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* The seventh installment is ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/us/en/games/18720/detectives-united-anthology-part-1/?pc&lang=en Anthology, Part 1]]'', which is a collection of the first three games in the series. In addition to the three games which the fans already know and love, the installment includes a number of special extras, including new details about the characters and an interview with the creator.

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* The seventh installment game, ''Mission Possible'' (currently in beta), is a CrisisCrossover within a CrisisCrossover. A new case brings Brown, Anna, and new partner Ewan to investigate disappearances possibly connected with people dressed as animals. They soon discover that one of Anna's past antagonists has joined forces with the successors of past enemies of the Mystery Trackers, and the detectives are in serious danger.

The devs have also released a special edition called
''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/us/en/games/18720/detectives-united-anthology-part-1/?pc&lang=en Anthology, Part 1]]'', which is a collection of the first three games in the series. In addition to the three games which the fans already know and love, the installment includes a number of special extras, including new details about the characters and an interview with the creator.



** ''Beyond Time'' ends with James [[spoiler:formally retiring from the Detectives United]]. Brown then speaks to Ewan about possibly joining the team, which turned out to be foreshadowing for the next installment, ''Mission Possible''.



* TapOnTheHead: A few of the games involve the detectives getting into car wrecks and suffering head injuries in one manner or another.



* TwoGuysAndAGirl: The three field agents. Anna occasionally refers to James and Agent Brown as "the boys."

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* TwoGuysAndAGirl: The three field agents. In the earlier games, Anna occasionally refers to James and Agent Brown as "the boys."



* VitriolicBestBuds: James and Agent Brown have this sort of vibe to their interactions, especially in the early parts of the series. They clearly like and respect each other and are willing to help each other out of trouble, but Agent Brown frequently gives James a hard time. Anna rolls her eyes at them, but she also seems to find the dynamic amusing.

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* VitriolicBestBuds: James and Agent Brown have this sort of vibe to their interactions, especially in the early parts of the series. They clearly like and respect each other and are willing to help each other out of trouble, but Agent Brown frequently gives James a hard time. Anna rolls her eyes at them, but she also seems to find the dynamic amusing. The vitriol tones down considerably as the series progresses.



* ContinuityCameo: Elf, the miniature pinscher who accompanies the player character of ''Mystery Trackers'' in many installments, has a brief cameo in one of the hidden object scenes at the castle.

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* ContinuityCameo: Elf, the miniature pinscher who accompanies the player character of ''Mystery Trackers'' in many most installments, has a brief cameo in one of the hidden object scenes at the castle.


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[[folder: Mission Possible]]
* BigBrotherMentor: Brown's dialogue indicates that he has taken on this role for Ewan.
* ContinuityCameo: James has left Detectives United, but his former partners still speak of him fondly, and he makes an appearance in the CollectionSidequest.
* InstantSedation: The detectives have a car accident on the way to their destination, which of course is caused by the villains of the game. They barely have time to get their bearings before they're all subjected to knockout gas. Anna has no idea how she even gets out of the car.
* VillainTeamUp: Anna eventually discovers that the villains of this installment are Dr. Cooper (from ''Grim Tales: The Generous Gift'') and a new group identifying themselves as the Four Aces (who consider themselves {{Spiritual Successor}}s of the baddies from ''Mystery Trackers: The Four Aces'').[[invoked]]
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* AscendedExtra: This applies to James to an extent, as he's not usually the player character in his own series; but it's particularly the case for Agent Brown. He's only ever appeared in one single installment of ''Mystery Trackers''.

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* AscendedExtra: This applies to James to an extent, as he's not usually the player character in his own series; but it's particularly the case for Agent Brown. He's only ever appeared in one single installment several installments of ''Mystery Trackers''.Trackers,'' but never as the player character, and usually only in some sort of cameo.



* NoHistoricalFiguresWereHarmed: The Queen of the United Kingdom, who calls Agent Shade for help, is not [[UsefulNotes/ElizabethII Elizabeth II]]. (Her name is never given.) Interestingly, however, the woman depicted in the game during the phone call bears a strong resemblance to Queen Mary, HM's paternal grandmother, which only adds to the game's sense of AnachronismStew.

