a grapple hook mini game on it that requires a simple button pressing on the screen aligned icon. The problem is that these icons sometimes move improperly, so the grab is either too simple or frustrating. There is also a perfect hanging activity, but I would rather have fewer game elements to fill more than some forced action that feels like fillers. I will be very satisfied with more brain visitors.
Although not as tolerant as the 1985 iteration, it could fail in Carmen Sandiego. The clock is always ticking. Usually you have five to seven days to solve each case, and all your activities take time – just like flying from one city to another. If you miss a key clue and end up flying to Singapore when you should be in Buenos Aires, you've wasted 11 hours. If you don't have time to run out, the thief escapes and you have to start the case. But I never really felt the crunch in the main campaign. I usually have at least one day left, even if not a few.
Carmen Sandiego has other ways to make cases fail, and these cases represent more of a threat in my game. If you are picking up mean lackey and being noticed, you just missed the key evidence. A lack of a clue won't blow up your case, but to do it a few times, you won't have enough information to arrest. In most cases, I can determine the exact moment when I blow it up – I was too slow to follow the markup and I didn't pay enough attention to what needed the precise buttons. Other times, I found myself still having several suspects in the database, not sure I missed a clue.
Although I did make some mistakes, the main campaign is not what I call challenging. But considering the series’ history as a children’s educational resource, I may not be the target audience. I can see parents and children playing with Carmen Sandiego and having a great time with their kids building critical thinking skills and their parents’ geographical location for primary school. Despite its simplicity, Carmen Sandiego never felt stupid.
You are lucky for my fellow friends to find more challenges. Apart from the main campaigns, you can also explore ACME files to understand our refrigeration cases date back to the 80s. These cases employ modern systems to filter suspects and spray around the world, but they are introduced in retro, pixel art styles – and inject some questions that may make you feel like you’re back in school and the teacher just took a pop quiz on the desk. Fast, what is the largest island in the Caribbean? Which country was the largest wheat and rice producer in 1985? What is 4x13x80? (Thankfully, I do have a calculator in my pocket despite my teacher telling me.)
ACME files use a simplified interface, which made me feel like in the early 90s, I was back at home computers and frantically paginated through a physical book to find out the answer. This time, Google is my yearbook. This may make retro cases look easier than campaigns, but they are actually more difficult, especially with time crunch. Actually, I did have no time in the ACME file and watching the ticking of the last few hours made me do better next time. Overall, these cases are a smart addition to add a variety of speeds to the experience and provide some comfortable fan service.
Historical cases draw inspiration from the same list of cities as the main campaigns, and you can visit in a few hours around the world when you see Carmen Sandiego. I'm not sure why they can't expand her global reach in the main event, but after a while this will result in a little repetition in every environment. However, new facts can often be found when re-examining, so every city is always worth looking at again.
Maybe it was nostalgic goggles, but none of these shortcomings disturbed me to make me want to stop playing. Each chapter is very good pace so it always feels like you are making progress. I love the game that gets you out of the problem, and in most cases, that's exactly what Carmen Sandiego wants from the players.
However, it was a pity that the campaign ended suddenly. There is another free DLC release later this year, but in the menu of the full, publicly released game, it is preparing for the final mystery. This story hasn't reached a natural conclusion yet, but there's still 15 hours between the campaign and the ACME file – if you're done with all the refrigerated cases from when. After the initial chaos, I used it as an opportunity to explore more old cases and wait for the day when I could finish Carmen's adventure.
