Kevin C. Wong

Computer Game - Serial Cleaner (2017) [+]

Serial Cleaner is an isometric view stealth game. You are the Cleaner, a contractor hired to clean up after a murder before the police can investigate. In this case though the police are already on site guarding the crime scene and you have to sneak around disposing bodies, picking up evidence and mopping up blood.

It's a keyboard game: arrow keys to move around, A to pick up evidence or hide, S to pick up a body or drop it (making A and S distinct helps since you can drop a body right next to a hiding place and you wouldn't want to accidentally pick it up again instead of hiding), space to show Cleaner vision which is the whole map with real-time guard activity and location of every body, blood splatter, evidence, hiding place, movable object and teleport spaces with links.

Guards move in predictable patterns. They have vision cones which you must avoid. You also make noise while walking or vacuuming and there is a noise diamond around you when you're making noise. If a guard sees you he'll chase after you (rarely, some guards are set to shoot or sound a general alarm) and if you can get out of the vision cone the guard will stop at your last seen location and look around. Mind you in most levels guards move faster than you so getting away really means getting to the nearest hiding space (even if a guard sees you jump into a bush he won't be able to find you).

The main story is 20 levels. You are working for the mob and later a mysterious client who wants you to clean up after a serial killer. As you dump bodies or pick up evidence you emit bits of dialog and in before each level there is a bit of "at home" time where you can pick up news and talk to your mom. The story evolves about you becoming sick of cleaning up after a serial killer and eventually you have to confront the killer and defeat him.

Each level has a bonus item to pick up. There are 10 outfits and 10 bonus missions. The missions are based on movies -- there is one set in a Mos Eisley cantina and one set on the Nostromo (well, kind of in both cases). Further more there are achievements and challenge modes with leader boards, so you can try playing without cleaner vision and see if you can make the leader board for that.

It's not a long game. I'm thinking it took me a few days to do the main story (levels can take a minute or two but you get caught often so have to keep retrying) and one night to do all the bonus missions. It's not a macOS 64-bit binary so I used the Windows version via CrossOver + Steam and it worked fine (though even on idle it uses a lot of CPU). $15 on Steam.

It's a fun game. Each level is a puzzle, mixed with suspense and action. A good combination.