Blacksad - Under the Skin (Xbox One) Reviews

Blacksad: Under The Skin Xbox One 2025 Review



I don't remember how I initially came across Blacksad: Under The Skin. All I remember is being intrigued when I first saw the cover. It looked like a game that would be in the same vein as "The Wolf Among Us", a narrative-heavy experience with a gritty mystery and a unique take on the detective genre. I wasn't too far off with my assumption.


Story

Blacksad is a comic series inspired by film noir with the story following a private investigator of the same name in New York during the late 1950s. What sets it apart from other noir-inspired media is that all the characters are anthropomorphic animals. So, think the PBS kids' show "Arthur", but for adults with more crime, murder, scandals, and furry dames. But don't let the fact that the world's residents are walking-talking animals make you think that it's a parody or comedy. The story takes itself seriously and if you replaced the animals with people, it would still be a gritty noir in its own right.

Blacksad: Under The Skin is based on said comic series where you play as Blacksad (a black cat detective) as he gets hired to investigate the recent death of a boxing gym owner. I'm not going to reveal any other details of the story, since I don't want to spoil anything and because the mystery/discovery is the main draw of this game. What I will say is, it's well-written and at times can be quite gripping. The music that plays when you boot up the game along with the main menu screen (Which I don't want to spoil) is just "Chef's Kiss" excellent. It does a great job of setting the graphic noir tone and leaves you with many questions that draw you into the story to come. When you select a menu option, the music abruptly stops, leaving nothing but a harrowing sound. I'm telling you, if you're reading this review just to know if the story is worth your time, IT IS. I've never read any of the comics myself, but it's very apparent that the writer of the comics "Juan Díaz Canales" was a consultant during the development process. The story and writing are one of the game's greatest strengths…..But now I need to address the game's weakness.


Bugs And Glitches

Generally, I wouldn't talk about a game's technical issues so early in a review, but they're prevalent enough that it's best to address them now. This game is plagued with issues. From minor glitches like textures flickering and/or not loading completely, music stopping and starting when it shouldn't, achievements unlocking late or not unlocking at all, to more major issues like the game crashing every couple of hours and cutscenes stuttering. This is all after playing on the latest 1.0.5.4 NA update.
Nothing makes the game unplayable or uncompletable, but it does hamper the experience. As much as I praised the intro music and main menu screen, not soon after you start the game, there's a somewhat awkward quick-time event which is followed shortly by a cutscene that always gets stuck on a few frames. I can see some people putting the game down just from that alone.
It also makes it hard for me to review this game at times, because I can't tell what is a creative choice and what is a technical hiccup. For example, there's a scene where you're talking to someone at their office, and it is strangely devoid of any music and/or background noises. I can't tell if that's intentional or something isn't working properly. Regardless, this game still would benefit from having fixes done and I don't know if the developers "Pendulo Studios" are planning on releasing any more patches.


Game Play

Most of the gameplay involves you making dialogue choices with the characters you interact with to either get information or choose how the story plays out.
The rest of the time, you will be walking around different set pieces observing parts of the environment for clues. At any time, you can access a menu that lets you combine the clues you've gathered. If you combine the right combinations of clues, you will make deductions which helps with progressing the game and story.
What surprised me is that this game also has collectibles. They come in the form of sport/baseball cards. They are hidden around the set pieces you investigate, and you acquire them by looking at them and pressing the A button even if Blacksad isn't close enough to physically grab them. (More on that Later)
There's also the occasional quick-time event when the story calls for it. It's generally during the more intense moments like a fight.
If all of this sounds familiar, that's because it is. The gameplay seems to be inspired by a combination of one of Telltale's episodic adventure games like "The Wolf Among Us" I mentioned before and Frogwares "Adventures of Sherlock Holme's" games with the deduction menu being very similar to the "Mind Palace". In fact, the only way mechanically Blacksad: Under The Skin is different from the other games mentioned is the collectibles. That's not a bad thing though. It all works in the game's favor since the mechanics complement the story well.


Controls

The controls are basic. It's nothing you wouldn't expect from any run-of-the-mill adventure game. My only complaint is how awkward it can be to navigate and look at certain points of interest due to the camera. Most areas have the camera at a fixed position that will adjust/follow the player depending on where you are in the area. You can slightly move the camera/where Blacksad focuses, but only within the space the game allows you to. The main purpose of this is so you can look for and get the collectibles that are placed slightly out of view.
This works fine for the most part, but at times it felt like I was constantly straining the camera to try to look at things just for the camera to barely move. It becomes even more awkward when you're trying to look at things that are right next to where the camera's fixed position is and/or if you're in a small area. This all becomes very apparent during a scene in the game where you're in a basement in the dark and you have to control a flashlight with the same camera controls.


