Her Story: the computer game where True Detective meets Google

Game designer Sam Barlow has created a new kind of crime adventure, which relies on subtext and perception rather than quick joypad skills

In a cramped police interrogation room a woman is being questioned about her missing husband. Is he dead? Has she killed him? There are seven separate interviews, chopped up into short, teasing fragments, but the answers aren't immediately obvious. It's up the player to trawl through the video records and piece the mystery together.

This is the bare bones setup to Her Story, a fascinating police procedural game written by veteran developer Sam Barlow. Until a year ago, Barlow was working for mainstream studio Climax, where he designed the horror game, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories. Although it was part of a long-running series, the title was an oddity, hugely informed by Barlow's interest in the "interactive fiction" genre of highly narrative-based adventure games. Now he has set up on his own, and is experimenting with new ways to build compelling interactive mysteries.

"The ability to imagine a concept, put into words, type it and the game put flesh to that idea - it is magical"