Detective games are among the most narrative-focused gaming experiences that bring you some of the greatest mysteries, shocking twists, twisted villains, and gripping character development. They can also range from portraying more realistic stories to ones infused with more surreal and supernatural elements.
Whichever you prefer, thePS4andPS5have a lot of exciting selections. In terms of console exclusives, hardly any fall under the detective genre, but regardless,many astute video game detectiveshave made their way onto the platform over the years, and their stories are sure to scratch your investigative itch.
Updated on June 22, 2025, by Dennis Moiseyev:Detective games are always a great choice for some compelling mystery storylines and plot twists, and also if you don’t mind a few puzzles here and there. The PS4 and PS5 are home to a wonderful selection of games in this genre, whether you prefer to experience them in Metroidvania, RPG, horror, point-and-click, first-person, or third-person format. Below we’ve added some more titles that have now launched on PlayStation.
H.P. Lovecraft and the detective genre is a match made in cosmic horror heaven. However, The Last Case of Benedict Fox isn’t your typical investigation-focused gamebut rather a Metroidvania-style platformer. Starring the titular detective protagonist, Benedict Fox, you must get to the bottom of a grizzly murder mystery and missing persons case while battling Lovecraftian creatures.
The game bears very similar themes and story beats to Alone in the Dark and 2018’s Call of Cthulhu, with your investigation leading you to a mysterious 20th-century mansion where a child has gone missing and the parents murdered. Helping Benedict with the case is a demonic entity that has bound itself to him, its phantom tentacles bursting out to take on enemies during combat.
Nightdive Studios is on a roll with its remakes and remasters of retro games. Before Star Wars: Dark Forces Remaster, System Shock Remake,and The Thing: Remastered, the studio also launched Blade Runner: Enhanced Edition, bringing the original 1997 point-and-click detective noir set in futuristic 2019 Los Angeles to modern consoles.
Unlike the Ridley Scott film, the game doesn’t follow Harrison Ford’s character Rick Deckard. Instead, you have an original Blade Runner detective from the LAPD named Ray McCoy on the hunt after animal murderers and following the trail of a murdered Tyrell Corporation employee, the company behind the Replicants. Some of the original cast reprise their roles here, including Sean Young as Rachael and Joe Turkel as Tyrell.
Frog Detective lets you play asone of the smartest and most astute frogs in gaming, with a first-person view of the character and your environment. This is a rare detective video game that removes a lot of the darker elements that the majority of them would entail and is instead a fun mystery adventure for the whole family.
With Frog Detective: The Entire Mystery, you get all three episodes in one package. The gameplay mechanics involve questioning NPCs and getting some quirky and lighthearted dialogue, as well as navigating the dialogue with your trusty magnifying glass. All the characters involved in the case are also anthropomorphic animals designed and modeled in the game’s unique 3D aesthetic, which makes it incredibly charming.
Another first-person detective game is Shadows of Doubt, which has a 3D voxel art style to itand is set in a cyberpunk environment. The whole world here is your investigative playground, as you’ll move around and complete various casework for money as a private investigator.
You’ll have an evidence board that you can interact with and compile your evidence as it comes along, as well as have the ability to analyze CCTV footage around the retro-futuristic city. It’s a detective game that truly immerses you in the role, featuring a “fully simulated world” that feels alive.
If Atlus’s Persona serieswent full-on detective game, Master Detective Archives: Rain Code Plus would feel exactly like something along the lines of that. It’s an anime adventure game where you play an amnesiac detective named Yuma and are joined by a spirit that’s tethered to you named Shinigami. The neon-lit, rainy world of Kanai Ward also adds plenty of atmosphere to the mystery you’ll be solving.
As the title suggests, you are what’s known as a Master Detective, and part of the lore of your character involves the enigmatic Mystery Labyrinth, a treacherous plane that plays a key role in the investigation the deeper into the case you get. The UI and art direction will be highly reminiscent of games like Danganronpa, Metaphor: ReFantazio, and the Persona series, with an equally compelling story and original investigative mechanics to go along with it.
If you’re looking for a mature detective game that’s different from the rest, look no further than The Thaumaturge. It meshes historical fiction with supernatural Slavic mythologyand is set in Warsaw, Poland, while it’s still under the rule of the Russian Empire. You play Wiktor Szulski, a detective who can also collect entities called Salutors to level up and use them in battle against enemies as part of his thaumaturgical abilities.
The Thaumaturge isa turn-based isometric RPGfrom the support studio behind Larian’s BG3 and Divinity: Original Sin 2, so you have some masterful quest writing and world-building available here. The further you progress into the story, the more Salutors you may tame and have at your side. You’ll also be partnering with historical figure Grigori Rasputin.
You can play both The Case of the Golden Idol and its 2024 sequel, The Rise of the Golden Idol, on PS4 and PS5. This detective game seriesfollows a point-and-click structureand offers one of the most compelling mystery storylines and mechanics, with an adventure that quite literally spans centuries.
The first game will put you in the shoes of a detective in the 18th century, where you’re faced with 12 different murders that all seem to be connected but have also taken place over the course of 50 years. Rise of the Golden Idol is set in the 1970s, where you have 20 different crimes to investigate. By examining the crime scenes and clues, the game provides you with a creative way to weave the evidence and story together, and it’s all tied to the titular object.
23Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments
This won’t be the last detective game developed by Frogwares you’ll see here. The Ukrainian studio has really built a name for itselfwith its prolific Sherlock Holmes series, adapting the classic literary character by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle into both unique and familiar cases with challenging puzzle-heavy mechanics. Crimes & Punishments is arguably the best Holmes entry on PS4.
This 2014 Sherlock Holmes investigative adventure will have six different crime-solving cases in store from stories like ‘The Lost Special,’ ‘The Adventure of Black Peter,’ and ‘The Adventure of the Abbey Grange,’ along with originals like The Kew Gardens Drama and A Half Moon Walk. You’ll interrogate suspects and study any changes in facial expressions. To piece together clues, you have a ‘Sherlock Vision’ detective mode.
Looking for a more anime-inspired detective thriller in a futuristic sci-fi setting? AI: The Somnium Files and its 2022 sequel, Nirvana Initiative, is also an option on PS4 and PS5. Told in a 3D visual novel-style design,this series takes a more psychological horror approachwith a premise similar to Bloober Team’s Observer. To gain answers to the mysteries in your cases, you have to enter the dreams of suspects.
AI: The Somnium Files puts you in the shoes of Detective Kaname Date of the Advanced Brain Investigation Squad (ABIS), whose first mystery involves a string of bodies that have their eyes gouged out. Nirvana Initiative is about solving the cold case serial murders dubbed the ‘Half Body’ murders, which are as gruesome and sinister as they sound. In both games, Date will be assisted by an AI avatar called Aiba.
Yet another sci-fi detective noir game that envisions a dystopian future inspired by Blade Runner is Nobody Wants to Die. Set way into the far future period of 2329, you assume the role of Mortality Department Detective James Karra in a unique vision of New York that’s filled with flying vehicles, neon-lit cityscapes, holograms, and cyberpunk atmosphere –all constructed in Unreal Engine 5.
Karra is as gritty and heavy-drinking of a detective as they come, who can use special augmented reality software to reconstruct events in crime scene investigations. One of the biggest twists to the genre this game brings is that society has found a way to give humans immortality through advanced technology via a consciousness transfer from body to body unless their life is cut short; like in this case, where the city’s elites are being targeted.
