Product Details
 | Nancy Drew: Warnings at Waverly Academy |
| List Price: | $19.99 |
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Product Description
You, as Nancy Drew, are undercover at a prestigious girls' boarding school to discover the culprit behind threatening notes and dangerous accidents aimed at its valedictorian candidates! Is there a secret someone wants to protect or are the malicious pranks intended to scare away the competition - permanently? Solve the mystery before the threats turn deadly and you're expelled from the case!Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #1750 in Video Games
- Brand: Her Interactive
- Model: WAC game
- Released on: 2009-10-13
- ESRB Rating: Everyone
- Platforms: Windows Vista, Windows XP
- Format: CD-ROM
- Dimensions: .30 pounds
Features
- Features young sleuth Nancy Drew as she goes undercover at a top boarding school
- Help Nancy discover who has been threatening the academy's valedictorian candidates
- Blend in with typical high-school student behavior: text your friends, cram for projects and become familiar with social cliques
- Run the school snack bar and play air hockey in the student lounge to incorporate yourself on campus
- Jr. and Sr. difficulty settings offer different levels of challenge
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
Product Description
Threatening notes and dangerous accidents
plague the valedictorian candidates at a prestigious boarding school.
Suddenly the rumors start flying, and no one can tell the difference
between fact and fiction. Does someone want to knock these students out
of contention for top honors? What secret could the culprit be trying to
protect? No one knows for sure, but thankfully, Nancy Drew's here to
figure it out. Join her as she goes undercover to find out who's behind
these strange occurrences.
In Warnings at Waverly Academy, it's up to you and Nancy Drew to blend
in with the student body. Cram for projects, navigate social cliques and
text your new friends just like every other high-school student. When
no one's around, sneak through the dorm rooms and take pictures of
possible evidence with your cell phone camera. Become part of the scene
by running the school snack bar and playing air hockey in the student
lounge. Can you crack the case before the threats begin to turn deadly?Key
Game Features:
|
|
  | Synopsis |
- Features young sleuth Nancy Drew as she goes undercover at a top boarding school
- Help Nancy discover who has been threatening the academy's valedictorian candidates
- Blend in with typical high-school student behavior: text your friends, cram for projects and become familiar with social cliques
- Run the school snack bar and play air hockey in the student lounge to incorporate yourself on campus
- Jr. and Sr. difficulty settings offer different levels of challenge
- Returns you to the point immediately before you make a mistake so you don't have to start over from the beginning
- Windows XP/Vista, DirectX 9
- CPU 1 GHz, 256 RAM
- 32MB DirectX 9.0 video card
- 1 GB of free HDD space
- CD-ROM 24x
Customer Reviews
A Solid Installment
After being sorely
disappointed by the previous installment in HER's usually fun Nancy Drew
series, I admit I was a bit apprehensive about this one. Happily,
however, I thoroughly enjoyed this solid game.
Set at a girls'
boarding school, Warnings at Waverly Academy offers a well-thought out
plot centered around a mysterious series of threatening notes. As the
story develops, it weaves both the fictitious history of the school as
well as the real history of an American literary figure into a much more
complex storyline than you might expect from the initial premise.
There's a particularly clever twist that comes just when you think
you've got it all figured out, and while you've probably pegged the bad
guy--or girl, since Ned's the only male voice in this one--by the end,
it's not a "well, duh," kind of solution.
Practically all of
Nancy's tasks are seamlessly integrated into the storyline, making even
the usually somewhat tedious chores such as cooking feel important to
the advancement of the game. I found the game immensely less difficult
than some other recent ones--I'm looking at you, Ransom of the Seven
Ships--and although some of the puzzles were head-scratchers, none were
so baffling to drive me to online hints. There's also a nice diversity
of tasks: some visual, some logical, some skill-based.
The
archetypal characters at the school are distinctive and interesting,
with what come across as actual personalities and motivations--which is
good, because there are quite a few of them, another welcome change from
the last game. The addition of texting made the story feel very
contemporary and real. Although the setting was fairly limited with
little exploration available, the graphics were nicely rendered and the
music quite pleasant.
