A time-traveling locked-room mystery in VR.

Inspired by comics. Rooted in mystery. Designed for VR.

TICMB draws from Richard McGuire’s Here, classic locked-room mysteries, and the Japanese honkaku tradition of “fair-play” detective fiction — intricate stories where every essential clue is on the page and the solution can be reached through pure logic. In true honkaku fashion, there is a moment where the “author” breaks the fourth wall and tells the player: you now have all the information you need to solve the case. From that point on, it’s your choice whether to go back, review everything, and propose your own solution — or keep going and see if you were right.

The room itself becomes your investigation board. Instead of following a fixed route, you stitch together your own chain of scenes across time. With each time window you open, the story reshapes: new clues surface, alibis crumble, and your theory of the crime evolves.

How it plays.

You start in Mateo’s studio, just after the body has been found. You can walk around freely and examine objects, photos, scratches on the wall, letters on the desk — anything that might hide a clue.

When you focus on something important, several time windows appear in mid-air, each marked with a date. Through them you glimpse frozen snapshots of the room at different moments across fifty years.

Point at a window and step through it: the static image expands into a full scene around you. Characters move, talk, argue, hide things, and make mistakes. Your job is to watch closely, read body language, and connect what you see with what you’ve already discovered.

At any moment, you can open a timeline that records every scene you’ve unlocked. It works like a story map: you can jump back to rewatch a key moment, follow a different lead, or test a new theory without losing track of the overall case.

There are no fail states and no branching endings — just one truth. At a certain point, in pure honkaku style, the game breaks the fourth wall and tells you that you now have enough information to solve the case. From there, you can either go back through the timeline to refine your theory, or continue forward and watch the official solution unfold — discovering whether your version of the crime was correct.

Highlights

• Non-linear investigation. Choose which leads to follow. Each clue opens new windows in time.

• Time-travel mechanics. Witness events across 50 years, all within the same space.

• Natural interaction. No controllers. Just your hands. Full hand-tracking for intuitive play.

• Armchair detective experience. Literally. Fully playable while seated, no room-scale movement required.

• Iconic visual style. Bold, graphic look inspired by classic Franco-Belgian comics. Instantly recognizable.