You walk into a crime scene, and suddenly a memory overwhelms you.  Clink, clink, clink—the sound of clinking ice into an empty glass as a Brooklyn bartender asks, “What can I get you?” You then come back to the present and explore a basket that then transports you with the sound of bicycle tires crunching along a dirt road in a countryside with a lady gently humming, then “Oh NO” and SPLASH. You come back to the present and see a cut brake wire. Perhaps this goes before the memory of the basket?

Echoes is a different take on a murder mystery game where you don’t have to read at all. You use sound clips to figure out the order of photos to put a story together. I love murder mysteries in books, shows, and board games. How does this game compare to the multitude of murder mystery games out there? I thoroughly enjoyed it, but it may not be for everyone.

Gameplay Overview:

You are a psychic detective (the game doesn’t say this, but I like to imagine it that way). You are helping solve a case. As you come across items (photo cards) on the scene, they transport you to a memory of what occurred here. Using a phone app, you scan each of the cards, and they play an audio clip. Sometimes it’s just a sound like shaking ice. Sometimes it’s part of a conversation between different people. Or perhaps it’s just a sound you can’t quite figure out yet—is that a bubbling pot? Or a fire? Is that just a winded guy, or is he dying?

Each of the 6 chapters of the story is represented with a photo card that is a thick tile. Based on linking the conversations or continuing a sound from a previous clip, you follow the story by connecting a chapter tile to the 3 other photo cards in order of their sounds. To play easy, you can play with half the cards to start. When finished with the first half, you then solve the next half. Or if you want a bit more of a challenge (and more fun in my experience), you lay out all 24 photos, then piece together the full story, finding what goes together with what, untangling a bigger web.

Some of the memories you’ll hear (scan to activate the sound clips), putting the images in their chronological order.

Game Experience:

I truly enjoyed this game! It was really satisfying uncovering the puzzle piece by piece of how the sounds and voices come together. Methodically picking out the next object that is connected to the current audio clip. Or making a leap of deduction from one noise to the next.

While I really enjoyed this game, I am very biased. I love all murder mysteries if there is something for me to solve, and the plot is good. (For this reason, I like murder mysteries, NOT true crime.  For me, it’s not about the murder itself but the puzzle of how it comes together and having the clues to solve it.)
I played these games with my spouse, who tolerates my murder mystery obsession and would prefer an escape room game with a light story. But he enjoyed this too, just a bit less than I. So far, we’ve played “Echoes: The Cocktail” and “Echoes: The Cursed Ring” (no, it is not LOTR, but also a cool story).

Start with 9 photo cards or flip all 18 over for an extra challenge

I bought these on sale. If I can get the rest of the Echoes cases on sale, I will buy them all. Similar to the escape room board game Unlock, you don’t destroy the pieces, so it is easy to pass it on to a friend (or resell it).

Echoes is similar to another excellent audio mystery game (computer game, not board game) called Unheard, where you piece together a story about what happened based on audio alone. There are things I like about both. The thing I like most about Echoes is the feeling of the bulky tile pieces of the chapters and stacking the cards under each chapter as they are solved. Echoes also has beautiful art and brilliant colors that make my mind feel like it ate a gumdrop.

Front and back of the photo cards

In general, I prefer a game with physical components rather than one purely on a screen, which—surprise, surprise—is why I prefer board games to video games. The thing I like more about Unheard, though, is the value. Unheard has 5 cases, around an hour each, for $7 total on Steam. Each Echoes case at full price is $13 for 45–60 minutes. You don’t have to use a calculator to see the difference in value. However, buying it on sale and reselling or giving it to a friend is pretty great. Or on the flip side, $11 is really cheap to have potentially a night centered around the game compared to movie tickets for 2–4 or doing an in-person escape room.

Outside of value, the only other knock I would give is that some cards are a bit fiddly to scan. But I get why they do that—so someone can’t just take pictures of the cards and essentially resell the photos, which is the game.

But again, overall, I really liked playing this and want to play more Echoes at the right price. Between the cases we played, both my spouse and I liked “The Cursed Ring” more. It felt more quaint. “The Cocktail” is probably a little more challenging of a story. I liked them both, but I would recommend “The Cursed Ring” over “The Cocktail.” And I would recommend Echoes to other murder mystery fans like myself.

Final Thoughts:

If you ever wanted to play a detective game but didn’t feel like doing all the reading, Echoes is the game for you. Unlike many other murder mystery board games with numerous pieces and puzzles, this game is story-centric, where the only components (or perhaps component, as there is only one type of item) are 24 photos to scan with a phone app. For a game of less than an hour, it packs a punch of satisfaction.

You piece the story together and deduce what happened from audio only. I really enjoyed it. It is going to appeal more to those looking for a relaxing, relatively easy, quick mystery rather than an adrenaline rush escape game. As with all single play games, it may be a bit expensive to just play it once, but it could easily be passed on to a friend or resold.

Final Score: 4 Stars – For those looking for a twist on the typical murder mystery or escape room, this audio-based story game is well designed, with a streamlined single-time playthrough in around an hour, but maybe a little expensive for what it is.

Hits:
• Easy to pick up and start
• Unique change to the murder mystery genre using audio instead of reading
• Well-chosen use of sounds and conversation clips to deduce what’s happening
• Good voice acting
• With no time limit or penalty for listening again to audio clips, it feels more relaxing putting a story together instead of an adrenaline rush escape room.

Misses:
• One-time playthrough
• For someone expecting numerous side puzzles, this may be disappointing as it focuses on one main story as THE puzzle.
• Maybe a bit expensive for what it is