Developer Her Interactive is known for consistently making high-quality adventure games—and is especially known for using the venerable Nancy Drew book series to create entertaining, challenging adventures suitable for both kids and adults alike. By contrast, new DS title, Nancy Drew: The Model Mysteries, brought to us by THQ and developer Awe Games, is an uninspired, poorly-made Nancy Drew adventure that could really use a strong dose of the Her Interactive magic.
Based on author Carolyn Keen's modern take on Nancy Drew, the Nancy Drew Model Mystery (book) Trilogy, the game follows Nancy as she helps her supermodel friend Syd prepare to marry dreamy reality TV star, Vic. The pre-wedding festivities suddenly go wrong when a mysterious villain starts sending notes to Syd, warning her not to go through with the wedding—or else. Nancy's immediately on the case and we help her investigate while marching through a series of pre-wedding dress fittings, photo shoots, parties and luncheons.
Now it might be taken for granted that the pure girliness of the game's schmaltzy subject matter is an automatic turnoff to male gamers or gamers over the age of 15. I might even agree with that if Her Interactive hadn't made a great adventure game—one that gamers of all ages and genders can enjoy—from a similar idea. Nancy Drew: The Haunting of Castle Malloy, while set in the middle of a wedding, offers up a humorous script, a compelling mystery to solve, a series of challenging puzzles and a wide array of gameplay activities to engage in. Model Mysteries on the other hand, trudges along, alternating between two lackluster main game modes: dialog and hidden object.
You start by engaging in fairly uninteresting, gossipy dialog with the other bridesmaids, the bride's mother and various wedding attendees, and are ultimately brought to a screen where you're allowed to ask three of them (you don't get to choose which) three additional questions. It's three questions and you're out—the game automatically moves you on when you're done, even if you choose the wrong questions to ask and don't gain anything useful from the interview. Sooner or later the talk stops though and Nancy will “investigate” a location in order to gather clues to the identity of the wedding stalker. This triggers the hidden object portion of the game, which while being about right difficulty-wise for kids under 12, will be too easy for anyone older than that.
At the end of each chapter, Nancy will have to accuse someone, according to the evidence she's gathered. What's frustrating about this is if you didn't gather enough info and pick the wrong suspect, you're forced to play the entire chapter over from the beginning. This could be Awe Games' questionable strategy for padding the game's length, which at most comes to a mere three hours, but the result is an extremely tedious kind of forced repetition. The only saving grace of the game is that while the gameplay is a wholesale disappointment, the graphics, especially the character portraits, are actually quite good—that is, if you can swallow the idea that Nancy Drew looks exactly like Hayden Panettiere.
In spite of the good graphics and the occasional seemingly pointless (and random) minigame thrown in for variety, Model Mysteries falls short both as an adventure and as a hidden object game. While the E10+ rating might be touted as the reason for the game's simplicity and brevity, that explanation feels well...like an excuse. At $19.99, you're paying roughly $6-10 an hour to play a game that just feels unfinished which is hardly a good entertainment value. If you've got $20 burning a hole in your pocket and you're looking for a good adventure, do yourself a favor—steer clear of Model Mysteries.
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Based on author Carolyn Keen's modern take on Nancy Drew, the Nancy Drew Model Mystery (book) Trilogy, the game follows Nancy as she helps her supermodel friend Syd prepare to marry dreamy reality TV star, Vic. The pre-wedding festivities suddenly go wrong when a mysterious villain starts sending notes to Syd, warning her not to go through with the wedding—or else. Nancy's immediately on the case and we help her investigate while marching through a series of pre-wedding dress fittings, photo shoots, parties and luncheons.
You start by engaging in fairly uninteresting, gossipy dialog with the other bridesmaids, the bride's mother and various wedding attendees, and are ultimately brought to a screen where you're allowed to ask three of them (you don't get to choose which) three additional questions. It's three questions and you're out—the game automatically moves you on when you're done, even if you choose the wrong questions to ask and don't gain anything useful from the interview. Sooner or later the talk stops though and Nancy will “investigate” a location in order to gather clues to the identity of the wedding stalker. This triggers the hidden object portion of the game, which while being about right difficulty-wise for kids under 12, will be too easy for anyone older than that.
At the end of each chapter, Nancy will have to accuse someone, according to the evidence she's gathered. What's frustrating about this is if you didn't gather enough info and pick the wrong suspect, you're forced to play the entire chapter over from the beginning. This could be Awe Games' questionable strategy for padding the game's length, which at most comes to a mere three hours, but the result is an extremely tedious kind of forced repetition. The only saving grace of the game is that while the gameplay is a wholesale disappointment, the graphics, especially the character portraits, are actually quite good—that is, if you can swallow the idea that Nancy Drew looks exactly like Hayden Panettiere.
In spite of the good graphics and the occasional seemingly pointless (and random) minigame thrown in for variety, Model Mysteries falls short both as an adventure and as a hidden object game. While the E10+ rating might be touted as the reason for the game's simplicity and brevity, that explanation feels well...like an excuse. At $19.99, you're paying roughly $6-10 an hour to play a game that just feels unfinished which is hardly a good entertainment value. If you've got $20 burning a hole in your pocket and you're looking for a good adventure, do yourself a favor—steer clear of Model Mysteries.
Note:- Be the first to get free full version download link for this game in your mail inbox Subscribe To Our Post Feeds.
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