|
HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
#1203498
12/03/19 07:44 PM
12/03/19 07:44 PM
|
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 49,974
near Yosemite
Marian
OP
Global Moderator
|
OP
Global Moderator
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 49,974
near Yosemite
|
Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem is now available to purchase from both HeR Interactive as well as Steam. Nancy Drew unexpectedly finds herself in Salem, Massachusetts investigating an arson on the Hathorne estate. The Hathorne House was originally constructed by Judge John Hathorne, inquisitor of the infamous Salem witch trials and the final home to 102-year-old Frances Tuttle, his last direct descendant. When Tuttle passed away, the estate became city property and while the mayor was seeking a manager to oversee the estate the home burst into flames. The ongoing investigation has turned up little evidence but concerned citizens have accused Mei Parry of arson and are pressuring the police to arrest the secretive teenager. As Nancy races to uncover the truth behind the arson, she discovers connections to the house’s past with the Salem trials and finds herself drawn into a struggle with supernatural events that she simply can’t explain. Nancy’s convictions are put to the test. Are the ghosts real? Has Salem’s dark history come to life, or is there someone else to blame? Time is short, and Nancy must find the answers before the clock strikes midnight.
Game Features:
Analyze clues with all new examinable 3D objects
Team up with the Hardy Boys
Learn and uncover the truth about the historical Salem witch trials
Explore expansive 3D environments and investigate with updated controls
Discover the plight of the accused witches
Take a tour of Salem and discern fact from fiction
Meet and interact with all over 10 diverse characters
Solve challenging 3D puzzles embedded into the story
Enjoy thrilling in-game cutscenes
Cook a New England favorite dish: Johnny Cakes
Explore an ancient cemetery and historic estate
Investigate with updated and modernized controls
Mix herbal potions and learn about ancient remedies
Solve multiple crimes including arson
Sleuth at Amateur or Master level and earn achievements Happy gaming! 
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: Marian]
#1203500
12/03/19 07:59 PM
12/03/19 07:59 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 83,960
In the Naughty Corner
BrownEyedTigre
The Sassy Admin and PR Liaison
|
The Sassy Admin and PR Liaison
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 83,960
In the Naughty Corner
|
Thanks, Marian! I hope that it was worth waiting for! Ana 
Don't feed the Trolls
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: Marian]
#1203594
12/04/19 10:06 PM
12/04/19 10:06 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 83,960
In the Naughty Corner
BrownEyedTigre
The Sassy Admin and PR Liaison
|
The Sassy Admin and PR Liaison
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 83,960
In the Naughty Corner
|
Thanks, family! Do you have a link?
Don't feed the Trolls
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: Marian]
#1203619
12/05/19 09:41 AM
12/05/19 09:41 AM
|
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 49,974
near Yosemite
Marian
OP
Global Moderator
|
OP
Global Moderator
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 49,974
near Yosemite
|
You did not make a mistake, family. Michael Gray has been livestreaming it and he finished yesterday. He did a blind playthrough. Here is where the livestream begins: Midnight in Salem He was a tester for part of the game and got his name in the credits this time, which is nice. Tally Ho, I am playing the game but have decided not to comment upon it until I have finished it.
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: Marian]
#1203700
12/05/19 09:08 PM
12/05/19 09:08 PM
|
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,033
Sweden
Mikael
Addicted Boomer
|
Addicted Boomer
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,033
Sweden
|
The game installed smoothly and starts up with an evocative still picture of an abandoned house in glorious 2560 x 1440 resolution on my Windows 10 monster machine.
From there it's downwards.
I try to refrain from being negative about games on forums like this, since I make games myself, but sometimes it can't be helped... I haven't played much yet, but this far, I'm thoroughly disappointed in every single aspect of the game.
After the silly and stilted prologue you're hastily thrown into to a room which is supposed to be scary. On screen, you always have the inventory plus Nancy's phone, which looks EXACTLY like a low-res icon from a late 1990's website. I was expecting full 3D movement, like in Real Myst or the Tex Murphy games. But you move in a node-based environment, much like in the earlier games. The only real difference from the earlier games is that the transitions are seamless. I don't think that this is a problem in itself, but the use of the 3D engine makes the screens look much worse than the (sometimes beautifully) individually rendered pictures in the earlier games.
I was a big fan of the first half of the Nancy Drew games (except for the first one). The second half was more centered around repetitive chores than the intelligent puzzles featured in the first half, and didn't really appeal to me. But say what you want about Her Interactive, one has to give them that they were able to put out two solid games every year until 2015. It's a total mystery why this took almost 5 years to make.
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: Marian]
#1203706
12/05/19 09:58 PM
12/05/19 09:58 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 83,960
In the Naughty Corner
BrownEyedTigre
The Sassy Admin and PR Liaison
|
The Sassy Admin and PR Liaison
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 83,960
In the Naughty Corner
|
Mikael, I appreciate your honesty. I too was a fan of the games and couldn't wait for the next release. They had such talented team members. I am not purchasing this one.
Don't feed the Trolls
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: dianne]
#1203715
12/06/19 12:36 AM
12/06/19 12:36 AM
|
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 34,987
United Kingdom
Mad
Sonic Boomer
|
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 34,987
United Kingdom
|
IF this new Nancy Drew production had stayed faithful to its original era and just taken advantage of the progress in gaming technology to portray it - and IF the "new proprietors" had been honest with the huge fan base they already had (waiting in anticipation) about all the changes and delays of the last few years, I might have been a teeny bit tempted to relent and purchase the game.
(Even though I hadn't been impressed by the monotony of those game padding chores that were incorporated in so many of the later releases 🙀)
But the more I saw and heard about the version we were going to be offered, the less enthusiastic I became.