So what are the downsides? The world of the
game isn't as deep as it could have been, with few locale additions as
the story progresses; equally, the game isn't perhaps as long as some
others, although it's certainly not the shortest, either. Suspense or
even a sense of foreboding is distinctly lacking. Nancy's perils involve
demerits rather than actual danger most of the time. And the nature of
the storyline seems to dictate the audience for this game to a degree:
girls and young women will probably appreciate the characters and school
life aspects much more than would some older players. For some, too,
the puzzles are probably too easy. Those caveats aside, I recommend this
games wholeheartedly for the ND player more interested in plot than in
puzzles and in secrets than in secret passages.
Suspicious Students, Threatening Notes, & A
Thrilling Mystery Await At Waverly Academy!
Nancy Drew 21: Warnings At
Waverly Academy
-Before I Begin...
My review will be spilt up
into sections and have a in-depth look at that topic. If you hate
reading medium/long reviews or just don't have the patience I would not
continue reading, but if you want to learn the most about the product
before you buy it you'll continue.
-Interface
The interface is
just the same as Ransom Of The Seven Ships and the other newer games.
Just point in the direction you want to go in and click basically. There
is a new icon though that is special to this game, that is the Phone
icon. The Phone icon lets you go onto Nancy's phone to make calls, take
pictures, get text messages, change the time in the game, and change the
settings (background and message tone). I really liked the cell phone
feature of this game because it has been missing from the games for a
while (last seen in Legend Of The Crystal Skull and it only let you call
people). It's a lot of fun to take pictures and change the background
of the phone too.
*****
-Plot
The plot surrounds the
"Black Cat", a person who is sending threatening notes to valedictorian
candidates and even causing them to leave the school by way of "freakish
accidents". The most recent victims were either sent to the hospital
because of an allergic reaction or locked up in a closet in the dead of
night. I loved this plot because it was somewhat scary and it even tied
in with some history of Waverly Academy and a real-life famous poet. I
found the plot pretty straightforward yet very intriguing because there
is a couple plot twists that add even more oomph. I really liked that
there was basically one mission: find out who the "Black Cat" is! I just
loved this plot a lot!
*****
-Characters
If you played
Ransom Of The Seven Ships, you may have been extremely disappointed with
the amount of characters/suspects there was. Well if you were
disappointed then, you won't be with this game! There are five
characters in this game, each with very different personalities. There
is a goth girl, a straight-A outcast/nerd, a shy girl, a sporty
determined girl, and the conceited gossip girl. You'll definitely have
fun meeting all of them and hearing what they have to say about each
other. I loved that there were so many characters! There was also a
couple minor characters that you don't "see" that were cool too.
Warnings At Waverly Academy basically makes up for all the lack of
characters in Ransom Of The Seven Ships. There was a lot of interaction
with the characters too, so it wasn't just like having one conversation
in the beginning of the game and then not having anything else to say to
them at all. I really enjoyed the characters and it has definitely been
a step up from the character interaction from previous games like
Haunting Of Castle Malloy or Legend Of The Crystal Skull.
*****
-Setting
& Graphics
The graphics never seem to be a problem with the
Nancy Drew games. And this game is no exception because the graphics are
absolutely breathtaking. I loved the fact that the dorm was in an old
mansion-like hall. There is a lot of places to go in the game. There is a
library, rec room, and a whole bunch of dorm rooms to explore. Also
there are some outdoor places like the big oak tree and the cellar. One
thing I didn't like is that the setting was confined to just one
building and sparse outdoor settings. I understand the game would need
more memory to have more buildings but I would have liked to maybe go to
a couple more classrooms (there is one in Ramsey Hall). Also the dorm
rooms were really cool but there is not very many "angles" per say. I
would have liked to do a 360 pan in each of the dorm rooms. Otherwise I
really liked the way they designed Ramsey Hall and it is really pretty
outside when it snows in the game (yes it does snow in the game!). You
won't necessarily feel confined, but I did wish the game had at least
one other building.
