Art of Murder: FBI Confidential (*** out of four) is a point and click adventure game where you control the actions of one or more characters. The story line is set in modern times and follows a young female rookie FBI agent, Nicole Bonnet, as she tackles the case of a serial killer. The killings are grisly in nature, with the victim’s hearts removed using an ancient Aztec knife and the hearts then replaced with ancient Spanish gold coins. Your quest is to solve the mystery and catch the killer.

The story is linear, meaning you must help Nicole finish one set of tasks before you can go on. So if you get stuck finding a needed item or solving a puzzle, you are stopped in your forward progress. You can go back to an earlier point where you saved the game, but not forward. Clicking on a magnifying glass icon briefly points out items on the screen you need to be aware of. For the novice gamer at this point sometimes it’s best to save the game and come back to it later, perhaps with a fresh viewpoint. A visit to the Internet will usually provide some tips and tricks.

There are more than 20 characters that Nicole interacts with during the game, including her FBI colleagues, a museum director, an arts collector and various criminal types you might expect to encounter in this type of game, and, of course, the killer. The puzzles seem appropriate to the general tone of the game and might be considered easy to moderate difficulty. You are provided with a PDA for keeping notes and making calls to a so-called partner. Mostly you do all the work.

Your character’s adventures take her to some of the dark corners of New York City and to Cuzco in Peru and to the Amazon. The backgrounds are very well done, and some are beautifully portrayed, fit the locales well and provide some of the highlights of this game. The music occasionally has hints of "X-Files" and is mostly unobtrusive. The voice acting is adequate though stilted at times and not showing what we thought might be more appropriate emotion for a given situation.

The game is a common type of adventure game where you point to a spot on the screen to have your character move to that spot. When you point to an object, such as a door handle, for example, the door opens (or not, depending on other story elements). Point to some objects and your character picks them up and keeps them in inventory for use later. Some items in inventory can be used alone, such as a key, and some may need to be combined for use with another item for example a paint brush and a can of paint. Point to a person, and you may be able to engage them in conversation for clues on how to proceed. Also typically imbedded in this style of gaming are puzzles of various types, such as picture, numeric, logic or just trial-and-error. You’ll need to solve these in order to proceed in the game.

For someone who’d like to try out this type of adventure game, Art of Murder: FBI Confidential is a good start.

The Lost Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (***) is an interactive mystery adventure game where you work with the famous Sherlock Holmes and his faithful assistant, Dr. Watson, to find clues to help you solve mysteries. The game is set in Victorian London, and the 40 historically accurate background locations set the scene for the crimes.

The game is designed for casual game players, who must unravel the 16 included mysteries by finding hidden objects, drawing conclusions and eventually solving the crime. This is a timed game, so you must keep moving, and time is deducted if you click on too many incorrect items. Also included are mini-games that you play along the way to give further clues and add to the challenges. For some of the games, you must find differences between two similar scenes; for others you have to arrange items so they fit a particular shape, turn dials in correct order, or arrange items so none of them touch each other.

Once you’ve gathered enough clues, you must use your powers of deduction to decide which character is the guilty one. But first you must drag and drop suspects into a specific spot on a grid, where you separate them by distinguishing physical characteristics such as hair color or clothing type; you also use any other evidence that ties them to the scene of the crime. Once you’ve found the culprit, you have completed the case, the file is solved, and you can go on to solve other missions found in Sherlock Holmes’ bookcase. Missions become progressively harder as you work your way toward completing the entire set.

The Lost Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is the first interactive game officially licensed by the Conan Doyle estate and will appeal to those who like the "seek and find" type of game that

has some "spot the difference" and other diversion style games thrown in to keep it interesting. Options for volume of music and voices and to set the game for full screen or in a window are included, and a limited number of clues are available if you need help during the game.