that Nancy Drew is 75 years old! She sure doesn’t look it. I still remember
reading all the Nancy Drew books when I was young, with my favorites being The
Secret of the Old Clock, The Whispering Statue and The Mystery of the Ivory
Charm. My mom preferred The Hardy Boys, but I liked Nancy Drew much better. My
daughters also enjoyed reading them very much, even preferring the original
series over the more modern versions.
It’s also hard to believe
that Her Interactive has just published their 13th Nancy Drew
software title; it doesn’t seem that long ago since the first game was
released. The first Nancy Drew was an excellently designed game, and
the fact that it was targeted toward older kids and young teens, an often
neglected demographic, made it even more welcome. All of the Nancy Drew
games that have been published since have been quality products, with some
better than others, but on the whole the company has maintained the original
quality, with some small changes and improvements over the years.
Well, Nancy Drew finally
gets to receive help from her friends up close and personal, instead of only
over the phone – The Hardy Boys are here! Actually, it’s the Hardy boys’
adventure, as they have just invited Nancy along for the ride, but they’re
graciously allowing her to do most of the detective work, all the same.
Lori Girard, a rich
society girl with too much time on her hands, has assembled a party on a
mysterious old train, a la The Orient Express, western style. The original
owner of the train was an eccentric miner, who disappeared after supposedly
discovering a gold mine. Before he vanished, though, he left several hints and
clues as to the whereabouts of this mine on the train, and around towns he
visited. Lori thought it would be neat to have several “experts” help her
solve the mystery, so she has invited Joe and Frank Hardy in their roles as
amateur sleuths; Tino Balducci, a police detective; Charleena Purcell, a
romance writer who’s also an expert on American history; and John Grey, a
ghost-buster who has a TV show. The Hardy boys have invited Nancy Drew as
their guest, with Lori’s permission.
On the first evening,
Lori introduces herself at the dinner table. Suddenly, the train enters a
dark tunnel, the lights go out in the dining car and when the lights come back
on, she’s vanished. Everyone disperses, discussing this mysterious event.
Nancy and the Hardy boys decide to work together as a team to solve both
Lori’s disappearance, and the original mystery of the location of the gold
mine.
Joe and Frank Hardy have
decided to concentrate on the research side of the mystery, leaving all the
legwork to Nancy. She embarks on her investigation enthusiastically,
questioning the other guests and searching the train for clues. Before long,
she’s collected lots of clues and information, and it’s only a matter of time
before she solves the mystery once again.
As in previous Nancy
Drew Mystery games, this game is a point-and-click adventure game played
in the first-person mode. Nancy will collect clues and save them in her
inventory, gather information for her journal, and take pictures and phone
various people on her smart phone. The puzzles are a mixture of
inventory-based and manipulative conundrums, with a greater emphasis on
mechanical-type puzzles this time around, it seems. The Nancy Drew
games are very similar to each other, but the difficulty levels of the games
does tend to vary from game to game, and this latest title is one of the more
difficult to solve, with many of the puzzles requiring a good bit of thought,
as in the previous Secret of the Scarlet Hand and the Ghost Dogs of
Moon Lake. A lot of the puzzles depend on number and letter anagrams found
in cryptic clues, that are not overtly obvious to the connection between the
symbols. There are also manipulative puzzles, such as several pipe arrangement
ones. And, there are a few that seem to be of a trial-and-error type, a type
not usually found in Nancy Drew. However, they are not too difficult
or hard to solve.
As in the last several
Nancy Drew games, there are also mini-games that can be played over again
after serving their purpose to advance the game, but they’re not as much fun
as others have been. The first one is a simple arcade game that is easy to
play, and the next two are extremely simple games that require no skill or
thought whatsoever, although they look cool while playing. The fourth
mini-game, though, is a good one and is a logical puzzle that requires players
to jump marbles over other marbles, until there are no more moves left. Many
of the puzzles in the game are fun to play while solving, but can’t be played
again, unfortunately. One such game has Frank Hardy working as a short-order
cook, assembling hamburgers to order as per instructions on the orders. This
is an engaging activity, and would have been fun to continue playing.
There are also various
facts to learn about mining, semi-precious stones, and other historical
mentions. However, there’s not as much of this type of educational
information as is often presented in the Nancy Drew games. It would
have been neat to learn more about the history of doll making, for example, or
to learn more about the history of mining in the U.S.
Graphically, the game is
exactly like the other games, with the characters drawn in 3D against rich and
detailed backgrounds. Frank and Joe Hardy look just like what readers would
imagine them to look like, at least to this reader. The train is cool, and
moves and sounds like a real train.
As stated before, this
game is a bit more difficult than some of the Nancy Drew games, and the
whole tone of the game seems to be for the older set in the target age range
of 10-16 year olds. The dialogue is probably some of the best written in these
games yet, and is very entertaining. The humorous remarks from the Hardy boys
fit the conversational style of teens and young adults nicely and really make
the game fun. The puzzles are integrated into the puzzle logically, and serve
to make the game interesting. Having the story take place on a train is also a
great idea.
One important
technical note:
There is a common problem that crashes the game while playing the Taffey
Sorting puzzle, about halfway through the game. The game web site states that
this is often a problem with the specifications not being high enough, or with
drivers that need updating, but that wasn’t the case with my system, which met
all the requirements and I just had the graphic’s driver updated. There is a
patch for this activity, but it didn’t work for me. I ended up using another
temporary patch that bypasses this puzzle entirely, which worked and let me
continue the game. Be sure and save the game when the train arrives at Copper
Gorge, in case this happens. The patches can be downloaded from the
Her Interactive web site.
Nancy Drew: The Last
Train to Blue Moon Canyon
is a good adventure game for pre-teens and teens, and also most adults. Our
family is thoroughly enjoying it, and we rank this 13th Nancy Drew
entry as one of our favorites. The Hardy boys are cool characters, and sure
to appeal to everyone.
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Gameplay: 8
This game is a
lot of fun to play! The story is very interesting, with great dialogue and
engaging puzzles. However, the mini-game puzzles could have been better, and
there isn’t as much educational information presented as in previous games.
Still, we rank this Nancy Drew as one of the better ones in terms of
all-around presentation.
Graphics: 8
As always, the
graphics are pleasing and detailed.
Sound: 7
The sound and
music is pretty average.
Difficulty: Medium/Hard
All of the Nancy
Drew games have two difficulty levels, a Junior and Senior Detective. In the
Junior level, players will have a task list to help keep everything clear.
This is one of the more difficult games in the series on the whole.
Concept: 8
While this game
doesn’t deviate from the series, it does have an interesting, well-researched
story. The inclusion of the Hardy boys is great, too.
Overall: 8
A very good game
overall. It could have used more interesting mini-games for replayability, and
also more educational trivia, but the game itself is a hoot to play and will
involve the whole family in the mystery. Much better than the last game,
The Secret of the Old Clock.