Music/Sound/Audio

As I said earlier in this review, the theme music is excellent. It's surprisingly high quality coming from such a niche game. It's kind of hard to describe, but it sounds like it could just as easily be from a spy movie. Most of the music that plays in the game however is Jazz. It's slow jazz while you're investigating or sneaking around an area. It bumps up a notch when there's a tense moment like a fight scene. The rest of the music I would describe as cinematic/orchestral. The music adjusts to fit the circumstance…..when it works correctly. Sometimes it glitches and the chill jazz music will play during moments when it's not meant to. I had this happen during a moment that was just meant to have background noises. The music still kind of fit the scene, so it didn't ruin the moment, but it would have been more immersive had everything worked as intended.
The voice acting ranges from being excellent to being a bit flat. Some of the characters have excellent voice acting while others are a bit lackluster. Luckily Blacksad's voice actor did a solid job in my opinion. None of the voice acting is atrocious, but I can see some people being turned off by some of the weaker performances.
The background noise and sound effects are impressive. They're higher quality than you would expect from a game like this. Heck, during a part of the game where you're at a hospital, I was playing with headphones on and I continually thought that one of my family members was moving behind me due to the in-game background noises sounding so realistic. Now that's quality.


Graphics

Just like the story benefits from having the original writer of the comics involved, the art direction benefits from having the comic’s original artist "Juanjo Guarnido" as a consultant. The look of the game is very faithful to the source material. From the advertisements and baseball cards to the automobiles and characters' clothing, the game does a great job of capturing Blacksad's 1950s aesthetic. The art style goes for a more realistic look apart from the characters who look slightly cartoony. It looks great when it's not being held back by the technical issues.
Now the facial animations can be both hit and miss. In general, they’re serviceable, but some of the characters can look a little rough at times and the facial animations can be a bit stiff. That and the transitions between different expressions aren't always very subtle, so it can look awkward. As expected, Blacksad has the most detailed facial animations out of everyone.


Achievements

Most of the achievements are predictable enough. A lot of them you get by playing through the story, others you get by making certain decisions or making certain outcomes happen within the story, and some are for the collectibles. There's also one for dying less than 9 times and one for not dying once. I don't have an issue with any of the achievements, except one.
The "The End(s)" achievement. You get this for seeing all six versions of one of the ending cutscenes. This requires at least six partial playthroughs. What determines the outcome in the cutscenes is based on decisions you make with two of the main characters. Some of these decisions are made early in the story. From my understanding, you can't just reload to an earlier part of the story and change some of the decisions then reload before the cutscene if you've already completed the playthrough. You have to start a new game. To make things worse, you can't skip dialog or cutscenes and it takes about 7-10 hours to do one complete playthrough. You can get most of the achievements in 2 playthroughs if you're following a guide, so requiring 4 additional partial playthroughs just so you can see slight variations of the same cutscene is just dumb. It would have been better if they left out that achievement altogether.


Replayability

(ONLY READ THIS AFTER YOU'VE DONE YOUR FIRST PLAYTHROUGH IF YOU'RE INTERESTED IN THIS GAME)




Summary

Blacksad: Under The Skin is a game that could have rivaled the other narrative-heavy adventure games released around the same time if the story it was trying to tell wasn't continually being undermined by its constant bugs and glitches. It's a shame really, cause if you can look past these flaws, it's a solid game. The environments, the story, the characters, and the music, are all of higher quality than you would expect from a game that a studio of only 17 members developed. But by that same token, it's clear that this game needed more people on board or more time to cook in the oven because the issues are prevalent enough that I can understand others putting the game back down soon after starting it up.

People who should try this game
If you like any of the narrative-heavy story games like the Telltale/detective games mentioned before, you'll probably be able to look past this game's flaws enough to enjoy it.

People who should avoid this game
If you don't like a slower-paced game that focuses on narrative over gameplay with unskippable cutscenes/dialogue, quick time events, and an inability to run or jog around the environments, I would avoid this game.

Stats
The author spent almost 63 hours in total playing and replaying this game to get all of the achievements before writing this review.

Author: Currently known as “ACDCs TNT” on Xbox Live