Title: Law & Order Episode 2: Double Or Nothing
Genre: Adventure

There was no warning on the first box that it’s dismal contents were to be the first of a series. That was cruel. This present release sports the ominous "Episode 2" within the title, implying that there may be some sort of intention of creating an entire season’s run of the things. Please, no.

Almost inseparably similar to its predecessor, Double Or Nothing casts you as the anonymous newbie amongst the television programme’s regular cast. You must first of all choose two out of the four styles of detective work (those not selected essentially cut off various options during play), and then begin investigating a horribly cliched murder mystery. Firstly you play detective (that’s the ‘Order’ part), and then later go all legal in the court rooms (presumably the ‘Law’ part then).

And much like the posthumously named Episode 1, this is performed from that oh-so-loathed fixed-point-point-and click perspective. This involves the usual hoping to scrape the not-so-hot-spot that contains the vital, if not invisible, clue. Everything found is sent off to be analysed by forensics, and any individuals met along your path are interviewed.

Neither works. The clue analysis is so ambiguous that you have no choice but to send off every scrap of litter, every fleck of interactive dust, to both the crime and research labs, just in case they are the one in a million item that opens up a new location. The interviews ask you to pick the most appropriate question from a selection, most times removing the others from the list. But so often both questions are equally valid, and for no reason the game prevents you from asking it, not quite like a proper detective.