Review Of Nancy Drew Secret Of The Old Clock Video Game

 

Release Date: July 2005
Owner: HER Interactive
Ages: 10 to Adult


Honestly, I don't think anyone under five would be interested in this game, because there are a lot of puzzles and things younger kids just wouldn't understand.  It might be kind of scary for the younger kids too. For instance there is a part where there is a dark tunnel that leads to another house and that could be scary for younger kids.  In this part Nancy gasp and asks, "what was that?"


I am playing Secret of The Old Clock on my PC. Overall, it is fun, but more for people who spend all day solving puzzles. There are some parts where you just watch, some parts that make your stomach lurch and you cling to your chair, (which all end up in FALSE ALARMS! I suggest Warnings At Waverly Academy and The Phantom Of Venice, some of the other Nancy Drew games, for those who get scared easily but that's besides the point!)


I like how the game took place in 1930, instead of the 21st century, because you get to use an old fashion pay phone, that's fun. Also, the characters are very interesting, especially Richard Topham. Not related to Sir Topham Hat in any way! He is a big phony clairvoyant, and he lives in Josiah Crowley's house, just across the bridge from the Lilac Inn.  The Lilac Inn is the restaurant and one of the main places in the game. Josiah Crowley was a nice old man who was great friends with Emily Crandall, a seventeen year old who recently was orphaned and lives at the Lilac Inn. Josiah Crowley promised Emily's mother before he died that he would leave them a lot of money.  Josiah Crowley was a weird man with many strange hobbies, like once he went to Emily's birthday party dressed as her aunt and she believed it was really her aunt.  Emily didn't find out until two days later that it was really Josiah Crowley.  Weird!


I did not like, however, that when you were driving in town, the screen showed a real - live picture from our actual world.  Or there was a black screen whenever Nancy was talking to a town character.  HER (HER Interactive Game Makers) could have made some of the townspeople visible.


Maybe that's a glitch in the game, or maybe the people who made the game did that purposely so they wouldn't have to make as many characters because that's a lot of data on the game. You never got to see what the townspeople looked like. I would rather see the people she was talking to.  

There was something else that I liked, the game makers put Rebecca from "Sunny Brook Farm" in this game.  That was funny. There are only four onscreen characters, Emily Crandall, Jane Willoughby, Richard Topham and Jim Archer.

The mini golf course built by Josiah Crowley was fun as well but very frustrating because the number of tries it took you to get in the hole.  For example if you got more than 30 points for your whole score then you would lose.  You had to stay under 30 points otherwise you would lose, and that wasn't easy to do.






That's my rating. 4 out of 5. About 90%. Not too bad. The older games are a lot worse. Sometimes there are only three onscreen characters, like in Ghost Dogs Of Moon Lake.

I also read the book "Secret of The Old Clock", and really enjoyed it.  This game is a mixture of "The Mystery At Lilac Inn" and "Secret of The Old Clock".

Here is a snippet of another Nancy Drew game enthusiast playing this game.  He's very funny to listen to.