Remember, not too long ago, when practically everywhere you looked in the gaming world there were zombies?

Then steampunk started to appear. There might even be a couple of steampunk zombie games out there.

Recently, Mars has been popping up in various places. We’ve been taking on Mars, waking up Mars and reading Mars war logs.

Here we have Murder One: Mars, billed as a story-driven point-and-click murder mystery adventure game in space. Think: Poirot (or Agatha Christie) set in Downton Abbey (on Mars), written by Arthur C Clarke.

Murder One: Mars — actually the first of a planned trilogy from Keith Blyth and 4th Monkey Media — is currently in pre-production. Inspiration has come from such classics as Broken Sword, Grim Fandango and Beneath a Steel Sky. It’s being developed with the Unity engine.

The game will feature such classic adventure game elements as witty dialog, puzzles, exploration, dead bodies, red herrings and…of course…an English Edwardian Manor house on Mars.

As is obvious from the title, there has been a murder on Mars. Players will control two different characters who are sent to investigate.

The backdrop is one of contrasts: high-tech meets high society; droids in the drawing room. Also present are human foibles: greed, resentment, fear and lies. Secrets abound. Love is thrown in for good measure. And — dare I say it — a stretch goal is the addition of steampunk.  

A Kickstarter campaign for the game is in progress and will run until December 8, 2013.

Now all we need are some steampunk zombies on Mars.