Windows

Nancy Drew: The Haunted Carousel

The tightness of the game’s construction, plot and location mean that the game is pretty short. This is not a complaint. Nancy Drew books aren’t long, and it wouldn’t make sense for the games to be epics, either. Modesty becomes Nancy Drew. Indeed, the compactness of the game even adds a welcome sense of urgency and immediacy. You really feel like you’re Nancy, rolling up your sleeves and getting to the bottom of things without any nonsense.

You just can't keep a good girl down! That indefatigable sleuth, Nancy Drew, is on the case again, this time at an amusement park. There've been some mysterious goings-on (aren't there always?) with some of the rides, and the park has had to be shut down. The owner is a friend of Nancy's father, and Nancy has agreed to put her detective skills to work and find out what's behind all the shenanigans.

The Haunted Carousel is not as difficult as some other mystery adventure games, but the in-depth gameplay is fun, challenging and highly entertaining nonetheless. The graphics are quite good and the maps are easy to navigate. Ambient background music completes the scenes nicely. The game feels like an old episode of Scooby Doo, without the annoying "Zoinks!" and Scooby-snacks. Nancy Drew: The Haunted Carousel is sure to please fans of the series as well as those players new to the Nancy Drew sagas.

As a $20 find, of course our flame-tressed friend takes the cake. Nancy is always a good way to spend the evening hours with a little girl who loves to solve a mystery.

This is Nancy's 8th pc adventure, and it's been a while since I played one. After playing a few, I thought they were a bit much the same, and so left them to my daughters. However I was looking for a light outing, and this one caught my eye. The break obviously worked. The Haunted Carousel is still essentially more of the same, but I am pleased to say that I enjoyed an afternoon sleuthing with Nancy.

So how did they do? In short, they did well. The graphics, characters, game play, innovations and ambiance all added up to a captivating time with my favorite girl sleuth. There were a few items that I thought could have been left out or improved – but nothing that gave me real pause.

I feel that the main issue people will have when deciding whether or not to pick up the game is the playtime. The game box touts 20+ hours of gameplay; for their target audience of preteen girls, I am sure this is true, but experienced gamers will finish it in significantly less time. Aside from that though, this game was still very enjoyable to play and I look forward to what improvements they may make to this series in the future.