Night Call
A mysterious serial killer stalks the streets of modern-day Paris. The body count rises, and the police are no closer to catching the culprit. You are a taxi driver and survivor to the killer’s most recent attacks, having barely escaped with your life. You have seven nights to help find the killer, or the police will pin it on you. These next few shifts will be far from ordinary or safe… Night Call is a non-linear, narrative-driven noire investigation game. You are no detective, but you do have a gift. Around you, people feel more at ease. They talk. They share their thoughts, their emotions, their stories… their secrets. To passengers, you are more than just a driver; you are also a friend, a confidant, a shrink. A voyeur catching a glimpse under the masked but very real lives throughout the City of Light. And you’ll need to play these roles well if you want to catch the killer. Use the limited time you have available each night to gather clues while earning money to pay your bills. Drive passengers to their destinations, hear their stories and choose your responses carefully—some are just regular people with a tale to tell, while others might reveal a clue that’s key to your investigation. Follow the right leads to uncover new info about the suspects, and don’t forget to make enough money to buy gas and pay your bills.
Game Discussion
Steam User 4
Very nice experience, perfect for a chill gameplay! I loved hearing each passenger's story and helping them, but also learning bit by bit about the driver and his past!
Steam User 5
Possibly one of the most stylish games ever?
Night Call is very French and very Parisian and I absolutely recommend playing it in French if you can (although I'm sure the English translation is good too). It truly captures what France was like around 2016 (after the 2015 terror attacks and before Macron was elected) with an almost uncanny level of precision and vividness. Some of the characters in this are direct parodies of pundits and politicians that actually made me laugh out loud.
Mechanics-wise, there's two games smashed together into one here, which mostly works but you have to be ready to give the game some grace when it's a bit awkward. As a taxi driver who only works night shifts, you pick up people from all walks of life and chat with them while driving them to their destination. Every character has a little story you can unravel over the course of a few trips, depending on your dialogue choices. I've seen games try to do this and and fail to hold my attention because it just felt like a bunch of random stories, but I think Night Call succeeds because of the variety of stories you can encounter.
Some of the stories are humorous, some are completely wacky, some are quite dark - you never quite know what you're going to get. In particular, I really liked that a few of your customers are rude, or bigoted, or just not great people in general (I've never been a taxi driver but I'd guess that's probably true to life). That may sound a bit miserable when you write it down, but it actually felt much more immersive than games where every character is just sooooo happy to help you, The Main Character. While you can certainly talk back to a client if you want, there's no magical dialogue choice that can make you 'win' every interaction: you mostly have to listen. And on the other hand, meeting a nice client (there's a lot of them!) after dealing with bunch of drunk guys felt like an actual relief.
Grafted onto that main mechanic is the detective game. You narrowly survived an attack by a serial killer and a corrupt cop (great character work) is blackmailing you to help her identify them among a few suspects. As you work, you need to try and get more information on the case from clients so you can send it along. This...mostly works, but it's mechanically a bit janky at times. You don't conduct a full investigation: you simply try to guess which suspect is the most likely killer based on the clues that fit them. Every case in the game follows the same basic pattern and switches up motives, weapons and suspects. I enjoyed it, but there is a free-roaming mode that lets you just talk to passengers once you're done with the cases if you'd rather focus on the core strength of the game.
This game is also beautiful and the music is perfect for it. I love knowing I can still come back to it to meet new characters (there are a TON of potential clients) and just experience its atmosphere. I fully recommend it.
Steam User 4
I'd definitely recommend this. There's a strong balance between the clue-gathering that keeps things interesting, and the time allowed for your character to explore the city and get to know different passengers. Not to sound sappy but the stories are really well-done and touching too.
I'd love to purchase an expansion with more mysteries, if one ever becomes available.
Steam User 14
A taxi driver’s talk show on the night streets of Paris. In the confined space of a taxi, you, the driver, listen to various talkative passengers with different backgrounds and ideologies, hearing about the issues of modern urban life and sharing their perspectives. This offers a glimpse into a cross-section of contemporary city life.
However, it is a bit unfortunate that the job of a taxi driver seems to have been chosen merely as a pretext to introduce these diverse characters, which results in a somewhat flimsy role for the investigator.
Steam User 2
This was very well written and loved meeting some many of the characters, from the usual people coming home from work or a night out, to the downright unusual and sometimes even creepy! All though I didn't like how repetitive it got, sometimes finding yourself having the same interaction with the same characters on different cases.
Steam User 5
A unique, beautiful, and incredibly clever way of exploring contemporary Paris --of feeling the vibe and anxieties of the city, of discovering its countless stories-- wrapped up in atmospheric graphics and intriguing detective gameplay.
I honestly adore this.
Steam User 2
Brilliant game. It is already some years old, but I can still recommend it to everyone that likes detective stories and story telling as such. The passengers do not all contribute to the murders portrait or motive, but they tell their own stories to the driver, as if he would be a bar keeper in the night and their tongues would have got loosened by some alcohol.
I can imagine that some people would tell taxi drivers stories like this, even though some of it might be too confidential to tell it to a complete stranger. Emotional people could still be upset enough to do so. It gives the dialogues a certain tension to watch quite private worries and feelings. Some thoughts are suddenly not so seldom anymore and don't seem weird at all.
The people in your backseat are getting closer to you while you don't need to take care of them, but their life touches yours, inspires you, reflects yourself, confirm your thoughts. The game could have had more episodes in its story, I would have enjoyed it even more then. I grabbed the game pretty cheap and I think it was absolutely worth the money.