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* NoHistoricalFiguresWereHarmed: The Queen of the United Kingdom, who calls Agent Shade for help, is not [[UsefulNotes/ElizabethII Elizabeth II]].UsefulNotes/ElizabethII. (Her name is never given.) Interestingly, however, the woman depicted in the game during the phone call bears a strong resemblance to Queen Mary, HM's paternal grandmother, which only adds to the game's sense of AnachronismStew.



* AnotherDimension: The BigBad wants to connect to a couple of these. You visit one in the bonus chapter.

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* AnotherDimension: The BigBad wants to connect to a couple of these. You Brown and James visit one in the bonus chapter.



** We also have yet to learn what Dark Brown and Dark Anna did to make Dark James turn on them. However, in response to a Facebook comment about it in December 2020, Elephant Games said that they will "drop some hints soon."

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** We also have yet to learn what Dark Brown and Dark Anna did to make Dark James turn on them. However, in In response to a Facebook comment about it in December 2020, Elephant Games said that they will "drop some hints soon."soon," but as of October 2023, there has still been no new information.


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* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Dark Anna has not been seen in the series since the events of this game, though the detectives muse that they know she's still out there somewhere. It remains to be seen if she's done with them.


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* SpotTheImpostor: Much to Brown's relief, James arrives to help him escape from the room where he's trapped. As they go to get into James's car, however, [[spoiler:Brown catches a glimpse of the other man's reflection in the car window and immediately realizes that "You're not James!"]]
* StuffBlowingUp: It doesn't take long for Brown to work out how to open the mysterious box which has been delivered to their office. As soon as he does, though, half the office is blown apart by a brilliant explosion. James and Anna manage to avoid being harmed, but [[spoiler:Brown completely vanishes from the scene]].

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* LetsSplitUpGang: Although the three field agents are working together, whichever two are not currently the player character will often go elsewhere for one reason or another - even if it's just to pick up the DistressBall offscreen. Taken to extremes in the third game (in which they're separated not just by distance, but ''time'') and again in the fourth (in which Agent Brown's disappearance means the team is fragmented for much of the story).

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* LetsSplitUpGang: Although the three field agents are working together, whichever two are not currently the player character will often go elsewhere for one reason or another - even if it's just to pick up the DistressBall offscreen. Taken to extremes in the third game (in which they're separated not just by distance, but ''time'') and again in ''time''), the fourth (in which Agent Brown's disappearance means the team is fragmented for much of the story).story), and the sixth (in which a demonic creature forcibly breaks up the team with magic and it takes some time for them to find each other again).



* TeamTitle: The series name is that of the group's identity. Although Agents Brown and Shade are among the Mystery Trackers, and James and Anna are solo investigators, they identify as the Detectives United whenever they join forces.
* TimeTravel: A recurring activity, since it's Anna's particular hat; this factors into resolving the main cases, by going back in time to SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong. All three heroes are subjected to it in the third game.
* TokenNonHuman: Anna's father, Richard, is this for the team in the first three games. He's dead, but his daughter carries around his enchanted skull ({{it makes sense in context}}) and his ghost frequently helps with the investigations. He even gets stolen in the second game. Somewhat overlaps with SpiritAdvisor.

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* TeamTitle: The series name is that of the group's identity. Although Agents Brown and Shade are among the Mystery Trackers, and James and Anna are solo investigators, they identify as the Detectives United whenever they join forces.
forces. Somewhat overlaps with ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin.
* TimeTravel: A recurring activity, since it's Anna's particular hat; this frequently factors into resolving the main cases, by going back in time to SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong. All three heroes are subjected to it in the third game.
* TokenNonHuman: Anna's father, Richard, is this for the team in the first three games. He's dead, but his daughter carries around his enchanted skull ({{it makes sense in context}}) and his ghost frequently helps with the investigations. He even gets stolen in the second game. Somewhat overlaps with game, and to the team as a whole he occasionally functions as a SpiritAdvisor.



* VitriolicBestBuds: James and Agent Brown have this sort of vibe to their interactions. They clearly like and respect each other and are willing to help each other out of trouble, but Agent Brown frequently gives James a hard time. Anna rolls her eyes at them, but she also seems to find the dynamic amusing.

