CSI: Miami (iPhone)

Not since The Golden Girls has Miami been the source of so many laughs. CSI: Miami launches an investigation on iPhone that's fraught with silly shortcomings and laughable mistakes. While the core gameplay sticks to adventure basics, attempts to add new elements specific to iPhone derail its defense as wildly innovative.

More than five seasons on the air have made the cast of characters in CSI: Miami a popular bunch, but you'd never understand why from how they're portrayed here. Abysmal voice acting does nothing to create a believable ensemble. This is hands-down the worst voice acting of any iPhone game to date. It's not that they sound nothing like their televised counterparts (because they don't) or that the dialogue is poorly written (because it is), the real issue stems from actors that fail to act out their lines. Monotone performances not only make the characters out to be depressed – it's simply unnatural.

Solving crimes takes a combination of evidence processing and interrogation. The latter proves far superior in terms of design, letting you ask witnesses a range of questions. Better still, some options grant you the ability to take a specific tone that may evoke a different response. It's a slick system, but one that unfortunately isn't mirrored in how evidence is handled.

You begin an investigation by scouring the crime scene for evidence. A static scene can be searched by tapping on areas of interest. Toggling accelerometer controls allows you to tilt the phone to pan the scene or you can use the scroll bar lining the bottom of the screen. Unfortunately, a bizarre bug prevents the game from registering use of the touchscreen when the device is tilted away from its neutral position. Grabbing evidence, for example, can only be done by centering your phone and then touching the screen. Worse, the pixel-precise cursor often makes it difficult to select evidence.

Tapping a piece of evidence puts it in your inventory; you then haul it over to the lab for analysis via mini-games ranging from cellular analysis via microscope to lock picking to piecing together photo puzzles. Lock picking, on the negative side, demands you line up three pins within a short period of time. You do this by tilting the device back to launch the pins up and into place. Time wouldn't be an issue at all if it wasn't so difficult. Aligning the pins requires precision that proves infuriatingly tough using the accelerometer.

There are a few decent mini-games such as DNA extraction, which puts a twist on match-three puzzle-solving. Your finger guides a coloured amino acid ball along the bottom of the screen while a double helix slowly spins. Launch the ball at the right time and you can pair it with two like-colored amino acids. Complete enough of these matches and you successfully extract the subject's DNA. It's a great little game because of its simplicity.

But what little enjoyment can be gathered from the decent mini-games like DNA extraction isn't enough to counter the mounting evidence against CSI: Miami. Drab characters meet lacklustre crime solving for a game that's guilty on many counts.