The Roottrees are Dead opens mobile pre-registration for November release

Pre-registration is now open for the mobile version of The Roottrees are Dead, the indie detective sim from developer Evil Trout Inc. The genealogical mystery arrives on iOS and Android on 5th November, giving phone and tablet players their first chance to tackle one of the most acclaimed indie puzzles of recent years.

From desktop hit to award contender

The Roottrees are Dead first launched on desktop three years ago, standing out in a crowded detective genre. Since then it has received a remaster, arrived on Steam, and picked up serious critical attention. Its recognition includes a finalist nomination for Game of the Year at the Thinky Game Awards and an Honorable Mention for Excellence in Narrative at the Independent Games Festival — nods that put it among the most decorated indie puzzle titles around.

The case: a billion-dollar will and one very old rule

The game is set in 1998 and opens with a private jet crash that kills the Roottree family — three sisters and their parents — leaving behind an empire worth over a billion dollars.

The twist comes from the family patriarch's century-old will: the fortune can only go to verified blood relatives. Playing as a hired investigator, you dig through archives, cross-reference evidence, and reconstruct the complete Roottree family tree to work out exactly who qualifies for a share of the inheritance.

Every confirmed lead lets you match names to faces, verify occupations, and pin down birth order. Correctly filling in nodes on the tree narrows the pool of potential heirs — but the clues you still need get steadily harder to track down.

What happens next

Pre-registration is live now on the App Store and Google Play, with the full launch set for 5th November. If the game's desktop track record is anything to go by, the mobile version could bring one of the genre's sharpest deduction experiences to a much wider audience.

Source: the original publisher