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* VitriolicBestBuds: James and Agent Brown have this sort of vibe to their interactions.interactions, especially in the early parts of the series. They clearly like and respect each other and are willing to help each other out of trouble, but Agent Brown frequently gives James a hard time. Anna rolls her eyes at them, but she also seems to find the dynamic amusing.


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** Although all the previous games implied that the DU is headquartered in the UK, ''Beyond Time'' seems to imply that it's set in the United States instead. One scene shows both Anna and James driving cars on the right side of the road. Also, the last installment of ''Haunted Hotel'' explicitly states that James and his wife Jessica live in California; in ''Beyond Time'', various pieces of information suggest that he commutes to and from the DU offices on a near-daily basis, meaning that it must be within driving distance of his home.
** There is a third possibility, which is that DU's headquarters in Silent Hollow ''is'' in the UK, but they also have a satellite office in the United States near where James lives. This would account for the DU office in the fifth and sixth games looking very different from the one seen in the previous installments, and also for the fact that Agent Shade only appears in either game via communications device - the field agents could be in the US while she's back in the UK.


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* ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: The Time Defenders are a group who were founded to... defend time.

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* BreakingTheFellowship: The main game ends with [[spoiler:James announcing that he's decided to quit the team in order to spend more time with his wife Jessica]].
* TheCallKnowsWhereYouLive: A variant. While trying to figure out where he's been taken, Brown finds a note explaining that the mysterious box (which was the cause of his trouble) would make its own way to whoever was most likely to be able to deal with the Glimbourg. He realizes that this is why it ended up on the DU team's doorstep.



* HeroicLineage: Ewan Florence, being the great-grandson of the founders of the Time Defenders, is the only one with the hereditary powers needed to stop the Glimbourg.

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* HeroicLineage: {{Foreshadowing}}: There are multiple hints throughout the main game that [[spoiler:James is going to leave Detectives United]], and sure enough...
* HeroicLineage[=/=]InTheBlood:
Ewan Florence, being the great-grandson of the founders of the Time Defenders, is the only one with the hereditary powers needed to stop the Glimbourg.

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* CallBack[=/=]ContinuityNod: There are a number of references found in the series, such as newspaper clippings about other cases, which are this for the adventures the heroes have in their individual series.

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* CallBack[=/=]ContinuityNod: There are a number of references found in the series, such as newspaper clippings about other cases, which are this for the adventures the heroes have in their individual series. Each of the sequel games also contains references to previous games in the series.


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** The first playable scene in ''Beyond Time'' includes a [[TheBigBoard Big Board]] with pictures and notes regarding the events of ''Timeless Voyage, Phantoms of the Past'', and ''Deadly Debt''.


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* FirstNameBasis: Agent Brown is now solely identified as Dorian beginning in this game; not only do his partners always call him that, as they began doing near the end of ''Phantoms'', but even the game's interface identifies him this way rather than as Agent Brown (as it had always done previously).
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* SharedUniverse: It was established in ''Haunted Hotel: The Phoenix'' that the ''Haunted Hotel'' and ''Mystery Trackers'' franchises exist in the same universe; since the dawn of this series, it's confirmed that ''Grim Tales'' also shares the same universe with them. It may be that other Elephant Games properties share the universe as well, but this has yet to be confirmed.

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* SharedUniverse: It was established in ''Haunted Hotel: The Phoenix'' that the ''Haunted Hotel'' and ''Mystery Trackers'' franchises exist in the same universe; since the dawn of this series, it's confirmed that ''Grim Tales'' also shares the same universe with them. Because ''Grim Tales'' has a crossover with ''VideoGame/ParanormalFiles'' in its tenth installment, it too is part of this same universe. It may be that other Elephant Games properties share the universe as well, but this has yet to be confirmed.
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The first game, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/download-games/38816/detectives-united-origins-collectors-edition/index.html Origins]]'', explains how the partnership came into existence. The Mystery Trackers organization is contacted by the Queen of the United Kingdom, asking for help, and they soon find themselves working alongside James and Anna to save the world from being completely undone.

The sequel, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/download-games/40384/detectives-united-ii-darkest-shrine-ce/index.html The Darkest Shrine]]'', brings the team in to stop a mysterious organization called S.H.R.I.N.E., which is using dark magic to summon monsters and destroy significant locations around the world. Their motives are unclear, but they have to be stopped.