I won't be buying it 👎
Time : The Most Precious Commodity
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: Marian]
#1203818
12/06/19 05:06 PM
12/06/19 05:06 PM
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 40,644
southeast USA
Jenny100
GB Reviewer Glitches Moderator
|
GB Reviewer Glitches Moderator
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 40,644
southeast USA
|
Arglefumph's first impressions (from after playing the game in the livestream) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4fi24KQxScI think he's too kind to it. J.B. Lewis gives his thoughts at the end of the last video of his playthrough https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4KFv1IlaCYFast forward to 24 minutes into the video to get past the end of the game. I had a bit of a laugh around 28:53 - 29:17 where he says "HerInteractive had a new CEO, Penny Millikin, who decided (it seems like) to take the company in a bit of a different direction and make more profit. This led to the development of the Codes and Clues app which was essentially a Nancy Drew game with microtransactions..." ...and right after he says "microtransactions" the music stops and you hear an ominous bang... +_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+ Locations lack the detail of previous Nancy Drew games -- not just in how things "look" but in how much you can interact with. There were lots of empty nodes where you couldn't really interact with anything and there wasn't much to see. Too much dialogue and not enough puzzles. One of the shorter Nancy Drew games -- strange considering one of the excuses they gave for moving to a 3D engine was to have longer games with more expansive environments. The new voice actress for Nancy sounds a lot better in the game than in the trailers. But she seems to have adopted many of Lani Minella's speech patterns for Nancy. Not that that's a bad thing for the customer, but it seems like Lani created the Nancy Drew voice and personality, and the new girl is just copying her.
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: Marian]
#1203831
12/06/19 06:15 PM
12/06/19 06:15 PM
|
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 49,974
near Yosemite
Marian
OP
Global Moderator
|
OP
Global Moderator
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 49,974
near Yosemite
|
As far as I know, Jenny hasn't played the game.
I also wanted to mention that initially I thought there was a problem with the lip syncing, but once I figured out the right settings for the game to make it run optimally on my system, it was much better than before. A lot of ND game fans are not used to having to mess with screen resolution, shadows, antialiasing, etc., and at least some of the complaints about lip syncing and lag would go away if they knew what the optimal settings would be for their computer (assuming their computer meets the system requirements).
The game is by no means technically perfect and in truth I see defects (some of them glaring) that definitely need fixing/improvement, but I just know that the complaints about game performance would be less numerous if people were running the game with the right settings.
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: oldbroad]
#1203838
12/06/19 07:29 PM
12/06/19 07:29 PM
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 40,644
southeast USA
Jenny100
GB Reviewer Glitches Moderator
|
GB Reviewer Glitches Moderator
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 40,644
southeast USA
|
Jenny, have you played the game or are all the observations you list from other people? I watched the playthroughs by Arglefumph and J.B. Lewis, then watched the comments/reviews they posted after finishing. All but one of the observations I listed were noted in one or both of their reviews/comments videos, but I agreed with those opinions. The comment about the new Nancy Drew voice actress and Lani was my own opinion, not theirs. I'm not a big fan of lengthy dialogue. I will play the game someday though, I assume. There were quite a few puzzles near the end of the game. But for most of the game there weren't as many puzzles as in other Nancy Drew games, and some of them are those you've seen 60 times before -- like the torn up note you have to reassemble, and the paper-clip-in-the-lock where you have to touch 5 tumblers in the right order and in the right way to get them to stay up. When I check out a playthrough of a game before purchase, I'll stop watching if I decide the game is something I want to play for myself. That wasn't the case here. Too much dialogue, not enough puzzles, and for a 3D game I expected larger environments. They could have done this game with their old 2D game engine and had more detail in it, and maybe more puzzles too.
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: oldbroad]
#1203844
12/06/19 08:09 PM
12/06/19 08:09 PM
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 40,644
southeast USA
Jenny100
GB Reviewer Glitches Moderator
|
GB Reviewer Glitches Moderator
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 40,644
southeast USA
|
Thanks for clarifying Jenny. I didn't think you had played it but then I wasn't sure. I did the cheap thing. I enjoy watching Let's Plays of games I've already played. But I also use them to decide if I want to play something. And sometimes I use them for How-To's (for example with games like The Council).
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: oldbroad]
#1203848
12/06/19 08:28 PM
12/06/19 08:28 PM
|
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 49,974
near Yosemite
Marian
OP
Global Moderator
|
OP
Global Moderator
Sonic Boomer
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 49,974
near Yosemite
|
Thanks for clarifying Jenny. I didn't think you had played it but then I wasn't sure.
Marian, I read something about the lip syncing and lag being fixed by some settings, maybe in some review I guess. I am one of those that doesn't care for too many setting options because I don't know what most of them do so I never know what settings to choose. It's not all that complicated. You can always ask for advice here if the way it runs seems suboptimal. You may not need to make any changes at all. My computer meets the system requirements including the video card, but my video card is outdated at this point, so I needed to make some changes.
|
|
|
Re: HeR Interactive releases Nancy Drew #33: Midnight in Salem
[Re: Marian]
#1203879
12/07/19 11:10 AM
12/07/19 11:10 AM
|
Joined: Jun 2010
Posts: 7,407
marietta,georgia
family
BAAG Specialist
|
BAAG Specialist
Joined: Jun 2010
Posts: 7,407
marietta,georgia
|
a bunch of us have not got our game, i am one of them, the fex man has it, when i call all i got was yesterday and today, they even went on little jackolope , blog about it, so the ones with enjoy, because i do not know when or if it will get here.
Last edited by family; 12/07/19 12:05 PM.
|
|
|
|
|
acebook
witter
