GameZebo: "Foreboding title aside, the outing's much the same as previous episodes in the series: A fairly upbeat exercise in hunting for clues, sniffing out on-screen hotspots and conducting suspect interrogations, with occasional allusions to darker topics lending the proceedings a hint of creepiness. But by and large, the saga – once again starring the Nancy Drew-like Carol, a twenty-something Englishwoman who dodders around Sweden solving mysteries – is mostly suitable for those aged 13 and up, adopting a chipper stance to suspenseful storytelling."
ACG writes: "The Colour of Murder: A Carol Reed Mystery is the fifth game in the Carol Reed mystery series. Given my lack of familiarity with previous games in the series, I felt assured initially by the developer's website that there would be no loss of enjoyment in this sequel if I had not played any of the previous titles. What I took this claim to mean was that I would be quickly brought up to speed on who Carol Reed was and the world around her. After hours of playing the game, I learned that Carol Reed is a young Englishwoman who lives in Sweden, has a best friend named Stina, and likes to solve mysteries. Beyond these factoids, however, I knew little about her, as the game revealed so little about her character that I wondered why the designers had even chosen to give you a character to play at all. Rather, the focus of the game's design is on exploration and immersion, but this seems to come at the expense of an interesting story and relatable characters."
Anyhow, at the end of the day, this is a very well produced game. Thumbs up, Nyqvists! It's probably the best one in the series yet, and certainly much better than the anticlimactic ending of Time Stand Still.
