Reed Smart: AI Detective/An Ode to Deception

At the start of the case, Inga Wright enters the office after speaking to Detective Smart on phone about her case. She mentions her son, Rimes, a poetry fan whose poem made it to the finals of Birchwood School District's annual poetry contest. However, his poem got disqualified for being apparently written by AI. She gave him the poem, reading "I watched as Detective Smart silently read the poem. His eyes welled with tears.", and informed him about a celebration gala where the player can start their investigation.

At the gala court, Detective Smart suggests interviewing fast before "the soup arrives", and tasks the player to talk to the attendant in front of the entrance. The attendant cannot let them in because the gala is invitation-only. Dismayed, Detective Smart suggests either sneaking in through the vents or looking for an invitation in one of the pockets in the coat check room. Upon finding the invitation, the attendant allows them to enter, and Detective Smart advices to blend in.

Once there, the player has to interview the attendees of the gala and take pictures of any clues. Among the attendees is the school's literature teacher Kevin Sting, who complains about the difficulty of grading papers because of AI-generated work. This was tedious for him until he learned about AI detection software, but he has a hard time trying to find the best one. He mentions the AI in Education Conference that will take place this weekend, telling the player to find some flyers and giving them one.

Another attendee is Julie Bloom, the President of the Poetry Club who won the annual contest four times and became a top finalist for this year. When the player asks her about Rimes, she mishears it as "rhymes" before realizing it is the contestant and member of the club. She tells them that the last time she saw him is in the library, the place where the Poetry Club meets, before telling them to stop staring at her. As she told them, the player merely took a picture of her, which Detective Smart finds it can be useful.

Another is Alan Poh, a reluctant contestant whose parents forced him to participate to the contest, as well as every other club and activity they find as a means of boosting "internship". He finds it a joke because one thing important to him is his yo-yo practice, which he sees as his destiny. He then keeps training as long as his parents are distracted talking to the guests. When interviewing Mr. Poh, he argues that his activity forcing will make his son become an industry leader, but Mrs. Poh sees Alan's yo-yo training as key to computer programming.

Judge Rhinehalt then stops the player to answer their questions. She tells them that students all over the school upload their poems on the contest website, which are reviewed by a panel of judges. The top poems entered the finals. The next week, the announced winner will earn the Medal of Poetic Merit. In order to detect AI-written poems, the judges use experimental detection software. The player then returns to Detective Smart, who says it is time to arrange the clues on the case board, which include the finalists' family photos, a flyer for AI EDU, and Judge Rhinehalt's statement. Upon noticing gold flakes from Julie's medals on Detective Smart's hand, he suspects if he can find more clues at Julie's club and find out the truth about Rimes.

Upon arriving at the library, Detective Smart starts smelling the scent of books, before telling the player to ask the librarian Britta. The player asks her about the poetry club, but Britta informs them that the library hosts several poetry clubs. She could not recognize Julie's club until Detective Smart shows her the picture, which reveals that the club is called Birchwood School Poetry Club and holds meetings at one of the private meeting rooms. To find the room, Detective Smart suggests following a trail of gold flakes Julie left behind using the magnifying glass.

Upon entering the room, the player must investigate the clues, including Julie's gold-covered comic book "Professor Z: AI Technomancer!", which Detective Smart speculates could be an inspiration for Julie's poetry. Another is a book titled "Potentially Kinetic: A Yo-Yo Story" which allegedly belongs to Alan, as well as a bunch of books. On the desk is the club's computer which compiles the finalists' poems in the folder Final Submissions: An Ode to a Toad by Julie, All Wound Up by Alan, and The Whisper in my Heart by Rimes. It also includes a roll call attendance sheet for the club, as well as a trash folder full of Alan's failed yo-yo poem drafts, including a poem reading "Yo-yos are red - Yo-yos are blue - Yo-yos are rad - Yo-no that it's true!". Feeling suspicious while comparing the drafts to Alan's All Wound Up, Detective Smart suggests printing all clues the player investigated and bringing the evidence to the office. Afterward, he suggests going to the AI for Education Conference if the poems are really AI-generated.

Prior to their arrival to the conference, Detective Smart tells the player that he made an AI-generated poem of his named A Slender Reed for comparing reasons. He then finds the opportunity to talk to AI detection specialist Dr. Sarah Bellem, whose lecture just ended. While talking to her, Detective Smart informs her that he and the player are here to investigate about whether their four poems are AI-written. Although she likes a "good mystery", she laments that AI-generated content can no longer be distinguished from "real" ones, and even mentions that AI detection software have their issues, emphasizing cross-checking and critical thinking. Upon learning about these, Detective Smart asks her to read the finalists' poems. At Alan's poem, she begins to worry that the content could be AI-generated while Rimes' seems the opposite, although she is unsure of Julie's. Because she is in a hurry for another lecture, Sarah suggests Detective Smart to use the AI detection programs at the exhibit hall downstairs.

There, the player meets Kevin Sting from the gala, who feels excited yet skeptical about the AI detection software. To find out, Detective Smart tasks the player to test the poems on the three AI models in the hall, which results in the following:

Upon their investigation, Detective Smart finds out that Rainbow Analytics is close to Dr. Bellem's opinion while POH-TEC Systems is the opposite. He then noted that the school might be using the latter to detect AI-written poems, and told the player that its representative is in a hurry for a meeting in the office, hence his rude personality. As the player takes a picture of the meeting beyond the window, they accidentally ruin Alan's yo-yo trick. Upon realizing that they are Detective Smart's co-worker, he soon realizes that the player is also reluctant to go to the conference, and he says that his parents forced him to work at POH-TEC Systems.

Seeing the picture, Detective Smart notices Judge Rhinehalt in the meeting, and suspects if the school really uses the POH-TEC Systems software to disqualify The Whisper in my Heart. He also notices that the representative of the software company is actually Alan's father, who might have tampered his own software for his son's profit. The player then must search for clues at the company's booth to look for any clues, including a letter by the judge requesting a demonstration copy of the software, reading:

While interviewing Kevin Sting, he soon becomes disappointed about how unreliable these AI detection software are, which Detective Smart agrees with. Back at the office, the player must arrange the clues on the case board.

At the end of the case, Detective Smart is now sure that Rimes is falsely accused of having written an AI-generated poem, and that the school district is using POH-TEC Systems to review the poems. He also notices that Alan's poem is strangely excempt from the criteria for AI generation and, with the help of the player, he ties it to the drafts that are entirely unrelated to the final work.

Both then gather alk the people they met: the contestants, their family, Judge Rhinehalt, and Dr. Bellem. Detective Smart explains the events to them and how Rimes was accused. Judge Rhinehalt then affirms that she used POH-TEC Systems to filter AI-generated poems, and that she did not ask an expert like Dr. Bellel first. Because of this, Alan proves he tampered the code of his father's software to qualify his poem, and he never intended to disqualify Rimes'. To celebrate it, Detective Smart composes a poem of his, much to Rimes' astonishment.