****
-Puzzles/Activities
Ransom Of The
Seven Ships was definitely a game for those who love puzzles, this game
is more revolved around the plot. The puzzles in this game were pretty
moderate, none were as challenging as Ransom Of The Seven Ships. There
was plenty of variety though which I enjoyed. You also got to do some
fun stuff too like play air hockey, darts, and run the snack shop for
merits. Speaking of merits, you could also get plenty of demerits. You
can get caught being up after curfew, pulling the fire alarm, sneaking
into people's rooms, climbing trees and etc. It's really fun to get
demerits, but if you get 15 or more you get expelled. Another thing I
liked was the use of Nancy's cell phone. A couple activities required
you to go around and take pictures of things/people for the school
website and you also get text messages concerning gossip. I found myself
constantly wanting to run the snack shop because while you are working,
some of the girls start chattering and their conversations are quite
funny. Overall, you will have a lot of fun completing the puzzles and
activities in the game even if they are not particularly challenging.
*****
-Ending
One
disappointment of this game was the ending! I really didn't want the
game to end because I was having so much fun! The problem with the
ending is that it came kind of unexpectedly. The ending puzzles were
pretty suspenseful though which was a great. Also the wrap-up/motive was
really interesting and made sense. Although I didn't like that the
ending came unexpectedly/abruptly, I did enjoy it and found the
resolution to tie the game up nicely.
****
-Overall
I know
that many people were disappointed with Ransom Of The Seven Ships, but
this game kind of balances out Ransom. Warnings At Waverly Academy is
solely surrounded by the plot and its characters while Ransom is more
centered on its puzzles and setting. So if you had to pick only one to
buy, I would base it on whether you are a puzzle junkie or like
interacting with characters more. I really enjoyed this game just as
much as I enjoyed Ransom. I just liked that they are totally different
from each other so playing both of them makes me happy. Warnings has
been a step up in a lot of areas like character interaction, plot and
scariness. This game wasn't extremely scary, but it did have me curious
and engaged. If you played this game on Halloween night you wouldn't be
too scared at all (I would recommend Curse Of Blackmoor Manor, Legend Of
The Crystal Skull or Ghost Dogs Of Moon Lake if you want scary). This
game was definitely one of my top favorites, maybe even my number one
because I just loved the setting and characters. I fully recommend this
game to all mystery fans (although it may appeal more to girls because
it takes place at an all girls boarding school) because it is a great
mystery adventure game. It is definitely worth the $20! The next case
will come out summer of 2010, Nancy Drew 22: Trail Of The Twister!
Add
all these up and divide by 6...
5 *'s (Interface)
5 *'s (Plot)
5
*'s (Characters)
4 *'s (Setting & Graphics)
5 *'s
(Puzzles/Activites)
4 *'s (Ending)
= 28 Stars Divide By 6
(Categories) = 4.6 = Rounded to 5 Stars
-Recommended Games
Ransom
Of The Seven Ships (See my review of this game)
The Phantom Of
Venice (See my review of this game)
Danger On Deception Island
Last
Train To Blue Moon Canyon (See my review of this game)
Thanks
for reading my review!
Better than
the last game, but has some bugs
I've played all the games in
this series and some have been better than others, but I disliked the
last game (Ransom) so much that I almost didn't buy Waverly. This was a
much more enjoyable game, but I had some problems with it. Like a
previous reviewer, I got stuck at the Rachel/photo part of the game.
Reading through the Her Interactive message boards, MANY players got
stuck here. There were a number of hints listed in the message boards
for how to get out of this part of the game, things totally unrelated to
what I was being told to do in the game (I was being told in the game
that I had made a mistake on a task and had to redo it, but that wasn't
the case). In my case, none of the hints worked and I had to restart my
game. Then towards the end, my game crashed completely and I had to
start from an older saved version.
This brought back memories of
one of the earlier games (Stay Tuned for Danger?), where there was a bug
in the game that if you didn't get a pair of pliers out of a room at a
certain point, you'd be stuck and unable to progress. I liked the
boarding school setting of this game, but the frustration of having to
restart my game is keeping me from giving it more than 3 stars. Maybe
Her Interactive rushed this one out a bit too fast.
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