cracker24's Full Review: Nancy Drew: Message in a Haunted Mansion for Windo...
Message in a Haunted Mansion is the 3rd in this series by Her Interactive based on the hit book featuring a young girl detective, Nancy Drew. Nancy Drew is invited by her housekeepers friend Rose to help in the renovation of a Victorian mansion.
In the beginning players are given the option of playing at the Jr. level with hints or at the Senior level which is more difficult. There is also a tutorial for those new to interactive gaming to explain the interface.
The graphics are very well done. Ornate to be more precise, there are family photos hung in various rooms throughout the game. The game also uses quite a bit of Victorian themed furniture as well as Chinese decor which helps to solve some of the more difficult puzzles later on. Music was exceptional and the creepy overtones as the danger escalated made you feel like you were a part of the game itself. The voices seemed to fit the characters they were portraying and the characters themselves seemed more like dolls than animated characters. Throughout the storyline, at various intervals Nancy heard women crying, floors creaked and even witnessed her very own ghost like figure during a seance performed by one of the characters. I found the special effects to be very believable when staring out at one of the characters from a secret pasage.
Nancy starts off with a fairly simple task in the beginning that was basically to put a tile puzzle together. As she progressed through the adventure, puzzles became a bit more complicated and often involved calling Bess and George, her childhood friends, Hannah, her housekeeper, and a journalist friend of hers to help her with various hints.
While there, Nancy witnessed some very unsettling events which caused some to think the house was haunted. In addition to the hauntings, there were rumors of buried treasure hidden somewhere in the mansion. For someone who was there to help renovate the house. She didnt do very much in the way of renovation and the majority of the time she went to speak to the main character Rose. Rose had nothing new for her to do. There were 3 other main characters or suspects. First, Charlie, the handyman who was doing the repairs on the house always stayed downstairs in the basement. Abby and Louis the other two suspects weren't always easy to track down. Abby is the free-spirited business partner who performed a seance to try and make peace with the spirits in the house. The final suspect in this game was Louis. Louis was an antiques dealer who happened to show up and was giving advice on proper restoration techniques befitting the Victorian mansion.
I have to say in this particular game I got lost quite a bit even with only 7 real rooms and the various trapdoors and secret passageways etc. Unlike previous games, the entire adventure takes place at one location which I didn't really like. I was honestly surprised at how many doors/rooms there were that were not open to exploration.
While everyone of the suspects had an okay motive, only one really stuck out in my mind and at the end of it all it came down to them or me.
Puzzles involved such things as spelling out words on bannister, to playing a song on the piano so your clue would fall out, find out combinations to various things to get to the next step etc.
One thing I didn't like in addition to the one location was that Nancy's journal was kept upstairs. It was annoying to constantly to go back and forth to read it, whereas in the newer version she has it with her at all times.
As with the earlier games if you screw up, you can start back over where you messed up. I did this a couple times as I got sent packing for not following directions, being careful, etc.
I hate to post too much detail about the game itself as I don't want to spoil it for anyone.
You, as Nancy Drew, are invited by a friend to San Francisco to assist in the renovation of a Victorian mansion. But, there are other uninvited guests...More at BargainStation.com
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