Finch & Archie
Octarine Arts · 2026 · Puzzle, Dogs, Mystery, Investigation, Interactive Fiction
PC
Positive92% · 25 📈 Making a comeback 100%
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About Finch & Archie
The careless romance and glamour of the Roaring ‘20s in America are over; poverty and crime run rampant in the grimy streets of the Great Depression. Jack Finch, a reclusive but hard-nosed detective, has sworn he’ll never work with another partner again. But his boss doesn't much care about him vowing to work alone – and soon he finds himself teamed up with the newly graduated police dog Archie. He might want nothing to do with the spunky canine, but with a mass murderer on the loose and an ever-growing case file, the new team has to learn to work together if they want to catch the culprit and restore peace to the city… COOP PLAY: CHOOSE THE COP OR THE DOGFinch & Archie is a two-player co-op. You can choose to be either the weathered detective Jack Finch or the good boy Archie. Please don’t fight over who gets to be the dog. FIND A WAY TO COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR PARTNERBecause you are a human-dog partnership, communication does not come easy. You will have to be creative to explain your findings to your partner. The mystery cannot be solved without sharing evidence between yourselves – but unless you speak dog (or can bark in human), you’ll need to find creative ways to communicate with your partner… BRING YOUR UNIQUE SKILLS TO THE INVESTIGATIONBoth Finch and Archie bring their own strengths and unique skills to the investigation. Use either your magnifying glass or your excellent sense of smell to find and gather evidence that will help you with your case. INTERROGATE SUSPECTS AND WITNESSES Suspects can be as wily as witnesses can be unreliable. Question their motives, find out their alibis, poke holes in their testimonies, and use evidence to catch them in lies and contradictions. ANOTHER NIGHT, ANOTHER CASEDive deep into a collection of hard-boiled, noir crime stories set in the Great Depression. Finch & Archie is an episodic game, and each episode opens a new investigation – but they are all tied into an overarching story.
What Steam players say
Recent verbatim reviews from Steam — separate from playze.io community reviews below.
If you play this and follow the guidelines of just using messaging in the game to share clues, it's an awful lot of fun. Although I played with a friend and we were on Discord, it was honestly a hoot and a half trying to use the basic language system to communicate. There were a lot of laughs. Though I will object to not being able to says "suss" as one of the words. I mean, is this an Aussie game or not?! All in all, my friend and I had a blast streaming it together and cannot wait for the rest of the cases to be released. JUSTICE FOR MAX!3 found this helpful
I have nothing but praise for this game. It is exactly what it claims to be, in the best possible way. The clues and puzzles are challenging, but rewarding. My friend and I (certified idiots) were able to complete everything currently available without feeling frustrated or like anything was unfairly difficult. The game also manages to perfectly balance the murder mystery aspect with humor in a way that is so rarely pulled off this flawlessly. If I HAD to pick a negative, I'd say that the lighting in the game can make it a bit tricky to locate your partner, as they can blend in to the shadows, but that's nothing a quick bark or whistle can't solve, and the map locations are small enough that you'll run in to them just a couple minutes of searching. All in all, I would give this game an 11/10. Absolutely fantastic, and I cannot wait for more.2 found this helpful
Short but fun. Communication system made us laugh. Neither of us felt like we were waiting around for our 'turn' or anything like some co-ops. No hand holding, but not so hard to be frustrating. Looking forward to future cases.2 found this helpful
This game was so much fun and was a lot of laughs. The things we said to each other when only being able to communicate with one syllable words had us saying the dumbest yet funniest things. I can't wait for the full release and be able to play more! If I had any feedback to give, it would be that not all one syllable words are able to be used, which does make it harder. I think opening up the vocab would be nicer since using words like "Pee" and "poo" should work. Def recommend though!!! 10/10! would play so many times over.
So the concept of this game is pretty cool, but I do feel like the tutorial is not sufficient. It does not give enough information to understand what you will need to do with the case files at the end of the actual case. The blanks where you need to fill in the text and photos seems to be too confusing (especially not knowing you would need to do this and having to use the weird one-word clues from your partner). I feel like if the tutorial had a shorter case with a case file, it would be useful. Also, I think it should be more clear that you should try all the clues on multiple people, even if you gained some information already about it. Unclear why I cannot use some words that are one syllable (eg. 'it'), maybe that is on purpose. To be honest I loved the single syllable aspect with one exception - [spoiler] the location clue for the phone. [/spoiler] Pros: Story Unique Communication Playstyle Evolution of crime Cons: Tutorial Location clue Case file fill in the blanks Possible imbalance of things to do (I think my partner waited on me a bit too much) TLDR: If they fix the tutorial and fill in the blank case files, this would be a great experience!
Finch & Archie is a really unique co-op detective game. Both characters solve mysteries in completely different ways. Finch talks to people and pieces together evidence, while Archie follows smells and talks to animals to uncover clues. The communication system is probably my favourite part. You can’t fully explain things to each other normally and instead have to communicate through restricted keyword chats. It makes every clue feel more important and leads to a lot of moments where you’re both trying to work things out together from incomplete information. It honestly makes the investigations feel way more engaging than if you could just explain everything instantly. The two roles complement each other really well and it actually feels like both players are equally important to solving the story. Really cool models and art style as well, I can’t wait for the next chapter.
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