Lockheart Indigo

Steam poster art

**Lockheart Indigo** is a 2020 adventure game developed by Fangsoft (formerly Harmless Games), using the RPG Maker MV program. The game itself inspires tech-noir, murder mystery, and psychological thriller film genres with visually styled after 8-bit video game consoles such as those on the Game Boy Color, using minimal colors with a pixel art aesthetic.
The story follows Beatris Summers, a young private detective hired to solve the murder of the business owner, Evan Volkov. After the conversation with Evan's wife Aya, Beatris interrogates one of them, especially the Volkov Family and its workers, who commit the murder behind the wealthy robotics tycoon in the mansion.

The game was released commercially on July 31, 2020 on Steam and itch.io. It was made available as freeware on December 21, 2020.

## Gameplay

*Lockheart Indigo* is a top-down adventure game where the player traverses levels nonlinearly and navigate obstacles similar to the 2D installments of The Legend of Zelda as well as other 8-bit games from Game Boy Color, seeking out keys and opening locked doors. Potential culprits are interrogated in a conversation system that uses facts, evidence, and special abilities to get closer to the killer and progress the game; failing the interrogation with the character is the only way of trial-and-error method or (sometimes) life-and-death situation, the latter result of getting a Game Over screen.

## Plot

Beatris, a young and cynical private detective has arrived at the wealthy mansion under the owner of the Volkov siblings, Nasha and Ivan. In the mansion, she meets Aya Ishida, Evan's devoted husband and widow who was the only person to hire the detective and allow her to investigate one of them who murdered her husband. Aya permitted her for entering every room to meet and interrogate them.

Beatris meets Evan's brother, Yvon, admitted Aya is the one who responsible for the family's wealth and Evan's death, so he and his older brother Ivan willing to arrest her for good in exchange for wealth to Beatris, agree to make her a deal and leaves. Margeret briefly appears in the office and Yvon told her to keep an eye on Beatris. After meeting with Ivan and collect the Evan's will, Aya forced her to interrogate, admitting she accused Beatris of betrayal for choosing the family's side and not her, but Beatris trusted her always by her side.

After Beatris interrogated five of them, she meets Margeret, believes she was the murderer of Evan, and Margeret alerts her robots to kill her, but Aya destroys them and helps Beatris to escape from danger. Eventually, most of the workers were killed by the corrupted robots, only the remains survived in the dining room: Beatris, Aya, Yvon, and his son Lloyd. Beatris removes every painting that belongs to the deaths and victims, except two of them, Nasha and Ivan, who are the most beloved siblings who caused mayhem in the mansion. Aya believed that the owners only deactivate the satellite from the rooftop where the robots connect. After approaching the rooftop, Beatris interrogates them about all the evidence she handed. Enraged, Nasha fires a gun at him and attempt to kill Beatris. Fortunately, Aya kills Nasha in defense to save Beatris.

Beatris leaves the mansion as the police arrive. She was invited by Aya for her husband's burial. During the burial, she takes off her glasses, Aya believes that she was young for her face as Yvon told her, but she leaves gracefully without asking her age.

### 1919

In an optional side-quest, you will find and ask a ghostly figure painter, Lawrence, in eight different locations to get the charmer and collect two testaments, find the garden outside the mansion to meet a mysterious person, Jared.

In the post-credit scene after the Lawrence's side-quest, a young girl named Vika explores in the basement, where she meets her obscurely injured mother, but she was murdered by Lawrence, visibly coated in blood.

## Development

Development started in 2017, where they create the prototypical game for a game jam submission under the name *Machines That Bleed*, a tech-noir game with similar features and themes that would later serve as the basis for *Lockheart Indigo*.

In contrast from the prototype, some characters who differently appeared in *Lockheart Indigo* such as Jared and Margeret, the former once as a mysterious person while the latter is a corrupted female robot once as a supervisor to Volkov Family, were returned from *Machines That Bleed.* However, Buster from *Machines That Bleed* and Beatris Summers from *Lockheart Indigo*, were the same as young and cynical private-eye detectives, as the former was gradually changed into a female version of the game for the alpha version and onwards of *Lockheart Indigo*.

## Release

Prior to the game's full release on Steam, it was available for free as a beta version throughout its development on itch.io.

## References

1. ↑ Lockheart Indigo Locks You in a Rich Family to Find an Active Killer (27 August 2019).
2. ↑ Solve a robotic murder mystery in free detective game Lockheart Indigo | PC Gamer
3. ↑ Version 1.0.0 - Lockheart Indigo by HarmlessGames.
4. ↑ The Developer's Kind Message and Lockheart Indigo Became Freeware.
5. ↑ Really old proto build with weird differences... - Lockheart Indigo by HarmlessGames (en).
6. ↑ The "1919" Update & Game Release in 7 days - Lockheart Indigo by HarmlessGames.