Review Nancy Drew: Mystery of the Clue Bender Society Developer: Gorilla Games Publisher: Majesco Genre: Adventure Release Date: September 2008 Platform: Review by Ray Ivey November 25, 2008		Buy this game at Trade for this game at:

I really wanted to like this game. The eternally plucky Nancy is a perfect subject for a game, and the Nintendo DS is becoming a viable alternative to the PC as a platform for graphic adventures.

But let’s just say that this awful mess of a game is no threat to the superb PC Nancy Drew series from HerInteractive.

The story starts out promisingly enough. Nancy receives a mysterious invitation to join “The Clue Bender Society,” a sort of benign version of the Illuminati. She shows up on a remote island (naturally) for the tests to see if she is worthy of joining this elite think tank. It turns out that the group’s headquarters is in a quirky mansion just full of puzzles that Nancy has to unravel.

So far, so good, right? I love puzzle houses. The two Safecracker games are among my favorite adventure games.

But, alas, the game foils the potential for fun at nearly every turn. The various tasks Nancy is given get bogged down by some truly sludgy game mechanics.

First up is the needlessly awful interface. The “exploring” in the game, which takes place on the upper screen, consists of clicking on predetermined waypoints that move you from screen to screen, with big exclamation points indicating items of interest. The arrow keys provide the movement. While this may sound convenient, it really makes movement in the game a rote and tedious experience. In other words, the game tries to give you the impression that you have freedom of movement, when you’re really on very tight rails.

The bottom screen contains various game elements that you interact with using the stylus and touch screen: inventory, maps, conversation topics, and puzzles.

Then there are the puzzles. The puzzles in the game are of only two varieties: those that are Insultingly Easy and those that are Irredeemably Opaque. Neither are fun. Oh, wait, I forgot a third type: the Numbingly Tedious. This type is exemplified by a series of “puzzle doors” that have combination locks. To open them you have to travel to four different consoles in four different hallways. So while you are grimacing at the childish music and struggling with the cumbersome game movement, you also get to enjoy dizziness from all the circling around to these damned consoles. Yay fun!

To break up the scintillating puzzle-solving fun, the game has snowmobile sequences which consist of . . . driving a snowmobile in a straight line. Real white-knuckle stuff.

Special mention must be made of the remarkably annoying game music, which loops about every sixteen bars and quickly forces you to simply turn the volume all the way off.

And let’s not forget the conversations with characters which play out exactly the same no matter how many times you visit them. As an added bonus, there’s no way to quickly skip through these conversations when you accidentally trip one of them into starting again. Suck-tastic!!

The final straw for me came when I was working on opening a puzzle box, an activity I usually relish in an adventure game. This puzzle had no clues, gave no feedback and eventually simply disappeared as I was working on it. I mean literally disappeared. No open box, no progression to the next bit in the story, just . . . no more box. Huh?

I have a question for the game execs at Gorilla Games: Have you ever heard of play testing? It’s difficult to imagine gamers of any age giving the designers positive feedback on any of the aspects of this game. What’s more likely is that the project was given a miniscule budget and schedule and they did the best they could with what they had and pushed the game out the door.

I recommend you do NOT push it into your Nintendo DS. Nancy Drew deserves better than this. If you liked this game, you might also enjoy lithium.

System Requirements:

• Nintendo DS and an incredibly forgiving attitude

This review is copyright Ray Ivey and Just Adventure and may not be republished elsewhere without the express written consent of the author. Republication of said review must also contain a link back to Just Adventure.