Happy Broccoli Games Announces Mystery Title 'Apple Crumble'

Someone wants to kill grandma. In this Knives Out-inspired mystery game, each of your family members is suspicious in their own way: your stressed mum, your “midlife crisis uncle” and especially that stranger in your bedroom. Yikes!

While Apple Crumble is still a mystery, it is mechanically different from Happy Broccoli Games’ previous game, Duck Detective, in which the player solves crimes in a small office. Here you are largely snooping through your family home. “I love the idea of having a walking sim where you can really open up every drawer, every door, and see what’s behind there,” says founder and creative director Annika Maar. As you learn more about the different grievances and troubles of your family members, the mystery slowly unwinds.

After Duck Detective, the team wanted to make a “sad grandma” game – something that may come as a surprise after the humour of the studio’s previous games. Apple Crumble begins comedically, says Maar, but the tone shifts throughout the game; it gets more serious and a bit sad: “I felt very emotionally attached to the death of my grandma. There’s some baggage there and I thought it would be fun to explore that.”

You’ll pick up the plot by digging through stuff. Lots of stuff. Apple Crumble’s storytelling extends into the different made-up fiction placed throughout the house. “There’s a film script that the midlife crisis uncle wrote which he’s convinced is going to get money from investors and become huge,” says Maar. “Just so many small details that I’m hoping will make the world feel very believable.”

That depth of hidden detail also applies to the art style, which was inspired, in part, by concept art for Puss in Boots. “In the movie and the concept art, they use a lot of these paint splatters,” says Maar. “From a distance it’s not immediately apparent, but when you look, you’re like, ‘Wow, there are so many different colours in this.’ Your eyes kind of blend it together and it just makes it feel more natural. Less clinical. More exciting to look at. It ended up being a lot more work than I thought it would be, but I think it was worth it.”

Maar is currently finishing up the script and will soon begin the process of recording voice actors. Happy Broccoli is booking the actors together so that they can really riff off each other. After all, with a grandma-killer in their midst, there are a lot of arguments to record.