The third installment, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/games/14651/detectives-united-iii-timeless-voyage-ce/?pc Timeless Voyage]],'' picks up with the SequelHook from the second game's bonus chapter. Anna's dark copy from the alternate dimension breaks up the trio by sending them to different points in history, with directives to acquire certain artifacts. They have no choice but to play along since she's holding all of their futures hostage, even as they search for a way to stop her altogether.

The fourth game, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/games/14848/detectives-united-phantoms-of-the-past-ce/ Phantoms of the Past]]'', splits up the heroes. Agent Brown has not returned from his latest case, and James and Anna must find out what's happened to him. The trail leads them to the placid town of Restville, where a mysterious mayor and streets lined with blue roses seem to be hiding something.

The fifth game, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/games/18584/detectives-united-deadly-debt-ce/?pc Deadly Debt]]'', takes place not long after the previous case is concluded. Agent Brown has invented a device to help him locate sources of paranormal activity, and stumbles into a new mystery while following its lead. At the same time, James and Anna have separate visions about a soulless man with a violin and a woman begging for assistance in reviving her lost love at any cost. It'll take all of their combined abilities and skill to figure out how everything is connected, and how to stop it.

The sixth game, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/us/en/games/15845/detectives-united-beyond-time-ce/ Beyond Time]]'', finds the team receiving a strange package from an unknown sender. An otherworldly entity threatens to destroy all of humanity, and the agents have to race against the clock to stop a cosmic catastrophe.

The seventh installment is ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/us/en/games/18720/detectives-united-anthology-part-1/?pc&lang=en Anthology, Part 1]]'', which is a collection of the first three games in the series. In addition to the three games which the fans already know and love, the installment includes a number of special extras, including new details about the characters and an interview with the creator.

to:

* The first game, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/download-games/38816/detectives-united-origins-collectors-edition/index.html Origins]]'', explains how the partnership came into existence. The Mystery Trackers organization is contacted by the Queen of the United Kingdom, asking for help, and they soon find themselves working alongside James and Anna to save the world from being completely undone.

* The sequel, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/download-games/40384/detectives-united-ii-darkest-shrine-ce/index.html The Darkest Shrine]]'', brings the team in to stop a mysterious organization called S.H.R.I.N.E., which is using dark magic to summon monsters and destroy significant locations around the world. Their motives are unclear, but they have to be stopped.

* The third installment, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/games/14651/detectives-united-iii-timeless-voyage-ce/?pc Timeless Voyage]],'' picks up with the SequelHook from the second game's bonus chapter. Anna's dark copy from the alternate dimension breaks up the trio by sending them to different points in history, with directives to acquire certain artifacts. They have no choice but to play along since she's holding all of their futures hostage, even as they search for a way to stop her altogether.

* The fourth game, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/games/14848/detectives-united-phantoms-of-the-past-ce/ Phantoms of the Past]]'', splits up the heroes. Agent Brown has not returned from his latest case, and James and Anna must find out what's happened to him. The trail leads them to the placid town of Restville, where a mysterious mayor and streets lined with blue roses seem to be hiding something.

* The fifth game, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/games/18584/detectives-united-deadly-debt-ce/?pc Deadly Debt]]'', takes place not long after the previous case is concluded. Agent Brown has invented a device to help him locate sources of paranormal activity, and stumbles into a new mystery while following its lead. At the same time, James and Anna have separate visions about a soulless man with a violin and a woman begging for assistance in reviving her lost love at any cost. It'll take all of their combined abilities and skill to figure out how everything is connected, and how to stop it.

* The sixth game, ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/us/en/games/15845/detectives-united-beyond-time-ce/ Beyond Time]]'', finds the team receiving a strange package from an unknown sender. An otherworldly entity threatens to destroy all of humanity, and the agents have to race against the clock to stop a cosmic catastrophe.

* The seventh installment is ''[[https://www.bigfishgames.com/us/en/games/18720/detectives-united-anthology-part-1/?pc&lang=en Anthology, Part 1]]'', which is a collection of the first three games in the series. In addition to the three games which the fans already know and love, the installment includes a number of special extras, including new details about the characters and an interview with the creator.

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