As we enter the final week of this year’s Celebrating All Things Mysterious, let’s discuss the third and final game included in Touch Detective 3 + The Complete Case Files.

Touch Detective 3 is the third entry in the series and the most recent one to be released. For the west, that was after a significant length of time, but there was a bit of a time gap for the original Japanese release, too.

The first Touch Detective, which we discussed near the start of the month, originally came out for the Nintendo DS in 2006. Touch Detective 2 1/2, which we talked about last week, followed in 2007.

Touch Detective 3 didn’t come out until 2014, for the 3DS.

In other words, the first two games released a year apart, but there were seven years between the second and third games. It’s little wonder that the third game feels the most different. (And since it wasn’t localized until the collection came out last year, western fans waited an additional ten years on top of that. Never say it’s too late to hope.)

The first thing I noticed was that the UI had changed. It still functionally plays the same way, but the icons are in different spots and the inventory is spread across the bottom of the screen instead of being confined to the corner. It also has save slots, instead of a single save. Strangely enough, the resolution seems to be slightly worse than the older games, although it’s still fine.

After I completed the standard tutorial section, I got another surprise, as the game rewarded me with… Funghi Coins? Soon afterwards, I also received a Funghi Coin while tapping something in the environment. What is this, Professor Layton??

Yes, the most notable addition to Touch Detective’s gameplay is that you can now find Funghi Coins hidden in the environment, as well as being rewarded with them for completing each case. These coins actually can be spent on hints, but I never used them for that. Instead, I used them to fill out my figurine collection; yes, there are now collectible Funghi Figurines you can get by spending your coins on a lottery to get a random figurine and spending 5 coins to combine two to get another one. It’s a bit too luck-based for me to completely fill out my collection, but it still made for a fun change of pace every now and then.

The cases feel a bit more disconnected from each other again, although there are some narrative threads throughout, including the return of the Cornstalker.

We also see the addition of yet another detective rival for Mackenzie. (Maybe they’re going for the Ace Attorney approach, where you get a new main rival in each game.) He doesn’t dominate the story to the exclusion of the previous rivals, though, and he has a great theme song, so I don’t even mind.

Now, this is by far the easiest Touch Detective game. I mentioned that the second game had less tedious back-and-forth, but 3 simplifies things even further. Everything was very clear and straightforward, and the cases felt a lot faster as a result. I also found it easier to find entries for the touch list, but that might have been because the addition of Funghi Coins had me madly tapping everything in sight.

While it was nice not to get stuck, it might be a little too simple. The gameplay felt like it was lacking something. On the other hand, the charm and humor are as intact as ever, so it was still an enjoyable experience.

And I really do love the addition of the coins and figurines.

Touch Detective 3 left me with one big question: will there be a Touch Detective 4? There’s easily room for more wacky cases and silly antics with these characters. In fact, when I view the series with that in mind, I’ve changed my mind about the Cornstalker. I finished the second game thinking it was an odd omission to not have a big reveal of his true identity, but I’m now convinced it’s an intentional wink to the player to imply his identity while keeping it a secret from the characters, so that he can be a recurring antagonist who is never truly defeated.

Of course, it’s been 11 years since the original release of Touch Detective 3, so a fourth game seems unlikely. But since Touch Detective 3 + The Complete Case Files released just last year and brought in new fans like me, I’m crossing my fingers that we’ll see more Touch Detective games in the future!

I never played the Touch Detective games when they originally came out, but with the release of the collection for the Switch, I decided to give them a try.

Touch Detective 3 + The Complete Case Files does not exactly make it obvious through its title, but it’s a collection that contains all three Touch Detective games as well as bonus content.

(It’s only the English title, so I assume the reason is because Touch Detective 3 hadn’t been localized before and they wanted to emphasize its inclusion. Still a confusing name for a collection.)

The first Touch Detective puts you in the shoes of a young detective named Mackenzie who needs to prove herself as a detective by solving four cases (accompanied by her mushroom companion Funghi). It makes use of the touchscreen controls for movement and interactions, although you can use the buttons and joystick instead. This mostly works, although moving sometimes felt a little awkward.

Mackenzie also keeps a “touch list” of what touching different things feels like, so it encourages tapping everything on the screen to find interactions. I found a little over half of these by playing naturally.

It’s an adventure game, so gameplay mostly revolves around talking to characters for information, finding items, and using those items in the correct way to make progress. Although it’s decently straightforward, the back-and-forth between different characters and areas got tedious at times.

(After the main cases, you unlock short bonus interactions, and there’s also a separate side scenario starring Funghi, but I only did some of the bonus content since I found the formula a little tiring by the end.)

Now, Touch Detective has a pretty unique tone. It’s funny, and it’s also weird. When the first case began with Mackenzie’s ditzy friend claiming someone was stealing her dreams, I thought it would be one of those stories where it turned out to be a misunderstanding, but soon it was a legitimate investigation into a dream thief. It’s that sort of game.

It also has a pseudo-spooky vibe I did not expect, even though it’s fairly lighthearted.

But the character interactions in Touch Detective are what stood out to me the most. It doesn’t matter how silly or weird a case might be, because if Mackenzie’s rival shows up to make some absurd proclamation and then run off without waiting for details, while their friend is off in her own little world like usual and all the other characters are being oddballs in their own way, it’s all worth it no matter what the case is about.

I’ve only played the first game in the Touch Detective collection so far, but I do want to try the others. While I wouldn’t say the mysteries themselves are especially compelling, the characters and charm made up for it.